u/TheDistantWave

I wanted to share my thoughts for anyone curious, given I’ve been working long hours and haven’t been online much

But to keep things short this by far is my favorite issue of Jeremy Adams Aquaman run so far.

What really stood out to me.

1.) It was nice to see him come back to previous mentioned aspects of his own run and Arthur’s overall lore/history

Seeing some action with Thalassa was needed and seeing it match and clash with Poseidon’s trident was really cool.

Seeing Poseidon’s trident was still in the possession of the Aquaman family up until Poseidon took it back was a really nice attention to detail by Adams and I really loved the fact Mera has been using it. For anyone wondering Arthur got the trident from Poseidon on multiple occasions once during the Post-Crisis era after defeating Triton, another time he borrowed it during the DCYou Exiled arc to destroy Thule, and the final time it was given to him to keep by Poseidon during the Justice League event Drowned Earth. So Atlantis being in possession of the trident of Poseidon was a really cool lore point. The added aspect of Vivienne being responsible for crafting Poseidon’s trident which was something stated earlier in Adams run.

There’s also the point Adams didn’t obviously have any need to nerf Poseidon in this fight, and he addressed the possible common elephant in the room for probably most battles involving haxxed characters like Aquaman with the fact Arthur stated he couldn’t do the internal hydrokinesis stuff to Poseidon based off his physiology. I’m really enjoying the fact that there are limitations to the powers Arthur has and the writer is showing there are still forces that can challenge Aquaman. It’s also a really great showing for Poseidon in matchups against other characters who have similar hax abilities

2.) I got extremely excited to see Aquaman use his telepathy to call sea life in to help assist him. It’s his most iconic ability and it’s good to see it’s not forgotten. I love how it was something he even fell back on as something he saw as his ace.

3.) I previously mentioned on the preview post I was worried about Arion jobbing and this issue alleviated that concern for me. I think Arion and Garth acting as defense for Atlantis and the Lighthouses is my preferred usage in this case and it was a good subtle feat for Arion while also being a really good feat for the clash between Arthur and Poseidon

4.) The way the fight was done overall was extremely entertaining as well. I liked the fact Arthur was shown to offensively use portals to shift the battle location as needed. It kind of negates any idea that it’s a slow process on Aquaman’s end doing so.

I think the outcome not being necessarily a defeat of Poseidon being knocked out or killed. But instead yielding was definitely my preferred outcome for this clash as well.

Overall this was easily the best issue so far in my opinion. It read smoothly in terms of pacing, the action was superb, the attention to lore/history was great.

Really looking forward to Tidal War!

Would love to hear other thoughts on today’s issue

Location: Desolate world
Win condition: Death, KO or Submission

Characters: Carol Danvers and Black Bolt composite, get what if feats

Round 1: Apokolips Duo/Mister Miracle and Barda

Round 2: The Amazon and Atlantean/Cassie Sandsmark and Jackson Hyde (Composite Cassie and Jackson)

Round 3: The Egyptians/Black Adam and Hawkgirl (Kendra) (Hawkgirl gets her buff during the Scott Snyder run)

Round 4: The Apokolips Siblings/Orion and Grail

Round 5: The Atlantean and Amazon/ Garth and Donna

Round 6: New Olympus/Wonder Woman and Aquaman

Location: Desolate Planet
Victory: Death, KO, or Submission
Characters: Vox Supreme, Supreme Accuser Captain Marvel, Emperor Black Bolt, Grayven, Big Barda, Orion

Location: Battle takes place in a serene valley. Landscape is indestructible

Characters:
Jane Foster has Mljonir
Unworthy Thor
God of War Wonder Woman
Poseidon Blessing Aquaman

Composite Ares no Godwave
Base Kurse (Algrim the strong)

Win conditions: KO, Death or Submission.

Battle Location: is in an uninhabited marshland.

Victory by Death, KO, BFR or Submission

Versions: Waterhand Aquaman, Absolute Superman, Absolute Wonder Woman,

Gauntlet:

1.) Ultimate Thanos
2.) 616 Apocalypse
3.) 616 Annihilus
4.) 616 Uranos

Location: The Heart of Apokolips

Rules:
1.) Fight is to Death, Incapacitation, or KO
2.) Once someone loses the Heart of Apokolips turns them into a statue.
3.) Speed is equalized
4.) 3 rounds

1st Round: Everyone is in base for the first round
2nd Round: Versions as specified in the versions portion of post.
3rd Round: Everyone is at their strongest form

Versions:

