Like a splash of cold water in the face, Aquaman has arrived.
And though it's great, it's also a little confusing, jammed with a century's worth of
undersea exposition.
Don't worry, though, we're here to help you keep track of all those lost tribes and strange
artifacts.
So grab your life preserver, because here's a spoiler-filled explanation of the ending
of Aquaman.
Arthur and Mera's search for the legendary lost trident of King Atlan took them to some
exotic locales, but none were more unexpected than the center of the Earth itself.
But longtime comic book fans know that if there's one place you should always expect
the unexpected, it's the land of Skartaris.
See, in the 1970s DC Comics series The Warlord, it was revealed that Skartaris is a prehistoric
jungle world accessible through portals that connect it to Earth, and after the destruction
of Atlantis, a band of refugees traveled through one of these portals to Skartaris and founded
New Atlantis.
Though Aquaman didn't run into any of the citizens of New Atlantis during his brief
time on the other side of the portal, it would make sense if the final resting place of Atlan's
trident was actually Skartaris, as it would explain the fate of the "missing tribe" which
opens the door to a whole new world of adventure, quite literally.
Once Arthur finally got his hands on Atlan's trident, fans got to see an incredibly confusing
sequence where it seemingly lit up the nervous systems of a bunch of random sea creatures.
There was no concrete explanation as to what was actually happening, leaving viewers to
wonder just what exactly this mythical rident actually does other than spark up what appeared
to be a bonus level from Tetris Effect.
Earlier in the film, it's said that the trident gave Atlan command of the seas.
The prevailing theory is that the trident essentially enhanced Aquaman's natural ability
to communicate with sea-life, amplifying it to the point where he could exert his will
and actually control it.
That would explain how he was able to command the karathen, as well as the shark mounts
used by King Orm's forces.
It even seemed to extend to the trench-dwelling Atlantean descendants who had devolved back
into a more monstrous form.
You have to hand it to Princess Mera.
Not only did she save Atlantis, and the surface world as well, she also managed to free herself
from an unwanted political marriage by replacing the ambitious and scheming Prince Orm with
the much more suggestible and, well, kinda dumber Arthur.
It was a brilliant maneuver from the real power behind the throne.
"Let's just say, you do your best thinking when you're not thinking at all."
"That was the worst pep-talk.
Ever."
And Arthur is going to need Mera's political acumen, because he is way out of his depth,
no pun intended.
So far, it doesn't seem like he's even heard the word "diplomacy."
Sure, a lot was made of Aquaman's unique ability to bring the surface world and Atlantis together.
But you have to be able to do more than talk to fish to get that done, you have to talk
to people.
And so far, that doesn't really seem to be his strong suit.
Did anybody really think Black Manta was dead just because his head exploded and he fell
hundreds of feet into the angry ocean, bouncing off every single outcropping of rock in Italy
on the way down?
Of course not!
Considering the lengths to which director James Wan went to in order to shoehorn Manta
and his origin story into a film that didn't need him, there's no way he was going to be
written out that easily.
So what can fans expect from Manta in future Aquaman films?
Well, comic book readers have a pretty good idea, and it ain't pretty.
Way back in the 1970s, Black Manta was at the center of one of the most shocking storylines
in comics history, as he finally got his revenge on Aquaman by murdering Arthur and Mera's
infant son.
We're not sure a sequel will get quite that dark, but Aquaman's dad is still alive, and
would seem like a ripe target for Manta's vengeance… especially since the mid-credits
scene showed Manta teamed up with Atlantis-obsessed researcher Stephen Shin.
In the comics, Shin was a friend of Aquaman's dad who betrayed them both to satisfy his
compulsion to find the location of Atlantis.
So will things play out similarly in the movies?
With Black Manta and Dr. Shin working together, not to mention the continued danger of Prince
Orm and the existence of Skartaris, one thing is for sure: Aquaman 2 will have no shortage
of plotlines to choose from.
Besides giving him the ability to command the creatures of the sea, the trident of Atlan
was also supposed to serve as the ultimate trump card, granting Arthur the title of King
of Atlantis.
Yet, when he showed up with the trident to try and stop the Atlantean civil war, surprisingly
few people on either side of the battle seemed to actually notice or care, at least at first.
It's clear that his goal of uniting the seven tribes of Atlantis is going to take a whole
lot more work than just raising aloft the underwater equivalent of Excalibur.
As a wise man once said:
"Supreme executive power derives from a mandate from the masses, not from some farcical aquatic
ceremony."
Becoming king isn't the end of Arthur's work: it's just the beginning, magic trident or
no magic trident.