Expect to see a whole lot more of Aquaman in the near future; with the Worlds of DC,
previously known as DCEU, releasing the upcoming Aquaman live action feature film, we’re
bound to get a whole lot of feels, and whole lot of marketing promotion, thrown our way
when Jason Momoa flexes his guns, hangs out with Mera, and inevitably debunks some lame
fish reference.
It’s not easy being Arthur Curry, you guys.
In celebration of the upcoming hype, we’re taking a look at some of the variations the
king of Atlantis has had over the years, with our list of the top 10 alternate versions
of Aquaman!
Let’s dive in.
Get it.
Dive.
Like Aquaman.
Cause he’s into water.
Got it?
Yeah?
10 Sea King (Earth 3) Starting off our list is the evil version
of Aquaman known as Sea King.
He hails from Earth 3, where basically all of the heroes are villains, and part of a
group called the Crime Syndicate, the evil version of the Justice League.
Along with the other members of the Crime Syndicate, Sea King managed to escape his
own world’s destruction by travelling through a portal to Prime Earth, although at that
time, he didn’t survive the journey and died the second the portal open.
But during Forever Evil, when the Syndicate dumped all of their fallen peers in the ocean,
Sea King was resurrected, and Deadman would later enter his body, with Constantine having
to break Sea King’s hold over Deadman in order to save him.
Oh, and he also doesn’t have a left hand.
Instead, he’s got a hook.
Classic evil.
9 Holy Terror Batman: Holy Terror is one of the more interesting
Elseworlds imprints.
Not to be confused with Frank Miller’s Holy Terror, which follows a hero named the Fixer
who battles Islamic terrorists.
THIS ONE tells of a USA that is a commonwealth nation run by a corrupt theocratic government.
Bruce Wayne had intended to join the clergy years after his parents deaths, but then ends
up finding out the truth about how his parents were killed; a state planned execution rather
than a random mugging.
Bruce embarks on a crusade to hunt down the people responsible, and during this crusade,
he comes across a government testing facility filled with humans with super powers who have
been tortured by the government’s experiments.
This includes a speedster named Barry Allen, and an utterly traumatized Arthur Curry, who
Barry Allen approaches in his glass tank and promised that he’ll help him escape.
We also find out from Barry Allen that the government tried to force Arthur to man with
a Mer-woman who died upon giving birth, resulting in the creation of a half mermaid half fish
creature, and a ton of gene splicing, creating aquatic creatures who constantly attempt to
kill themselves in order to end their pain.
Dark stuff.
8 Barracuda Up next is another evil version known as Barracuda,
from the Antimatter Universe, who first appeared in issue 114, vol 1 of JLA back in 2005.
The Crime Syndicate, which also rules over this universe, have to deal with ‘anti-syndicate’
riots across 17 different countries.
One of these 20 insurgencies comes from Atlantis, where the leader of the Atlanteans, Barracuda,
has invaded Florida with his army.
Barracuda definitely has a much more sinister look that his Prime Earth counterpart, donning
a blue suit of armour with gold highlights on his wrists and helmet, and he rides around
with two dolphin steeds.
7 Mermaid (Earth 12) Mermaid is the Earth 12 alternate of Aquaman.
She’s a member of the Freedom Brigade, and is a total parody of her inspiration.
As is the rest of the Freedom Brigade, which also included The Patriot, Lady Liberty, Captain
Swift, Princes Power, The Bowman and Mister Might.
They debuted in Showcase issue 62 in 1966.
After retiring, Mermaid got hitched to Mister Might, and had a son who became known as Awkward
Man, who they forced into joining up with the team of heroes known as the Inferior Five;
a team made up of all of the Freedom Brigade’s kids who were quite incompetent at fighting
crime.
Mermaid would also go on to become a teacher at the Academy of Superheroes.
But alas, that’s all for Mermaid.
Earth 12 was erased from existence after the Crisis on Infinite Earths, along with all
of the other characters and stories that corresponded with that earth.
Tough luck.
6 Aquaduck Aquaduck hails from Earth C Minus; the home
of the Just’a Lotta Animals.
What’s that, you may be wondering?
It’s the JLA equivalent in Earth C Minus, where all of the superheroes are, you guessed
it, anthropomorphic animals!
Essentially Just’a Lotta Animals and the series the originated in, Captain Carrot and
his Amazing Zoo Crew, are a fun little parody of DC’s superheroes, published by DC themselves.
The first time they were mentioned was in the New Teen Titans issue 16 back in February
of 1982, and their first appearance came a month later in Captain Carrot and His Amazing
Zoo Crew issue 1.
Aquaduck is the amphibious member of the group, the worlds greatest swimmer, and also a muscular
duck who wears basically the same uniform as the original incarnation of Aquaman.
He would first show up in issue 14 of Captain Carrot in April of 1983.
5 Aquawoman of Earth 11 A female Aquaman!
Aptly named Aquawoman of course.
Hailing from Earth 11, this hero is not only the Queen of Atlantis, as expected, but also
a member of the Justice Guild and the Justice Incarnate.
