It’s been nearly two months since Aquaman sloshed its way into theaters, slapping moviegoers on the back with a hearty “My man!” and crushing a beer can on its head as it proceeded to earn more than a billion dollars worldwide. Wondering why Warner Bros. hadn’t already begun a sequel? Let’s find out.
Sure, we can now report that, according to The Hollywood Reporter, a sequel to DC’s biggest movie ever is now officially in the works, with the studio hiring David Leslie Johnson-McGoldrick, who co-wrote the first film, to pen the continuing adventures of Fishy McDudebro. And yes, original director James Wan will be back to oversee things as a producer, though whether he returns to the director’s seat is still up in the air. But it doesn’t explain why it took this long—and even had Warner Bros. greenlighting a spinoff based on the screeching fish monsters from like five minutes of the first movie in the interim—to get a second film started. Sure, we can pretend it’s because both Warner Bros. and DC are pretty gun-shy about rushing into anything too quickly after the impetuous decisions surrounding Justice League and the preceding films that almost tanked the DCEU. But it seems far more fun to baselessly speculate about the behind the scenes of a sentient Warner Bros. and their lackadaisical ways:
[Time: The weekend after Aquaman opens. Setting: The messy one-bedroom apartment of the Warner brothers. A faded Reservoir Dogs poster hangs on the wall.]
“Aquaman? That did pretty well for us, didn’t it?” mutters one of the brothers Warner, as the studio siblings recline on their couch, the mushrooms they took an hour ago finally kicking in with a vengeance. “Should we make a sequel?”
His identical brother turns to him, a goofy stoned smile on his face. “Oh yeah, man. Water dude!” He giggles, emitting a high-pitched patter of guffaws not unlike Paris Hilton reading a Cathy comic strip. His face turns serious. “But first, let’s finish playing Red Dead Redemption 2.”
“For sure, mi hermano! Tear open those Doritos, and let’s get it popping! I’ll call someone in a few hours and we’ll get started on that movie sequel thing.” The brothers pick up their controllers and turn their attention to the large screen in front of them, as the plastic bag that held their recently consumed hallucinogens wafts to the floor, a small sticker affixed to the bottom left corner remaining unseen: “Warning: Effects will last approximately two months.”