Aquaman looks to be an awesome translation of the King of Atlantis’ mythos onto the big screen and one of the most promising elements is Black Manta, one of Arthur Curry’s most deadliest enemies.
The San Diego Comic-Con trailer for the upcoming movie gave us our first look at the villain and it promised a perfect adaptation of David Hyde’s iconic costume from the comic book page. But perhaps the most exciting part about Black Manta’s role in Aquaman is that it could lead to more appearances down the line. Or at least, that’s what star Yahya Abdul-Mateen II is hoping for.
He spoke to Collider recently about his character’s huge crossover potential, either in future Justice League or Suicide Squad movies, and made it clear that he’d love to play the part again in any DC project where he’s needed.
“Well, yeah, I mean, this character, he’s all over the canon. He’s in Suicide Squad, we see him in the cartoons, we see him in Young Justice, we see him in… he’s all over the place, in way that he can get to his means to an end. Right, if you see Aquaman in Justice League, then, you know, it’ll make sense for Black Manta to say, ‘Hey! What you doing?’ Pop his head in, wherever he is, he can justify making it his business. I’m looking forward to living long within the DC world, and creat[ing] a little bit of chaos.”
The obvious role Black Manta could fill in future DC films is as part of Lex Luthor’s Legion of Doom, first teased at the end of Justice League when the bald billionaire recruited Deathstroke to his evil cause. Black Manta was a classic member of the team on the Superfriends animated series, after all. Unfortunately for Abdul-Mateen II, however, recent reports point to WB cooling their plans for the Legion in order to focus on making standalone movies.
The studio would be pretty dumb not to make use of DC’s incredible rogues gallery, though, so hopefully Black Manta will reappear in some form after Aquaman hits cinemas on December 21st.