The embargo on reviews for Aquaman has been lifted, and the DC superhero film has been received positively by critics. While the reactions are not as unanimously ecstatic as they were for Wonder Woman – the highest rated DC film – they praise James Wan’s film for being a step in the right direction for the troubled franchise. The film currently sits at a healthy 76% score on review aggregator site, Rotten Tomatoes, based on over 60 reviews.
“Aquaman swims with its entertainingly ludicrous tide, offering up CGI superhero spectacle that delivers energetic action with an emphasis on good old-fashioned fun,” the critics’ consensus on Rotten Tomatoes read. A film of this size usually gets around 300 reviews, which leaves a lot of room for the score to fluctuate in the coming days.
“Notwithstanding the inevitable formulaic dialogue and a superabundance of boilerplate superhero action sequences, Aquaman turns out to be, almost despite itself, an engaging undersea extravaganza,” the Los Angeles Times’ Kenneth Turan wrote.
New York Magazine’s Emily Yoshida wrote, “Aquaman’s as formulaic, excessively trashy, and mommy-obsessed as any other entry in the DCEU, but its visual imagination is genuinely exciting and transportive, and dare I say, fun.”
Meanwhile, US Weekly’s Mara Rubenstein countered, “Take away Momoa’s steady presence, and you’re looking at an overstuffed mess that provides entertainment purely in an OMG-this-is-a-disaster kind of way.”
