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PORTSIDE CULTURE
AMC’S “NAUTILUS” GIVES US INDIANA-JONES WORTHY ADVENTURE WITH
IMPERIALIST VILLAINS
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Cristina Escobar
June 28, 2025
RogerEbert.com
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_ And that’s the other tenth of the show—a clear-eyed portrayal
of the evils of imperialism and the colonialism that empowered it. _
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AMC’s (formerly Disney’s
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“Nautilus” is nine-tenths fun adventure. We’re talking
otherworldly sea creatures, lost treasure, and 1850s technical
marvels, portrayed by the best our 2020s studios can offer. The
ten-part first season follows Nemo (an appealing Shazad Latif
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Odysseus-esque captain of the first-ever submarine, sharing the
show’s title, in this loose adaptation of “Twenty Thousand Leagues
Under the Sea.” He’s on an adventure to escape the British East
India Mercantile Company that enslaved him and most of his shipmates,
in addition to committing a whole host of atrocities.
And that’s the other tenth of the show—a clear-eyed portrayal of
the evils of imperialism and the colonialism that empowered it. The
brown and Black crew members of the Nautilus (including Pacharo Mzembe
as the endearing firstmate Boniface) are escaping war crimes and
enslavement. They are right to take arms against the unjust system
that has gobbled them up along with their homes, even if their primary
goal is just to survive personally.
The upper class white women—Georgia Flood as the intrepid, eligible
engineer Humility, and Céline Menville as her fierce French
maid/chaperone, Lottie—are also stuck in a patriarchal system that
treats them as chattel, even as it provides them with good meals and
pretty dresses along the way. I do wish Humility were more person and
less plucky stereotype, but she gets some meaningful arcs as the story
goes on, which counts for something in a show that is much more
interested in plot than character development.
Nautilus/Series 1. (L to R) Kayden Price as Blaster, Georgia Flood as
Humility, Shazad Latif as Captain Nemo in Nautilus/Series 1. Cr. Vince
Valitutti/Disney+ © 2022.
“Nautilus” also shows us how the system shapes white
men—there’s Gustave Benoit (Thierry Frémont), the French
scientist who builds the Nautilus and engineers its escape with Nemo
rather than see his scientific creation become an instrument of
horror. The company’s foot soldiers are generally there against
their will, having chosen between starvation and conscription. And the
leaders—Cameron Cuffe as Humility’s finance and would-be jailor
Lord Pitt and Damien Garvey as the ultimate capitalist and company
leader Director Crawley—are insecure snivels of men, certainly no
one to envy.
It’s a compelling backdrop for an adventure. The stakes are high,
the cause is righteous, and the villains are smarmy. The bad guys in
“Nautilus” are akin to the ones in “Raiders of the Lost
Ark”—powerful and terrible, driven by malice. It’s just a simple
switch between imperialists and Nazis. One red military uniform for
another.
And like Indiana Jones’ tale, Nemo’s is powered by escaping peril,
not social commentary (even if that is baked in). And the adventure is
thrilling. Yes, obviously, we grown-up viewers know that the ship that
bears the show’s name will survive past the second episode, as will
our leading characters. Yet the threats that face them feel real. My
heart was pounding. That’s the magic of moving pictures, and it’s
in full effect here, with these sympathetic and attractive characters
achieving death-defying acts of physical strength and mental acumen to
stay alive and eventually triumph.
Nautilus/Series 1. Shazad Latif as Captain Nemo in Nautilus/Series 1.
Cr. Vince Valitutti/Disney+ © 2022.
The monsters—underwater and above land, human and creature, big and
small—are terrifying. And the filmmakers know how to harness and
hone in on what makes them scary, giving us the close-up of one’s
giant eye in one episode and another’s insatiable gaping mouth the
next.
Now, some of the beats are pat. The love stories are predictable and
obvious, if satisfying. As are some of the deaths and plot twists.
Certainly, if you have a favorite sea myth, expect to see it in this
first season. But that’s not bad, just part of the genre.
With these well-worn, comforting beats, “Nautilus” is fun to watch
and feels ever so slightly subversive.It’s perhaps a bit rebellious
to paint the historical British East India Mercantile Company as the
Nazis of their time, particularly as fascism and ethnic cleansing rock
any modern pretense we may have of peace. For those unfamiliar with
the Company’s atrocities, there’s a lot to learn (or Google
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with hopefully some of the evil of it sinking in. For those who are
familiar with the history, it’s satisfying to see a visually rich,
mainstream story utilize this moral framing.
Certainly, to have an escapist show following righteous fighters who
take arms against imperialism feels good. And yes, “Nautilus”
shows the human cost and terrible harm of the Company’s historical
power grab. But it’s also a rocking good time, an adventure worthy
of its budget, with a set of heroes worthy of our allegiance,
attention, and admiration.
_Full season screened for review. Premieres June 29 on AMC+._
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Cristina Escobar
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Cristina Escobar is the co-founder of LatinaMedia.Co, a digital
publication uplifting Latina and gender non-conforming Latinx
perspectives in media.
* AMC
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* nautilus
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* imperialism
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* colonialism
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