Justice League: Throne of Atlantis (PG-13)
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Caution: spoilers.

This is based on a graphic novel that I haven't read. The movie came out in 2015, but I didn't see it until 2023. It's the fourth film in the DC Animated Movie Universe. A submarine in the Marianas Trench is attacked by unknown forces. Cyborg goes to investigate (via boom tube), and discovers the sub's missiles have been stolen. The Justice League, including Cyborg, Wonder Woman (Rosario Dawson), Superman (Jerry O'Connell), Batman, Flash, Shazam, and Green Lantern (Nathan Fillion), investigate further, and Wonder Woman determines that the attackers were from Atlantis. Meanwhile, a man named Arthur Curry (Matt Lanter) is mourning the recent death of his father by getting drunk, and gets into a fight with some guys whose asses he pretty thoroughly kicks. Arthur never knew his mother, who abandoned him and his father when Arthur was a baby. But we eventually learn that his mother is Atlanna, the queen of Atlantis, who sends one of her warriors, Mera, to bring him to Atlantis. However, her other son, Arthur's half-brother, Orm, is plotting with a guy called Black Manta to kill Arthur and frame surface-dwellers for attacking Atlantis, hoping to start a war. But Atlanna refuses to declare war, so Orm eventually kills her, blaming the murder on a surface-dweller, and becomes the new king, so he can start a war against humanity himself. The Justice League finds Arthur and go to Atlantis, and um... I'm sure I'm telling this out of order. The plot is all kind of jumbled in my head. Anyway, a bunch of other stuff happens, including the Justice League, Arthur, and Mera fighting Orm's army when they attack Metropolis. I don't want to spoil how that battle ends, but I liked it. (It kind of reminds me of certain events from my own book.) And of course, Arthur (whom some people dub "Aquaman") becomes a member of the Justice League as well as the new king of Atlantis.

There were things I found a bit weird about the movie, like how the Atlantean army uses a tidal wave to hide their approach to Metropolis, but then just disperse the wave, as far as I could tell doing no damage to the city. Seemed to me it would have made more sense to let the wave wipe out human resistance before the main attack. And Mera and Arthur become a couple, which seemed to me to come out of nowhere. (I mean, I knew it would happen sooner or later, but this seemed pretty fast.) There were also things I liked about the movie, such as Mera doing some awesome (and deadly) waterbending. And Clark Kent teaching Diana Prince to wear glasses to mask her identity as Wonder Woman was kind of cute. (Yeah, they're also a couple.) What else? When the Justice League were first being assembled for this mission, Green Lantern interrupted Batman while he was on a case of his own, pursuing some of Scarecrow's henchmen. There's a very short film (less than a minute) called "Nightwing and Robin" which is supposed to be on the DVD and Blu-ray, but as far as I can see it isn't included on my DVD (a 2-disc set, no less). So I watched it on YouTube. And honestly, I don't think it was even worth putting on the DVD, anyway, because not much happens. But it shows at least a bit of how Batman's interrupted case ended after he left to work with the Justice League. Oh, and there's a brief scene with John Henry Irons which I thought was a neat little Easter egg for fans. (I expect he'll be much more important in a future movie.) And um... there's a post-credits sequence with Orm imprisoned in Belle Reve, which I thought was a bit odd, and he is approached by Lex Luthor, but of course we don't get to hear what Lex has to say to him, so I am curious about that. Aside from those things, I don't really remember if there was anything else I wanted to mention. (Probably there were other things both good and bad.) But I thought the animation was okay, and the story was mostly pretty decent, and I guess that's about it. It's not the best movie in the DCAMU, nor is it the worst.