So much of Aquaman’s marketing campaign focuses on the conflict between Arthur Curry and Orm over Atlantis’ throne. Because of this, it’s easy to forget that another one of Aquaman’s deadliest enemies is in the movie as well. A new clip from next week’s film shows Yahya Abdul-Mateen II’s Black Manta making his debut on a submarine. Armed with an assault rifle and twin blades, the intensity of his fight against the title character is compounded by the vessel’s close quarters. You can check out the new footage via ComicBook.com below.
The clip premiered on an episode of The Late Late Show with James Corden earlier this week. At the start of their battle, Black Manta tells Jason Momoa’s Arthur that he’s “waited a long time for this.” However, Arthur is none the wiser to his identity. Despite his training, the villain is easily bested in combat by the Atlantean prince. Previously released footage showed newspaper clippings of Arthur’s heroic exploits tacked to a wall. It’s possible that Black Manta was collecting these excerpts in order to track the fabled Aquaman’s movements across the oceans.
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In the original DC Comics, Black Manta held a grudge against Aquaman since the days of his youth. He blamed the hero for failing to rescue him from the abusive sailors who kidnapped him as a child and forced him to work on their boat. DC’s New 52 relaunch retooled the character’s backstory several years later. In that version, Aquaman accidentally killed Black Manta’s father after the helmeted mercenary attacked his own father, Thomas Curry. This prompted the character to seek out the members of Arthur’s Atlantean team of Others and attempt to pick them off one by one.
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