‘Aquaman 2’ Officially Becomes The Biggest 2023 DC Movie

Despite falling significantly behind Aquaman and several other DC movies that were released over recent years, Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom is officially the DCEU’s biggest movie in 2023.

Arthur Curry’s latest outing was the DCEU’s final installment, giving way to the revamped DC Universe in 2025 as DC’s first cinematic franchise petered out with a series of underperforming movies that garnered middling reviews overall. Such was the case for the DCEU’s swansong movie, Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom, which earned disappointing reviews and a box office result that barely holds a candle to its predecessor.

Despite this, Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom was still the DCEU movie that came out on top in 2023. The Aquaman sequel saw its eponymous hero wrestle with his new responsibilities as a father and King of Atlantis while his arch-rival, Black Manta, aimed to tear Arthur Curry’s life apart by seizing hold of the Black Trident and ruthlessly gunning for Curry’s family. While the movie ended up lacking substance, there is no denying the spectacle it offered, eventually earning the DCEU $335 million worldwide against its budget of $200 million, according to The Numbers.

Evidently, despite concerns, Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom narrowly avoided being an outright flop, even if it did fall significantly behind Aquaman’s record-breaking worldwide box office of $1.1 billion. It did, however, manage to storm ahead of the other four DCEU movies in 2023. It’s easy to see that the DCEU suffered last year, which is ironically thanks in no small part to the reveal of the DCU in early 2023, helping to negate the necessity to keep abreast of movies that fell distinctly under the DCEU banner. Thankfully, enough audiences felt compelled to see Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom regardless, helping to keep its head above

The success of Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom isn’t all too surprising when viewing it relative to the other DCEU movies of 2023. The Flash and Blue Beetle were both debut installments in their respective sub-franchises, which may as well have been standalone movies following the reveal that their events would no longer tie into a wider narrative. Blue Beetle, specifically, was a far less well-known hero – despite the movie gaining the best reviews of the four – which further diminished the impetus to witness his debut. The Flash, meanwhile, has only appeared in movies that were critically panned and featured a controversial figure in the starring role.

(Source: screenrant.com)

(ROHN ROMULO)