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Amber Heard Talks About What Excited Her About the Role of Mera in Aquaman

Published Fri, 22 Jun 2018 17:55:48 -0500

Last updated Sat, 23 Jun 2018 08:38:58 -0500

We're learning more and more about Aquaman every day. As the summer continues on we should expect the marketing for this DC movie to kick into high gear. One of the ways we're learning about this movie is through cover stories like the one on Entertainment Weekly. They spoke to Amber Heard about what drew her to character of of Mera in the first place.

That Mera has her own name. Before I decided to take on this role I read a couple of the comic books and I was struck by how Mera was introduced. She comes into this one scene in the first comic I read where Arthur (Jason Momoa) is attempting to save the town from a flood and she helps him. She has an equal part in saving this village. And these civilians turn to each other and say, "Who is that? Is that Aquawoman?" And she says something to the effect of, "No, I have my own name, my name is Mera." That resonated with me as somebody who's always been allergic to being the damsel, the two-dimensional archetype of what women are often limited to in this industry — especially in the superhero world. So when I spoke to [Justice League director Zack Snyder] he got me at "warrior queen." He said, "You get a sword and a crown" and I'm like, "Okay, you know how to play to your audience."

So it sounds like Heard was against showing up as just another love interest in a superhero movie. Mera needed to be her own person with her own life outside of the life of Arthur Curry, aka Aquaman. Heard went on to elaborate where we find Mera and a bit of her past by the time Aquaman starts.

She's a warrior who was raised by the queen of Atlantis before she passed. We meet Mera after the queen has long since left and she's been raised to take over as queen her whole life. She's been raised to serve her kingdom and rule over Atlantis with King Orm (Patrick Wilson). She's very disciplined and almost militaristic. She's fully dedicated to saving her nation and that serves as an impetus to go to the surface world and elicit help from Arthur who's the polar opposite of Mera — he lives in the moment, he's confused about his identity, he lacks the purpose and focus that Mera has, which makes them an unlikely duo. But it's that disparity that makes a nuanced relationship between them. Where one is strong the other is weak and those differences are a conduit for their bonding.

Mera isn't just a politician or future Queen. She's a warrior with her own unique skill set: hydrokinesis, or the power to control water, the same way a person with pyrokinesis would control fire.

So there's an old-fashioned hierarchy in their society that they rule Atlantis. There are different tribe communities within the social hierarchy. Some of us have certain superpowers and I have hydrokinesis — not just making bubbles.

The comment about "bubbles" comes from the only time we've seen Mera use her powers, which was in a brief scene in Justice League. Mera is a very powerful character, and Heard wants everyone to know, right away, that she has the strength to fight her own battles long before Arthur gets involved.

Summary: Arthur Curry learns that he is the heir to the underwater kingdom of Atlantis, and must step forward to lead his people and to be a hero to the world.

Aquaman will be directed by James Wan and stars Jason Momoa, Amber Heard, Nicole Kidman, Patrick Wilson, and Willem Dafoe. It will be released December 21st.

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