Team Asgard
1.) Twilight Sword Beta Ray Bill
2.) Odin Force Thor with Mljonir
3.) Worthy Jane feats with Ultimate Mljonir to ignore Mljnor clashing statements. Jane also gets her Valkyrie shift.
4.) Queen Of Hel Angela

Team Hala
1.) Phyla gets her Quasar and Martyr feats as well as her overall feats as a composite Phylla
2.) Black Bolt gets his Earth-X and 616 feats as well as What-Ifs
3.) Carol Danvers is 616 but has the Arcade Device implemented in her as well as The Universal Weapon
4.) Post-Mad God Genis-Vell

Team New Olympus:
1.) Day of Vengeance Captain Marvel
2.) Avatar of The Blue Aquaman with Poseidon’s Blessing and Trident
3.) Earth Prime Wonder Woman but has the added abilities and gear of Absolute Wonder Woman
4.) Mary Marvel gets her base and Black Mary showings

Team Omega Mutants:
1.) Magneto her base 616 and House of M showings
2.) Emperor Vulcan
3.) Current Storm 616
4.) Current Hope Summers 616

Rules: Win by KO, Death, or Incapacitation

For Round 1:
Thor has the Thor Force
Strange has his current Lord Strange form.
Post-Ice Age Arion
Avatar of The Blue Aquaman
Black Bolt gets his what-if feats

For Round 2:
Everyone is at their strongest form

Battle Location: Is an indestructible dimension

Rules:
Speed Equalized
All characters are base or equipped with stuff they have at their base levels.
Diana does get her Absolute variants lassos and magic.
Storm has Stormcaster and Jane gets her Valkyrie and Thor feats.
Starfire gets her New God Odyssey feats
Phylla is a composite of all her variants
Supergirl gets her base and matrix showings.
Win conditions are KO, Death, Submission or Incapacitation.

Rules:
Speed Equalized
All characters are base or equipped with stuff they have at their base levels.
Diana does get her Absolute variants lassos and magic.
Storm has Stormcaster and Jane gets her Valkyrie and Thor feats.
Win conditions are KO, Death, Submission or Incapacitation.

I’ve stated this before but I love when writers pull old concepts and ideas from older runs, and modernize them or do stuff with concepts that never went anywhere.

Comparison of Jeremy Adams run with stuff that came before.

Wonder Twins interaction with Garth and Jackson is from Dark Nights Death Metal.

King Shark and Arthur Joseph Curry being comrades from Aquaman: Sword of Atlantis

Starro vs Aquaman is from Adventure Comics v1 issue 451

Aquaman’s connection to The Clear/Blue was originally established in Aquaman v5 Issue 35

Aquaman had godlike water powers under the possession of some Godlike spirit in The Flash v2 Issue 66

A mother ensembles the king of the seas rogues gallery to take him down. Action Comics v1 Issue 520

Might, make a bigger post if I find more stuff.

I thought we got a pretty cool showcase of a little bit of what Fisherman is capable of, so it peaked my interest on what else he can do and some of these other guys.

Tiamat? Kordax? Legend? Rath? Sea Witch? All are almost blank canvases.

With some of the others also having a lot of potential themselves.

I kind of read the New52 runs for Swamp Thing and Animal Man due to the direction of the current Aquaman run and I thought Rotworld would of been an awesome arc to have included Aquaman as a third protagonist during my time reading it.

No telling what Lemire’s story in specific would be, but with the direction of the current run. I think it would be cool to see Lemire pickup stuff from his Animal Man run and have the two crossover. The Bridgewalker stuff could easily be brought back and used as a storyline within the whole Emperor Aquaman stuff assuming that becomes a status quo with the Universe spanning lighthouses.

Be funny to see Arthur don the blue magical camo suit, and Animal Man in his concept unused orange design for an arc. Switching colors.

Overall just my thoughts.

Link to AMA.

https://x.com/dcuworld/status/2072793519664889974?s=46

Was kind of surprised Arthur didn’t get a post on the subreddit today. One of the most dedicated fathers in comics and media.

1st showcased team is The Protectors of The Parliaments, we got Justice League Dark for Magic this is basically “Justice League Nature” potentially Justice League Blue for the Environment

2nd up is a team heavily based off the Justice League on my picks, but the dynamic I think is way too interesting not to see them come together cause the majority of them are wack jobs, egotistical or self serving. I think seeing them interact would be interesting and you got characters like Nova and Forge who would be caught in the mess. Marvel already has The Squadron and Great Society as JL teams, this would be a Dark Avengers the dynamic is different by a lot to have it be its own thing.

A Sungod, A moon knight, An Amazonian warrior, An Atlantean, A speedster, A space cop, and the tech genius.

