Aquaman's Modernized Look In Batman v Superman

     When it was first confirmed that Aquaman would be appearing in Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice and that Jason Momoa would be playing the King of Atlantis, many were expecting a very different take on the iconic character. Director Zach Snyder had been hyping him up for months, trying to convince everyone that he is a badass and he would make sure that he is just that in the movie.

     This first look did not disappoint. I'll admit, I'm not as familiar with Aquaman as I am with, say, Batman, Spider-man, or Captain America, but I knew enough to know that this was pretty different from the Aquaman who was blond, wore green tights, and sported orange fish scales. But I wasn't expecting that, and Snyder would have been crazy to include that version of the character if he wanted to prove fanboys who said that Aquaman was lame that they were wrong.

     The first thing that came to my mind when I saw it was, Dang, he looks powerful. He looks like he has authority and he is respected. Momoa recently hinted that Aquaman would have tribal tattoos on himself. And boy, does he ever. The tattoos on his left arm look like they match up with the designs of the armor over his right arm and pay homage to his scaly shirt... or armor, whatever you want to call it, in the comics. The leather harness across his chest looks like it will hold his trident, which looks like it has 5 prongs on it instead of 3, so I guess it's not a trident. Regardless, it looks pretty cool.

                                                 

     It definitely seems like Snyder's take on the character is inspired by the 90s version of Aquaman, pictured above, though it doesn't look like Momoa will be getting a hook on his hand (yet). They both have the armor on one arm, and both have the long hair and beard. Also, you can see on both of their belts that there is the A symbol on it, which should please comic fans. But what is important, in my opinion in differentiating the DC Cinematic Universe's Aquaman from the one in the comics, is that this guy looks scary. Can you imagine going snorkeling and seeing him swimming around? I would not want to run into him; he looks like he is pissed.

     If the rumors are true about Aquaman emerging from the depths because Zod's World Engine affected the fish, then I would not want to be the Man of Steel, and Zod should be happy that he is dead. I'm sure that this new look will anger fans who have been following the character for years, but if there is one thing that I have learned from comic book movies, it's that you have to be flexible when it comes to some of the crazier and larger than life characters. You have to modernize these characters if audiences are going to take them seriously. Thank gosh Arrow doesn't wear a cute little hat and green spandex!

     Last thing, that caption, Unite the Seven; what do you think it means? Maybe it is referring to seven Justice League members, in that case, we should be expecting 6 more posters, hopefully showcasing a new look at Superman, another picture of Wonder Woman, a colored photo of the new Batsuit, Ray Fisher's Cyborg, Ezra Miller's Flash (who I am really interested to see) and possibly Green Lantern. Or is it referring to the seven seas? I honestly do not know, but it is certainly exciting. Hopefully more will be revealed in a trailer that should be soon approaching...

     

Looking back at The Amazing Spider-man franchise

     After the failure of Sam Raimi's Spider-man 3, many of us weren't expecting a Spider-man reboot after 5 years. It seemed too soon; Zach Snyder's Man of Steel hit theaters 7 years after the awful 2006 Superman Returns, and Christopher Nolan's Batman Begins flew in 8 years after... that other Batman film. Rebooting Spider-man after 5 years seemed like a bit of a stretch.

     I'll never forget seeing the July 2011 cover of Entertainment Weekly with Andrew Garfield on the cover with the new Spider-man costume. It was bright blue! It had an awesome logo! It was different! Actually, I was at my friend's house when I saw it, so I asked his mom if I could take it home. I still have it. So, in preparation for it, I watched all the Spider-man cartoons (Spectacular Spider-man by far being my favorite) and read all of the Ultimate Spider-man comics. 2012 was going to be the most epic year of super hero films to date, with The Avengers finally assembling for the first time, Christopher Nolan's final chapter in his Dark Knight Trilogy with The Dark Knight Rises, and, starting fresh with a new universe, new actors, and new villains, The Amazing Spider-man. Now we look back at 2012 and think, Pfft, pretty soon, we will be seeing like 6 superhero films per year! But nevertheless, 2012 was a defining year for superhero movies. 

     I actually really liked The Amazing Spider-man. I loved how Peter Parker was back in high school, and the movie ended with a bunch of mysteries to be solved in future installments. So 2013 came along, with 4 new movies. In my opinion, this was a very weak year. Iron Man 3 was not a great film, (yes, I am one of the haters, not just because of the Mandarin) Man of Steel was OK, The Wolverine was the highlight of of the summer, and Thor: The Dark World was decent. But I kept paying attention to The Amazing Spider-man 2. I was ecstatic when I first saw that Jamie Foxx's Electro would be blue, just like the Ultimate version, I was excited to see the Rhino, and the set photos coming out made me so anxious to see the movie.

     Then, rumors were swirling that the Green Goblin would show up. There were reports that Harry Osborn would be the Goblin, and there were all these descriptions of his costume, and I just couldn't wait. It was during 2013 that I discovered a guy on Youtube named SevenWebHeads. He just might be the most passionate Spider-man fan I have ever heard. He provided great insight on these rumors and set photos. His energy came over to me. Heck, I even found myself trying to make web-shooters.

     The year The Amazing Spider-man 2 came out was my first year of high school. The very first trailer came out sometime in December, and I was pretty disappointed to say the least. The Rhino was just a tank with a horn. The Green Goblin, who was obviously Dane DeHaan, looked like Billy Idol with a suit that looked like random pieces of metal put together and flying on a glider. I wasn't happy. So pretty soon, another trailer came out, on Super Bowl Sunday. It was a short thirty second teaser, so after the game, I go online to analyze it. It was an extended 3 minute trailer. So new trailers kept coming out, along with new photos. And by the time May came around, I pretty much knew what would happen. The marketing for the movie simply revealed too much.

     The only unanswered questions that remained were: Will Gwen Stacy die? How many hints will we get for the Sinister Six? So yeah. The movie tried to hard to set up this new universe that the story wasn't clear at all. I walked out of the theater pretty disappointed, and, to be honest, feeling pretty tired of Spider-man. By this time, Sony had already announced their plans for The Sinister Six, Venom, and The Amazing Spider-man 3. All the other films of 2014 were amazing, then hearing about Warner Brother's movie plans for their interconnected Justice League universe, Marvel Studio's plans until 2019 and all of Fox's X-Men films coming out, Spider-man was in the back of my mind.

     All these Spider-man spin-offs seemed so stupid and so far-fetched. And I wasn't the only one who felt that way. So I kinda stopped following the Spider-man movie news for a few months. When I read about the Sony hacks, and about how Spider-man almost was going to appear in Captain America: Civil War, I was so bummed out. He was such an important part of that story. So close! Then a few months later, I was on Screenrant, and if you have ever been on there, you know that the top headlines are on the far right side. I saw a picture of Iron man, Captain America, and Spider-man, and I just knew that it had happened. Sure enough, I read the headline, and grinned. Spider-man was in the Marvel Cinematic Universe. It was a dream come true.

     So now The Amazing Spider-man will sit on our shelves. Part of me is disappointed, as there were so many unanswered questions from the previous movies. Hopefully some old scripts will leak online. But they will probably be forgotten. No one will really care about them. Sam Raimi's films were integral to the development of superhero movies in Hollywood, the new Spider-man will be joining forces with the Avengers, and the middle Spider-man franchise will not be missed. The Amazing Spider-man really made me get into superheroes again, so for that, I will always be thankful. I thought it was a promising start to a new franchise, but the studio was just too eager to be like Marvel. But thank you Sony for finally coming to the realization that they couldn't bring this marvelous character to life in a good way without some help from the best.