Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom director James Wan says he learned all about family from the Fast and Furious movies.
During a live Q&A to debut the new Aquaman 2 trailer, the DC filmmaker explained that his time working on the Fast and the Furious franchise informed how he explores family dynamics in the Aquaman sequel.
“I learned about family from Fast and Furious,” he revealed. “We need to play in a big way. So, you can see a bit of that played into this in a big, big way. No, seriously, the family aspect in this film was something that was very important for me, and you have Vin to thank for that.”
Wan directed Fast & Furious 7 back in 2017 and it seems to have left an impression on him. After all, the Fast and Furious franchise is well known for its focus on family, and it's this focus on family that sees Jason Momoa’s Aquaman evolve beyond the Aquaman we found in the first film.
“In the first movie, Aquaman was a wanderer trying to still find out who he is,” said Wan. “But in this one, he ultimately becomes the King of Atlantis. He's a dad in this one, and he needs to reach out to his family member, the one that was his antagonist in the first movie, and they had to ultimately be a family together.”
That’s right: Aquaman is a dad this time around, with his role and responsibilities clearly causing Arthur some headaches.
“One of the things we want to do is give him something to care about so that when his world starts falling apart, it hits him harder, it means more to him,” Wan explained. “He wasn't the King of Atlantis in the first movie, but now he is, and so he has duties, and how does he balance the duty of looking after a kingdom and dealing with politics and taking care of their people. Meanwhile, he has to be back home changing diapers and put the kid to sleep, and stuff like that as well.”
But that’s not the only part of his family causing problems, he has to work with his brother, Orm, aka Ocean Master, played by Patrick Wilson. “Amongst all of this, he has to strike up a relationship with his brother because if they can't come together, then they can't solve the problem that is facing them very immediately,” he said.
“I wanted to see just the relationship between Jason and Patrick,” said Wan. “These two are really great in the film. They've got such great camaraderie and good chemistry that I described the second one as a bromance movie. It really is. The first one's romance, the second one's bromance. And it really is, it's really kind of like Tango and Cash. That was the spirit that we were going for.”
Has their relationship improved since the first film? Well, sort of, but you can still expect some friction.
“If you sort of look at him in the first film, he was just trying to do what is right for his people,” said Wan. “So, from that perspective, he doesn't see himself as a bad guy, so to speak. He's just trying to protect his people. And I think because of that, Arthur respects that as well. And again, Arthur, Jason's character, is so much about the family dynamic, and we touched a bit on it in the first film with how he's always wanted to reach out to his younger brother and try and build a relationship. Well, he gets to do that in this film.
“There's still antagonism between the two of them throughout the whole movie, which is actually where some of the fun derives from, just seeing the two of them bicker,” he said. “But at the same time, also leaning on the most sort of human aspect of his character.”
Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom heads to theaters on December 20, 2023.
IGN’s Aquaman review gave it 7.5/10 and said: “Aquaman is one hell of a popcorn movie – a fun time and a big bet for the DC movie universe that pays off in creating an exciting new realm for future installments to hopefully explore further. Wan’s geeky epic is chock-full of ridiculous elements and, on paper, it really shouldn’t work as well as it does, but it’s all so inherently weird and brazenly bonkers that the siren call of this giddy, otherworldly romp is hard to resist.”
Want to read more about Aquaman 2? Check out why Aquaman 2 is being praised for its visuals as well as how the Aquaman sequel has not been affected by the DCU reset.
Ryan Leston is an entertainment journalist and film critic for IGN. You can follow him on Twitter.
