Aquaman’s version of Batman: Year One coming from Captain Marvel writer Kelly Sue DeConnick

Kelly Sue DeConnick is taking over the Aquaman title in addition to her DC Black Label title, Wonder Woman Historia: The Amazons, DC Entertainment Co-publisher Dan DiDio revealed to Polygon at this year’s San Diego Comic-Con.

The upcoming project will focus on the core of Aquaman’s mythology and character. It’s currently uncertain when the new project will be released — potentially this upcoming December, based on DiDio’s tease — but it will likely run as the main Aquaman title.

Regarding DeConnicks vision for the project, DC Entertainment Co-Publisher Jim Lee told Polygon:

It’s in many ways a reexamination of who the character is and it’s similar to [the Daredevil comic] Born Again or Batman: Year One. It’s a reexamination of what makes the character tick. She started talking about him having mother issues because his mother came from the sea and then leaves him and so every day he goes to the pier and looks for his mother and can communicate with all the sea life and he can command them to come to him, but the only person that he can’t command is his mother. And so what kind of hold does that leave on his psyche.

In terms of plot, Lee commented:

The story itself starts with him washing up on this mysterious island, he’s got amnesia, he doesn’t know who he is and so he’s got to discover that he’s the king of the seven seas again. And how that happens, and he meets all these other people on this island who are mysterious and very unusual and you find out that these people are sea gods, they are gods of the sea that have been thrown out from the very angry ocean. I think I spoke too much ... These sea gods from different mythologies and cultures from all around the world that have become forgotten and thrown out by an angry ocean.

DeConnick earned the title at a DC writer’s summit in which writers were invited to present pitches on whatever character they wanted. Those invited only needed a five-minute pitch to make the cut. DeConnick unpacked 40 minutes of Aquaman material in front of a room that included classic Aquaman witers Dan Abnett and Geoff Johns.

In Lee’s words, “She just killed it.”

The exciting, new Aquaman material comes on the heels (fins?) of Aquaman, the next film in the DC Extended Universe. Starring Jason Momoa, the tentpole will be released this December in theaters, and recently made a splash with the release of the film’s first poster.

Image: Warner Bros. Pictures

While it’s not certain when we’ll get to see DeConnick’s Aquaman in print, we can look forward to the film’s release on Dec. 21, 2018.