The Truth Behind Aquaman And Wonder Woman's Romance

When people have known each other as long as the original members of the Justice League, it's not too surprising for those involved to consider each other romantically. Two of the most common "ships" involve Wonder Woman dating either Batman or Superman, but one of the most rare pairings connects Diana with Aquaman, the King of the Seven Seas. 

Though a relationship between these two might seem odd at first, they actually have a lot in common. They are both members of royalty who hail from long-lost kingdoms of Ancient Greece, and their long history with the Justice League shows that they clearly share similar values of truth and, well, justice. Suggested to mainstream audiences for the first time in the 2017 release of Justice League, Diana Prince and Arthur Curry are one of the few pairings within the Justice League that actually makes sense — but tragically, it might simply be doomed to fail. 

The humorous scene in 2017's Justice League was not the last time that the pairing would be mentioned in the DCEU. James Wan's Aquaman would address the idea one again it released in 2018. Though the film spends a great deal of its runtime building up a growing relationship between Arthur and Mera, it takes a brief moment in its mid-credits scene to make sure DC's viewers didn't get the wrong idea about Aquaman's previous confession. 

The mid-credits scene begins with one of the film's antagonists, Black Manta, waking up after being rescued out at sea and brought to a scientist named Dr. Stephen Shin. Dr. Shin has been studying Atlanteans his entire life and wants desperately to find out more about them and discover where they live. It's his life work, and Black Manta is more than happy to oblige — as long as Dr. Shin tells him everything that he knows about Aquaman. 

This is communicated when Manta throws a knife into a group of newspaper clippings that have been stuck to a wall. The knife lands in the middle of an article asking, "Who is Aquaman?", and just below it is a different article titled "Wonder Woman Nixes Aquaman Dating Rumours." 

In addition to their royal heritage, Diana and Arthur both hail from hidden, esoteric kingdoms with long and storied histories. The Amazons of Themyscira have existed for several thousand years, living out their immortality in peace and prosperity while developing numerous advances in both science and magic to ensure their safety and happiness forevermore. 

The Atlanteans, by contrast, have also been around for centuries untold, but their history is far less peaceful. The Atlanteans are typically described as a warlike and superstitious race who are slow to trust and quick to attack. They hate outsiders, even if those outsiders are sea dwellers like themselves. 

The History of Atlantis is filled with legends of wars against the other Seven Kingdoms of the seas, and Zack Snyder's Justice League even added the Amazons to that long list of enemy states. Snyder's film cites an ancient war between the Amazons and Atlanteans multiple times throughout the film, using it as a relatively minor point of contention between Wonder Woman and Aquaman as they attempt to work together on the team.

This shared history could simultaneously provide the couple even more common ground to bond over while also create a conflict for their relationship to overcome. The cultural differences and the animosity between their people could be something they must learn to live with while also providing outside interference as their disparate courts attempt to prevent them from marrying "the enemy" a la Romeo and Juliet.

In the 1994 Aquaman series' first annual, writer Peter David revealed that Arthur Curry and Diana Prince first met long before either of them became superheroes. During their young adult years, while Arthur was still exploring the ocean depths in search of meaning and Diana was watching the horizon and dreaming of the world outside her island paradise, the pair were forced to team-up in order to stop Triton, the son of the Greek god Poseidon, from making Diana his wife. 

Though no match for a Greek god, the pair worked together to stall him long enough for Diana to get away and summon Queen Hippolyta and her grand army of the Amazons, who sent the wannabe tyrant packing. After the fighting was over, Diana and Arthur stole a moment together on the beach but could not share the kiss they both longed for as Arthur was not allowed to enter the island and Diana was not yet allowed to leave it. Forlorn, the pair said their goodbyes, and Arthur swam away. 

They would get a second chance, however. Over a decade after the original incarnation had finally disbanded, the founding members finally decided it was time to join forces as the JLA once again. Wonder Woman and Aquaman were both quite different by now, however. Diana was a battle-hardened warrior who had managed to retain her deep compassion and love for all life, but Aquaman had become a grizzled and jaded loner who despised both the land and Atlantis. He hated the surface world for what they had done to the sea, and he hated the responsibility of needing to be the sole protector of every ocean on earth. 

For some reason, however, he still rejoined the JLA when the time came — and in 1998's JLA 80-Page Giant #1,during a relatively routine mission to rescue a damaged submarine, Wonder Woman found out why. Because other cables had snapped while towing the damaged vessel, Aquaman and Diana decided to use Wonder Woman's unbreakable Lasso of Truth to pull the sub instead. While holding it, Aquaman revealed that he was deeply attracted to Diana and had chosen to remain on the team because of her. 

Feelings were finally expressed, but Arthur was too late. Whatever Diana might have felt for him when they were younger was gone. Though she deeply admired him as an ally and friend, she did not reciprocate his romantic feelings, and the pair went their separate ways with a promise not to speak of this again. 

One question still remains. If these two heroes were attracted to each other for so long, why didn't they pursue it before it was too late? When they first met, they were literally divided by mystical and cultural forces they could do nothing about, but they could have tried again once they were teammates on the Justice League. The answer is surprisingly simple: for most of their time together, Aquaman was already married. 

Though the Justice League of America was officially created in 1960, Aquaman met the love of his life, Mera, just three years later when she was created in 1963, and the couple would get married just a year after that in 1964. Though this might seem like plenty of time for the pair to have explored a romance, fans have to realize that superheroes dating was pretty rare during that time in comics history — and three years of publishing history is more like only a few weeks of actual in-universe time. 

Mera and Aquaman would remain happily married for years until an unspeakable tragedy destroyed their relationship. In 1974, Aquaman's archenemy, Black Manta, murdered Aquaman and Mera's only son. Though the villain was defeated and though they tried to make it work, they were unable to overcome that loss and eventually separated. Aquaman deeply mourned the loss of his wife and son. He changed dramatically because of it, and by the time he might have been ready to love again, Diana could only see him as a friend. 

A romance between Aquaman and Wonder Woman seems ill-timed at best and world-shattering at worst. Like ships in the night, Diana and Arthur seem destined to never meet at the right time, and thus, their relationship has never extended beyond platonic friendship, which will likely remain the status quo for a long time to come. 

Though the idea was teased in Joss Whedon's Justice League and mentioned even more briefly in Aquaman, this idea is most likely nothing more than jokes. Aquaman's movies are poised to pursue his relationship with Mera, and the comics have followed suit, (re)marrying the couple last November in Aquaman #65. 

If that wasn't enough, DC has also been spending time exploring a friendship between Mera and Wonder Woman that has been a welcome sight. The two heroes were instrumental in helping each other survive DC's Blackest Night event, and they paired up again in DC Bombshell's second issue, which revealed that not only had the two been friends since childhood, they were also each other's first kiss.