Aquaman star Jason Momoa is saying “mahalo” to all who helped make the blockbuster the DCEU’s first billion dollar grosser, including director James Wan and producer Zack Snyder.
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“BILLION DOLLAR UNDERDOG,” Momoa wrote in an Instagram post Sunday.
“From Baywatch to making what once was the most disrespected superhero into a billion dollar movie. No one gets to the top without the people that love them. My success is from my fans. All my aloha to everyone that had a hand in making this movie. Mahalo Zack for choosing me and mahalo James for creating this beautiful world.”
Aquaman surfaced as a member of the billion dollar club over the weekend, topping 2008’s The Dark Knight with a $1.02b box office. Should it eclipse the $1.084b earned by 2012’s The Dark Knight Rises, Wan’s Aquaman will take the crown as the highest-grossing DC movie.
Momoa has long credited the Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice and Justice League director for awarding him the role and inspiring the re-imagined spin on the aquatic DC Comics superhero, envisioned as a way of reclaiming Aquaman as a “badass”:
“If people love what we did with Aquaman, it’s all [Zack Snyder] — it’s his brainchild,” Momoa told EW in November 2017 when defending the critically mauled Justice League, the superhero team-up completed by The Avengers director Joss Whedon that went on to claim the lowest box office performance for any DCEU entry.
“He came in with, ‘I’m going to make Aquaman a badass and I’m going to change stuff, and change the myths about this guy.’ And I busted my ass.”
Momoa has since lobbied for the release of the almost mythical Snyder Cut — the original version of the film envisioned by the Man of Steel filmmaker before he exited the project as result of a family tragedy — acknowledging Snyder had the future of the expansive cinematic universe “all planned out.”
“He had the plan for Justice League. I really do believe that Cyborg (Ray Fisher) and Wonder Woman (Gal Gadot), and all that has been shaped, is because of Zack. I’m definitely here and owe everything to that man because I wouldn’t have been cast if not for him,” Momoa told the Toronto Sun in December.
“I think that it was a genius idea to go in this direction with this character, and it’s been an honor. I’ve had people from all over the world — people from Argentina, people from Colombia, Singapore, Malaysia, Mexico, just all over, telling me, ‘How crazy and cool is this to have a brown-skinned superhero?’”
The former Game of Thrones star previously recounted Snyder envisioned him in the role after enjoying him in the HBO fantasy drama, where he played Khal Drogo. Momoa auditioned for Batman — a role filled by Ben Affleck — and believed he was going to play Batman v Superman‘s villain until Snyder revealed he wanted the beefy star as the modern Aquaman.
Wan similarly thanked fans for propelling Aquaman to its $1 billion box office haul Sunday, hailing Momoa for “turning Aquaman into one of the coolest, cinematic superheroes ever, and becoming the gold standard for this character for generations to come.”
A sequel is now in development at Warner Bros.
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