With the release of Aquaman comes questions regarding how the movie fits into the scenes from last year’s Justice League film.
A Redditor brings up four points that he views as plot holes or inconsistencies between the two films. Before we delve into things, it should probably be mentioned that Justice League wasn’t the Zack Snyder version, so things obviously played out a bit different.
Jason Momoa did let it be known that in the Justice League Snyder cut, at the end, he says he is leaving to go visit his dad, which is where Aquaman picks up from.
Regarding the four points Redditor Dodeltanase94 brought up, he questions:
- 1. Mera’s name. In Aquaman, Arthur doesn’t seem to know who Mera is, but they talked in Justice League.
- 2. Atlanna and Arthur. Justice League makes it look as if Arthur hated his mother for leaving him, but in Aquaman it doesn’t seem he hates her as much. “There’s no bitterness towards her,” the Redditor says.
- 3. Orm and the Motherbox. In Justice League, Steppenwolf ports to Atlantis and steals Orm’s/Atlantis’ most prized possession, the Mother Box. “He does so rather easily,” says the Redditor.
- 4. Aquaman’s suit in Justice League. “Where’d it come from? It’s obviously not his mother’s and he hadn’t been in Atlantis before,” the Redditor questions.
Fellow Redditors chimed in with answers to the questions, and I’ll add some of my own:
1. Arthur and Mera talked before, but he simply didn’t know her name. – Redditor MarcusForrest.
2. My answer would be it’s the difference between the Zack Snyder tone and the James Wan “fun” tone that WB now wants.
3. My answer would be that it doesn’t seem as if the JL scene takes place within Atlantis, but somewhere on the outskirts. In Aquaman, Atlantis was shown to be this vast highly technological city. To boot, Mera and Arthur needed that special ship in order to reach Atlantis in Aquaman, but not in Justice League. In the Zack Snyder version, the scene was supposed to be a lot bigger and more in-depth, but obviously things, unfortunately, got cut.
We could also add that maybe Orm wants Arthur to go after Steppenwolf in the hopes Arthur gets killed in battle, alleviating Orm’s problem, which plays into the Aquaman movie.
Also, the guards used in JL are not Orm’s red and white guards, which may mean Orm hasn’t come to power just yet in JL.
Redditor aheany15 further points out and brings up a good point:
I think it was closer to Xebel, not just because of Mera being there, but also those guards looked more like Xebellians than Atlanteans, if you look at their armor and weapons. Plus, it may have been long forgotten by the general populace of Atlantis/Xebel, which could explain why the kings didn’t get much backlash. I mean, Atlantis/Xebel isn’t like Themyscira where it’s one small island area, they are both huge areas!
Another factor could be that the Atlanteans believe Darkseid, Steppenwolf, and the Mother Box are myths – similar to King Atlan and his Trident – so they really didn’t bother protecting the Mother Box, but only when they found out Steppenwolf was real and on Earth did they decide to act, but it was too late.
On a side note, worth mentioning is that in JL, in order to talk, they basically created an air bubble, but James Wan simply had the Atlanteans able to talk underwater, which I felt was the better way to go and saved a lot of headaches (constantly having to create air bubbles would have come off as pretty lame).
4. A JL cut scene reveals Aquaman asking Mera for a favor, which is probably the JL Aquaman suit. He says to Mera, “Then I’m gonna need something from you.” She gives him armor because he already had his mothers trident. – Redditor MarcusForrest.
I’ll also add Arthur not using the JL suit in the Aquaman movie is probably because Arthur doesn’t want to be an Atlantean or sees himself as a hero — the Aquaman movie is about a hero’s journey and Arthur and the Atlanteans accepting that he is an Atlantean and their king (and the orange and green suit is a lot cooler).
Another Reddit user brings up that Justice League should probably be forgotten, which is a good point. – Redditor Biffmcgee.