The 3rd team is a team that’s inspired not based on The JL they’re massively different enough to be their own thing and do have built in connections already among themselves. My World’s Finest being Black Panther and Doctor Strange. My Trinity being Black Panther, Captain Marvel and Doctor Strange, and the overall team also including Medusa and Juggernaut. I like the 5 man aspect cause it feels like enough attention can be spread around. You do get each member kind of in a way parodying the JL.

Black Panther is the Brains, Carol is the cosmic alien, Doctor Strange is the connection to Magic and myths, on the JL you do have Aquaman who shares a Greco-Roman connection with Wonder Woman on this team you have Medusa and/or Black Bolt who share a Kree-Progenitor connection with Captain Marvel. Juggernaut’s powers come from a different dimension similar to The Flash and The Speedforce. Juggs also ties in pretty well with have a mystical lore matching Doctor Strange’s and Black Panther’s. Similar to how Flash and Superman are both tied into Sci-Fi.

I think the last added aspect is I’d try to tie this team together with the core being legacy. The concept overall has Medusa as a Nightmask to Carol’s Starbrand. With the idea of tying in White Hole Singularities to White Events.

I got a write up I’ll include in the comments for Nightmask Medusa The Midnight Queen and The Star Captain Marvel as a Starbrand or Starbrand connected.

My 4th and final team is an OG Avengers based roster, I didn’t really put too much thought into it admittedly. It just felt like something I had to include due to the JL based stuff. But overall you got The Couple, The Patriot, The Tech-man and The God.

Recently created an Arion Powerscaling post if anyone is interested the very few times I’ve seen him mentioned I often see his showings misconstrued or the character downplayed with people typically missing context within the stories of the character being weakened or not having his full kit.

https://www.quora.com/How-powerful-is-Arion-from-DC-Comics/answer/TheOneWhoKnows?ch=17&oid=1477743910393960&share=74d8b9cc&srid=pi39v&target\_type=answer

Enlil could be a cool concept to revisit within the mythos.

Flash hyping out current Aquaman all the way back in the 90s

Sources:

The Flash v2 Issue 66

Aquaman: Deep Dives issue 7

Emperor Aquaman Issue 17

Shoutouts to

Quinze-Pras-Seis on Reddit (Pictures 1 & 2)

The third picture is from Marvel Presents v1 Issue 19

NickFries55 on Reddit (Drew picture 4 finished version picture 7)

OmegaStorm on X (Pictures 5 & 6)

The last image is from the Marvel Tarot book

Let me know what’s the better name for the amalgam. Strange Panther. Supreme Panther. Panther Supreme?

Fanfic I wrote: https://www.quora.com/profile/TheOneWhoKnows/The-Panther-Supreme-Strange-Panther?ch=17&oid=249087313&share=46f6c13e&srid=pi39v&target\_type=post

EMPEROR AQUAMAN #20
Written by JEREMY ADAMS
Art and cover by JOHN TIMMS
Variant covers by DAN QUINTANA and STEPHEN BYRNE
$3.99 US | 32 pages | Variant $4.99 US (card stock)
ON SALE 8/12/26

Aquaman has become so powerful, even the gods have taken notice. Poseidon arrives in Atlantis to humble the lighthouse keeper’s son in a fight that will span the stars and wreck the seas!

DC X SONIC THE HEDGEHOG: METAL LEGION #4
Written by ADAM BRYCE THOMAS
Art by ADAM BRYCE THOMAS
Cover by PABLO M. COLLAR
Variant covers by MIN HO KIM and DANIELE DI NICUOLO
$3.99 US | 32 pages | 4 of 5 | $4.99 US (card stock)
ON SALE 8/5/26

Dr. Eggman and his super-powered Metal Legion are looming unchecked over the Justice League’s Earth! It’s going to take the combined might of the Justice League, Sonic, and his many friends to challenge the mad doctor’s mechanical might! But as their battle rages in space, who is left to stop Lex Luthor and the Legion of Doom?

DARK KNIGHTS OF STEEL II #2
Written by TOM TAYLOR
Art by OTTO SCHMIDT
Cover by YASMINE PUTRI
Variant covers by TRAVIS MOORE, GERALD PAREL, and LUCAS MEYER
$4.99 US | 32 pages | 2 of 12 | Variant $5.99 US (card stock)
ON SALE 8/19/26

A sickness has befallen the Els, sending the Kingdom of Metropolis into disarray. But what—or who—could bring true harm to such a powerful royal family? Queen Diana and her Amazonians are intent on finding answers, but what will it cost them? Amidst the chaos, Amanda Waller takes surefooted steps into the vacuum of leadership…but she harbors an agenda far darker and more twisted than anyone yet realizes.