How Aquaman 2 Gives Black Manta Enough Power To Challenge Arthur

It has taken a full five years but here we are, with "Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom" just around the corner. Indeed, the sequel to 2018's "Aquaman" is still coming out in December, despite the fact that the ongoing Writers Guild of America and Screen Actors Guild strikes have effectively shut Hollywood down. Be that as it may, director James Wan recently pulled the curtain back on the sequel, including how the main villain Black Manta will be able to go toe-to-toe with Arthur Curry this time around.

/Film's Jenna Busch recently attended a trailer launch event for "Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom," with Wan in attendance. Yahya Abdul-Mateen II is returning as Black Manta but, in the sequel, he's actually the main villain ... although he's still just a human. So, how will he be able to duke it out more effectively with Momoa's Aquaman this time around? Wan addressed the topic, saying the following:

"[Black] Manta, basically after the first movie, he is on this relentless quest to basically want to kill Arthur Curry or just destroy everything that Arthur has built. He's been searching nonstop for ways to do that. Without giving too much away here, in his search to try and fix the power suit that he had in the first movie that was all banged up and destroyed, he stumbles across something much bigger."

Understandably, Wan is keeping it a bit quiet in regards to what, precisely, our villain comes across but it's clear that it's something pretty powerful. Evening the odds with a superhero as powerful as Aquaman is no small thing, even if he has historically been the butt of a great many jokes.

"We obviously know that Black Manta is a big nemesis of Aquaman," Wan explained while touching on the topic. "My plan with the first movie was always to kind of set up the relationship with him." The filmmaker also called him "a glorified side character" in the first film. Though not ideal, Wan knew it would come back around. "It was going to be okay because we knew that the second movie was where we're ultimately going to go into him in a much bigger role," he explained.

Orm, aka Ocean Master, aka Aquaman's brother, was the big baddie of the first film. In a bit of a flip of the script, Arthur is actually going to have to team up with his brother, played by Patrick Wilson. It sounds a little bit like Thor and Loki in "Thor: The Dark World." Wan also talked a bit about that element of the film, while also talking a bit more about the Black Manta of it all:

"Patrick Wilson, who played Ocean Master in the first one, will be working with Arthur in this one to try and stop Black Manta and his bigger evil plan in this movie. One of the things I want to point out is that in the first movie, obviously, [Black Manta's] a human, which he still is in this one, but because he has stumbled onto the Lost Kingdom, he's now empowered in a way that he wasn't in the first film. So finally he's able to go one-on-one with Arthur Curry, who is a superhuman being."

The cast also includes Amber Heard (Mera), Nicole Kidman (Atlanna), Dolph Lundgren (King Nereus), and Randall Park (Dr. Stephen Shi).

"Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom" hits theaters on December 20, 2023.