There’s a fine line with cutting together trailers for upcoming movies between sharing enough interesting footage to entice people to see said movies, but not so much that major pilot points are spoiled. Well, the latest trailer for Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom has seemingly accomplished the latter, as it appears to reveal a major death within the upcoming DC movie.
To be clear, I will be going deep into SPOILERS from this point forward, so if you’d like to go into Aquaman 2 completely fresh, then tread through the major things we know about The Lost Kingdom and who’s joining Jason Momoa in The Lost Kingdom’s cast. For those of you sticking around, let’s get into it.
Admittedly, I speculated as far back as shortly after the first Aquaman movie was released that Thomas Curry could die in the sequel given that Black Manta was inadvertently responsible for the man’s death in the New 52 continuity. Last month’s Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom trailer seemed to support this theory, but now the latest trailer coming from China, as shared by @OAICEROMA, essentially confirms this will happen. See for yourself:
Aquaman2 New TrailerChina exclusive trailer#AquamanAndTheLostKingdom#Aquaman pic.twitter.com/ngU4mHFMF2December 6, 2023
Granted, we don’t see Temuera Morrison’s character taking his last breath, but between Yahyah Abdul-Mateen II’s Black Manta saying he’s going to murder Aquaman’s family, the helmeted villain stabbing Thomas, and Jason Momoa’s Arthur Curry screaming in rage as he holds his father and his childhood home burns, I think we can safely say Thomas will meet his demise. There may be a glimmer of hope that some advanced piece of Atlantean technology can save him, but I’m not betting money on that. As such, this will be the second DC character Morrison’s played who dies, having previously appeared in Green Lantern as Abin Sur.
It’s unfortunate that this plot point was just tossed out in a trailer, but this isn’t the first time this has happened with a DC movie. Even just narrowing our gaze to roughly the last year, the Black Adam trailer spoiled that the title character’s son died, and while not quite as direct, one of The Flash’s trailers tipped fans off to the younger Barry Allen becoming Dark Flash. This does seem to happen with trailers meant for international audiences rather than domestic audiences, but still, story beats like this should be saved for when people are seated for the movie itself.
Still, there are hopefully plenty of other surprises that await the public when Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom arrives in theaters on December 20. Remember that if you’d like to stream Aquaman, or any of the DC movies in order, you’ll need a Max subscription. Otherwise, continue checking back here for more news concerning the final DC Extended Universe installment.