Aquaman

I've said it a few times on the blog before, I'm an Aquaman fan.  I have been since I was a kid, and he was a big reason for me badgering my parents for swimming lessons.  So today's post is a bit of fanart dedicated to one of my favourite characters.

Last month saw the relaunch of the DC Universe with a host of new number one issues, one of which was Aquaman.  I really loved the issue, the stunning art by Ivan Reis who's been a big favourite of mine since seeing his work on DC's Blackest Night series, was a big draw for me anyway.

The issues received a bit of criticism for it's attempt to bring the real world stigma of Aquaman being "lame" into the comic book universe and having characters in issue the address it, often to Aquaman's face.  But I quite liked the take and felt that perhaps it needed to be addressed, especially to brand new comic readers.  Even my non-comic reading friends know Aquaman's a bit of a joke thanks to the efforts of The Big Bang Theory and SNL, so I think that bringing it up in the issue would give new readers something to relate to.

I do agree that they could have had a few more scenes of Aquaman "being awesome" to really cement the idea that he can be a great character, but writer Geoff Johns seems to be taking a much more decompressed approach to storytelling in his new 52 issues, so provided we now move forward with much more AWESOME Aquaman stuff and now that the "Aquaman is lame" stuff is out of the way then I'll certainly be back for more issues.