[James Wan] If you look at Jason strictly as a visual cut-out, [laughs]
he looks a biker, like a tough guy
that you wouldn ‘t want to pick a fight with in a bar.
You got enough footage.
Knowing Jason is the big dude,
and I ‘m barely six feet, so you gotta do a lot of work,
otherwise, you just look like a skinny guy in a muscle suit. [chuckles]
[Yahya Abdul-Mateen ll] I wanted to gain weight, man.
I wanted to get big.
But because of the way that the suit's got to be built,
if I get too big, then I'll be bulky and things like that.
But I'll probably still sneak on
about a good eight pounds or something like that
between now and May.
They won 't notice, or they will, but they'll deal with it.
[Peter Safran] When we made Patrick the offer for King Orm,
and obviously he knew that Jason was playing Arthur Curry,
he said, "l am going to start working out
this exact instant."
[Wilson] We've been busting our ass so much
to try to give him a formidable opponent.
[grunting]
You can't just see Aquaman kick everybody's ass.
[grunts]
[Abdul-Mateen ll] I got my mind blown by Patrick Wilson my first day.
And I said, "Oh. Oh, that's the movie that we're doing."
A lot of my job is to work out and clank iron.
It's like playing a sport or something like that.
As in, someone gets a little bit more physical,
and then you say, "Oh, okay, oh, it's like that.
We're playing like that. Game on."
[man] Lift your head.
[Abdul-Manteen ll speaks]
-You do! You're like... "Aw!" [laughs] -[crew laughing]
[Abdul-Mateen ll] As long as l can look really good for my shirt-off scene
and steal all of Jason's fans...
[grunting]
[laughing]
I want them to say, "l want Black Manta to win."
[Abdul-Manteen ll speaks]
No.
[Wan] Yahya is just terrific, and I think he's brought
a sense of intensity to the role.
I have a shirt-off scene that's coming later on.
We did a screen test.
James said, "Hey, um, let's just zip that down,
and let's just get some shots." So, I zipped it down.
I came back a couple of days later,
and they said, "Man, I think the shirt's got to come off, man.
We got to do some re-writes."
[vocalizes]
I'm happy about that.
Because there's numerous characters in here,
we start out in the drill process
to see what their strengths and weaknesses are,
and we build on their strengths,
and that's how we choreograph their fights.
[both grunting]
If you're bigger and stronger like Jason,
you're gonna make him like brute power...
[Arthur grunts]
Strength. More like a barroom brawler.
[grunts]
But you still have to have a little flair to it.
[groans]
And then Patrick, he's the king. He has a kind of arrogance.
lam the one true king!
[Wilson] And we also wanted Orm to be a little more flashy,
so it's a little more fluid and maybe a little less brute
than Arthur has at some points.
And then, of course, there's Black Manta, who's a pirate.
And you just want to make him more like the street.
He's not a superhero,
he's just a scrapper. He's a scrappy fighter,
so that's how we designed his fights.
[Abdul-Mateen ll] We fight with our hands,
and we fight with whatever we can find and pick up.
I got my gauntlet that comes out.
[both grunting]
-Whoa. -[man] Um...
[Wan laughs] Damn, you don't know your own strength, my friend.
[Abdul-Mateen ll] He comes in, jet packs, he's flying.
I have laser eyes.
[bell tolls]
I'm so prepared now. So prepared.
Patrick got big, but Yahya got ripped.
I'm not sure who put on more weight, but Yahya, definitely, he won.
[Abdul-Mateen ll] What's up, Patrick? What's up now? [grunts]
[chuckles] I always joke like, "Man, I did five months of working out."
And what was on screen,
which literally comes down to about one arm,
to be quite honest with you. [laughing]
[Momoa] Man, those guys just ate
whatever they wanted to and lifted weights. I'm like, "You bastards."
[Abdul-Mateen ll] llike to work on Jason more than I work on Aquaman,
so we have those little inside jokes
when we get on set and get across from each other.
lwhisper, "Oh, somebodyjust turned 38, that's almost 40.
That's pretty cool, man.