Aquaman

Essential within the continuity, and it is the most commercially successful DC film ever made, which surprised almost everyone. It arrived after three gloomy entries and went in the opposite direction entirely: saturated colour, a drumming score, giant seahorses, an octopus playing percussion, and a hero who is enjoying himself.

James Wan came from horror and directs it as a fantasy adventure with no embarrassment about any of it. The film is a quest structure with a map, a riddle, a trial and a hidden weapon, and it moves through four kingdoms with distinct designs. The Sicily sequence, following two characters across rooftops in one apparently continuous move, is the best-directed action in the DCEU.

It is also, frankly, silly, and knows it. There is a wedding interrupted by a shark cavalry charge, and a scene in which a man in an orange shirt argues with his brother on a throne in front of a crowd of people on sea creatures. Judged as an attempt at gravity it fails; judged as what it is, it succeeds.

Jason Momoa carries it on charm and Patrick Wilson plays the antagonist as a genuinely aggrieved politician. The Trench sequence is a short horror film inside a blockbuster. Nothing before it is really required beyond knowing he appeared in Justice League.