Working with the other members of those groups, all of which also have inverted genders, she
helps in the battle against the Gentry; a group of powerful beings who are led by the
Empty Hand to try to take over the multiverse and make everything the ‘opposite of natural’.
Not pleasant stuff, but Aquawoman agrees to join the war party, and even makes sure to
gloat about how the strongest native life form on Earth 11 is in fact, her.
4 Kikuchiyo Kikuchiyo first appeared in JLA Shogun of
Steel in 2002.
And also died in that same issue.
For context, JLA Shogun of Steel was one of DC’s prestige one shot Elseworlds imprints.
The story behind it was that rather than Superman crash landing in Smallville after Krypton
explodes, he lands in 14th century feudal Japan.
He grows up and is named Hoshi, and is eventually convinced by a group of warriors that he should
join the revolution against the oppressive Shogun of Steel.
Kikuchiyo is one of those members of the resistance, along with versions of Flash, Hawkman and
Batgirl.
He’s well acquainted with the sea, and impresses his comrades with how much distance he covers
when swimming.
And, side note, if the name Kikuchiyo sounds familiar, that’s because it’s the name
of a character from Akira Kurosawa’s 1954 film Seven Samurai.
3 Orin (Flashpoint Timeline) The Flashpoint Timeline has many an alternate
within it.
Long story short, Barry Allen wakes up to discover he’s travelled to an alternate
timeline in which the Justice League, Superman, and himself, do not exist, among many other
changes.
Orin is Aquaman’s alternate.
In this timeline, Orin was brought back to Atlantis when he was young because of the
death of his grandfather.
Since he was brought back, he would never learn compassion from his father, or stick
with the name Arthur Curry; his father was killed by Atlantean agents upon him being
retrieved.
Adult Orin would wage war on Wonder Woman and the Amazons after Diana’s mother was
killed on Aquaman and Wonder Woman’s wedding day, and later it was revealed that Diana
had actually been the real target.
Diana would then kill Mera for retribution.
2 Earth 2 Earth 2 is the designated Earth for all of
the original Golden Age DC heroes.
So back when the multiverse was created, DC decided for clarity’s sake, in order to
differentiate their old retired heroes from the new incarnations of them (like the Silver
Age Barry Allen Flash versus Golden Age Jay Garrick’s Flash), the old Golden Age heroes
would exist on an alternate timeline called Earth 2.
This includes the members of the Justice Society of America, and those heroes whose careers
started prior to World War 2.
It’s gone under several different variations over the years in terms of continuity and
what other Earths its been combined with, but all in all, Golden Age heroes live here.
This also includes the Golden Age Aquaman.
This Aquaman was not a true Atlantean; he was the son of a human scientist who had given
him the ability to breath underwater, along with super strength, and that was it.
Plus, his real name was actually Aquaman, not Arthur Curry; his father at one point
remarks, “My son is a true dweller of the deep – his name shall be Aquaman.”
His dad, who was said to be a famous undersea explorer, had lost Aquaman’s mother when
Aquaman was a child, so to cope he focused all of his energy on what he believed was
his discovery of the lost kingdom of Atlantis, leading him to train his son to thrive under
water.
Aquaman also temporarily adopted the secret identity Mr Waterman, which clearly isn’t
conspicuous AT ALL, in order to enroll in college.
1 The Drowned The Drowned, aka Bryce Wayne of Earth -11
is one of the newer additions to our list.
And technically, she’s not a true alternate of Arthur Curry, but rather, an alternate
of Batman heavily inspired by his alternate in Earth -11, Aquawoman.
But more on that in a sec.
First appearing in Dark Days: The Casting Issue 1 in 2017, Bryce Wayne played a major
role in the Dark Nights: Metal story event, in which we saw various different alternates
of Batman come out of the wood work, all of which were amalgamated in some severe way
with another Justice League member.
Bryce Wayne, on her home earth, was a crime fighter who was in love with a man named Sylvester
Kyle.
When Kyle was killed by metahumans, she lost her sh*t and decided to go on a revenge killing
spree, murdering every single metahuman she came across in order to avenge him.
18 months later, she had killed all the super powered beings on land, and that’s when
Aquawoman of Atlantis showed up from a self imposed exile, promising peace.
Long story short, the two of them fought after Bryce refused to trust her, and killed Aquawoman
with her own trident.
She then decided to take over the seas since her victory had caused Gotham City to drown,
and had flooded a large portion of the world.
Bryce then performed surgical and genetic procedures on herself, including biochemical
augmentations, so that she could be as deadly as any Atlantean under the water, and so she
could have hydrokinesis like Aquawoman.
She also designed her own army, creatures called Dead Water.
All in all, this character is Bruce Wayne’s intellect meets Aquaman’s abilities, all
wrapped up in a woman’s body.
There we have it friends!
Which of these alternates were your favourites?
Which ones did you hate?
And of course, which ones did we miss that we should include on our list next time?
Give us a shout, let us know your two cents, and whatever else is on your mind!
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