AFTER MAKING HIS SMALL-SCREEN DEBUT AS A TROPICS-KISSED (AND TATTOO FREE) LIFEGUARD IN BAYWATCH’S HAWAII ERA, THE HONOLULU-BORN BRAWNMAN CEMENTED STARDOM AS THE ARAKH-WIELDING KHAL DROGO IN GAME OF THRONES BEFORE TAKING HIS RIGHTFUL TITLE AS DC’S AQUAMAN (THOUGH HE ORIGINALLY HAD HIS SIGHTS SET ON BATMAN). TODAY, MOMOA IS AN UNEQUIVOCAL POWERBRAND, EQUALLY EXTOLLED FOR HIS PHILANTHROPIC INITIATIVES AND MASSIVE HEART, AND STILL STEALING SCENES IN FRANCHISES AND FANTASIES, INCLUDING THE SPRING RELEASE OF THE GAMING LIVE-ACTION A MINECRAFT MOVIE, PLUS THE UPCOMING HISTORICAL BIOPIC CHIEF OF WAR

BY WILL HARRIS

He’s big, he’s brawny, and given that he starred in one of the most successful films of 2025, it’s a fair bet that he’s not going away anytime soon.

We’re talking, of course, about none other than Jason Momoa, who along with Jack Black set the silver screen ablaze in April with A Minecraft Movie, a film that gave Momoa the rare opportunity to do a comedy.

“When I was approached, I was actually working with my producer from Dune,” Momoa told Today’s Parent. “We became really good friends and he knew that I have kids, and he just kind of got my sense of humor. And he’s like, ‘Dude, you’ve got to do a comedy.’ I’m like, ‘I’d love to. Just no one really gives me a shot at it.’ And he said, ‘I got something for you.’ So he told me about Minecraft. I knew nothing about it. But then he explained it to me and said, at the root of it, it’s just about protecting imagination. And I can relate to that.”

Born in Honolulu, Hawaii, and raised in Norwalk, Iowa, Momoa didn’t get the acting bug until very late in this teens, and not until after he moved back to his home state to attend the University of Hawaii at Manoa. A successful audition for Baywatch: Hawaii led to a series-regular role as Jason Ioane, one which he reprised in the subsequent TV movie, Baywatch: Hawaiian Wedding. From there, he kept busy on multiple series, including North Shore, Stargate Atlantis, and The Game, but it wasn’t until 2011 when he really began to make a significant impact as an actor, thanks to the one-two punch of starring as the titular character in the theatrically released Conan the Barbarian and taking on the recurring role of Khal Drogo on Game of Thrones.

That said, Game of Thrones also led to a now-amusing development in Momoa’s career: he couldn’t get auditions for a while because he did such a good job as Khal Drogo that some people thought he couldn’t speak English.

“It was very challenging,” he admitted to Jimmy Fallon in 2018. “It’s, like, what do you do with Drogo? I mean, you’re not going to put him in a comedy. You’re pigeon holed a little bit. The first person who really [made me aware of it] was Fred Armisen. I met him my stepdaughter Zoe [Kravitz] did Portlandia – and he was so excited to meet me…and then he was like, “I didn’t even know you spoke English!” And it was heartbreaking. I was like, ‘That’s why I’m not getting any jobs!’”

Fortunately, it wasn’t very long thereafter that Momoa secured the gig that helped turn him into a proper movie star: Arthur Curry, a.k.a. Aquaman. Funnily enough, however, one of the reasons that he got the role was because he didn’t get the role that he originally auditioned to play: Batman.

“I almost didn’t go [to the audition] because I thought, ‘This is bulls–t. I’m not a white guy. I ain’t playing Batman,’” Momoa told Entertainment Weekly in 2018. “Even if I do, I don’t even want to. It’s like an American playing James Bond, you know? I almost didn’t do it. I thought for sure I was going to be playing Lobo or something. The only people I knew they were casting for were Batman, Superman, and Wonder Woman who the hell was I going to play? So in the meeting, I just played it as if Batman had died in an alley and some thug picked up his suit and put it on. I just played him as a smart ass, jaded and sarcastic. And that’s when Zack was like, ‘I have an idea…’”

Mind you, after wrapping up his run as Aquaman after 2023’s Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom, Momoa did end up getting cast by James Gunn to play Lobo… Ah, but we’re getting ahead of ourselves.

In the midst of his stint as a member of the Justice League, Momoa also found his way into a few other notable franchises: he played Duncan Idaho in Dune, as he mentioned off handedly in an earlier quote, and he also popped up as Dante Reyes in Fast X, a.k.a. the 10th chapter in the seemingly never-ending Fast & Furious saga. In addition, he did two TV series: the Canadian historical drama Frontier and the Apple TV+ post-apocalyptic drama See, which ran for three seasons before the show concluded.

“I think three seasons is pretty perfect,” Momoa told Collider in 2022. “I mean, depending on the show, but I feel like this was the perfect time to kind of wrap it all up. I feel like a lot of shows I’ve been part of didn’t plan for that. And then everyone’s always bummed out, and the fans are bummed out, and I think that’s the thing where I’m like, ‘Yes, let’s wrap this up. Let’s do it.’ And truth be told, we had so many projects coming up that we were doing, too.”

Fortunately, Momoa has remained on good terms with the Apple TV+ folks, which is undoubtedly one of the primary reasons he’s also joined forces with the streaming service for his new historical drama series, Chief of War, debuting on August 1.

“My dream is to do this,” Momoa told GQ in April. “This has been my everything. This is my Braveheart, this is my Last of the Mohicans. When I was a little kid, I looked at all these Native American movies, and I love samurai movies and I love all these cultures, and so this is it for us. This is our chance. And it’s taken us a long time, but I needed to wait until my career was in the right moment, and I needed to wait until we saved cinema with Minecraft to come back and just f***ing kill it, bro! And to make the Hawaiian story. It’s been like 25 years in the making to be able to pull off something like this, and it’s just really exciting.”

As is the opportunity for Momoa to play Lobo within James Gunn’s DC Universe, a role that debuts in June 2026 within Supergirl: Woman of Tomorrow, starring Milly Alcock (who played the young Rhaenyra Targaryen in HBO’s House of the Dragon) as the titular character.

Now that he’s completed his filming for the role, Momoa has been torturing journalists by telling them that he’s got a photo of himself as Lobo on his phone. Suffice to say that he’s beside himself with excitement over people getting to see him all decked out in his Lobo makeup and gear. It’s truly a dream come true for the actor.

“I always wanted to play Lobo, because I’m like, ‘Hello? It’s the perfect role,’” Momoa told Fandango in 2023, before actually getting the gig. “I mean, listen. If they call and ask me to play him, it’s a ‘f*** yeah.’”