Aquaman (2018)

Before the New 52 reboot wiped it away, the death if Arthur Jr. was actually a major status quo shift for Aquaman.

The events surrounding it would severely impact Arthur's relationship with Mera and Garth, and even decades after things never really got the same.

And the memory of his son would always haunt Arthur effectively being similar to the death of Gwen Stacy or Jason Todd (before his resurrection) in how much it affects the protagonist.

Sure it's "edgy" but it was a pretty substantial and novel creative decision that majorly impacted the character's setting.

Which I'm not saying we should kill kids in mass, but the concept of parents having to live with the death of a child is no different than characters having to live with the death of their parents, siblings, or any other family member.

Edited by slimcoder on Sep 16th 2023 at 1:29:06 AM

Exactly, it's something that could work very well if executed properly.

Probably the worst part about Arthur Jr's death was that he didn't actually die right away from being suffocated in air; he lingered long enough for Mera to go on a solo quest for the one thing that could save him, suffer repeated delays, and be told he'd died when she returned.

Meanwhile Arthur Sr. was on a revenge quest against Black Manta and missed the whole thing, and Garth was on the outs cause Aquaman had attacked him with intent to kill during Manta's staged fight.

It was definitely a Wham Episode for the character and his stories, and affected the whole comic up until Rebirth, where he and Mera now have a daughter named Andy and Arthur Jr doesn't seem to exist anymore.

Fandom (and to some extent the comic) painted Mera as a Hysterical Woman during some of her down periods but the loss of your child, especially a toddler, when it's partially your husband's fault, would shatter just about anyone. Arthur himself carried the guilt for decades in real-time.

Edited by lalalei2001 on Sep 16th 2023 at 5:10:11 AM

None of the dead kids in Guardians 2 were killed in the movie, or even characters, admittedly. It was just your average pile of movie skeletons that we were told were kids.

As much as I think it would be interesting to get Manta biggest moment of villainy on screen, it definitely must be said that actively killing the main character’s living infant son during the film is… a step for superhero movies, one I could believe DC was unwilling to take.

Not that there aren't successful movies where a kid character dies. That said, gotta be done tastefully. Audiences are already to a degree tenuous about this movie and word of something like that being in there's probably not gonna sway certain people either.

Were all Ego's children actually kids or were a certain number of them grown adults? Then again, he only got to Peter as late as he did because Yondu refused to bring Peter to him.

Like I don't expect the kid to bite it this movie, its definitely gonna be Tom.

But on a hypothetical execution of this plot point I'd do it when the kid is older, maybe Jason Todd it.

And flashbacks on how DC has treated the Titans for years just came to mind...

I forget that it's Manta's son who becomes Aqualad. Haha. I suspect that's comics accurate?

There's rumors people walked out of test screenings for Aquaman 2, with the biggest rumor being that it was Aquababy's death.

If true, that might explain the reshoots.

Rumors were they swapped out Mera for Aquababy in terms of death, most likely a killing two birds with one stone. Avoiding the killing of a child and removing AH from the film cleanly with Alanna taking over whatever Mera's role would have been.

So they're fridging her in other words? There's a shot in the trailer—actually not the only shot in the trailer as I said before—where she's trapped in some kind of pod and trying to get out. That would imply she at least makes it to the climax—and if not that, it's an earlier point in the movie and she's probably gone by the midpoint/end of second act.

To think, back when the trailer for the first movie came out, the funniest line to me was: "Redheads! You gotta love 'em!"

Sure it wasn't Wolverine or Nightwing saying that?

Honestly I don’t believe in any bit in those rumors.

We all joke about it but I never expected they would actually kill the child, so I don’t buy that that was ever an issue.

Or Cyclops, he does date a lot of redheads, well technically one was the clone of the other.

Edited by slimcoder on Sep 17th 2023 at 9:10:31 AM

I don’t remember to be honest.

When a family movie does the death of a child, it's gotta be tasteful—think My Girl and Bridge to Terabithia. To do it in what's supposed to be a fun superhero movie is tone deaf. Bad idea.

Here's a question: does Manta die at the end of this one?

The first movie didn't kill Orm or Manta, but then this movie looks like it's going to have Manta doing some pretty gnarly, awful things, so they might change that this time around.

Buuuut, if Manta dies that means no Jackson Hyde / Kaldur'ahm somewhere in the future, and that's a character I'd actually like to see.

Edited by KnownUnknown on Sep 17th 2023 at 9:55:37 AM

That also depends on if this continuity even continues past this movie, which is at best uncertain at this juncture.

Edited by dcutter2 on Sep 18th 2023 at 9:40:37 AM

Its a shame how none of the movies introduced or will introduce their heroes famous kid hero

Wonder Woman/Wonder Girl, Flash/Kid-Flash, Aquaman/Aqualad.

Though at least Gunn is introduced Robin so they might have a better chance of appearing then.

Regarding Arthur Jr.’s death, it happened in 1977 when the comics would largely be playing to a young audience — while it would be an unusually dark moment for them, it wouldn’t play to a personal fear the way it would for an audience with a lot of parents in it. That might make a real difference in its acceptability if they were trying to adapt it to film.

Edited by Dayraven1 on Sep 18th 2023 at 2:00:39 AM

I wonder if there's a chance of them re-enacting the DCAU Justice League take on it and Arthur getting his hook hand because he chopped off his hand to save his son.

Edited by dcutter2 on Sep 18th 2023 at 10:05:19 AM

While we wait for the sequel, I discovered an Aquaman fan film from 1984 that won several awards at the time! It's called Aquaman: The Cast of the Angler and actually predicted his 'raised by dolphins' origin.

I see the Hook Hand definitely happening before killing the baby ever would. Not that it's the safer decision, but it definitely doesn't violate anywhere near as many sensibilities. Not even a Black Panther movie—despite how much pathos and relatability they have to real life—would do that.

I think the only superhero movie that pulled something like that off was X-Men: Apocalypse, where Magneto's daughter gets killed about halfway through the movie.

Otherwise, most children who die in superhero movies (which is quite rare, admittedly) tend to be unnamed extras or have died before the events of the movie.

That was done tastefully. I agree. The tone supported that though while maybe the tone could support it here, but DC fans are already dicey and I wouldn't push it if I were them.

So the tie-in comic is now out. Charybdis is the main villain and he ultimately didn't get to take Aquaman's hand off. I guess we can take that as an indicator that Black Manta won't get to kill Aquababy in the film.

It never really seemed like that was the sort of thing this movie would go for.