“Black Adam” is the eleventh film in the DCEU. Dwayne Johnson stars as the titular character.
So let’s dive into some trivia and facts about the film.
- Black Adam is a 2022 American superhero film
- It is based on the DC Comics character of the same name
- Produced by New Line Cinema, DC Films, Seven Bucks Productions, and FlynnPictureCo.
- It is a spin-off from Shazam! (2019)
- Black Adam is the eleventh film in the DC Extended Universe (DCEU)
- Serving as the first installment of Phase One
- The film is directed by Jaume Collet-Serra
- It is written by Adam Sztykiel, Rory Haines, and Sohrab Noshirvani
- In the film stars Dwayne Johnson as the titular character alongside Aldis Hodge
- Alongside Noah Centineo, Sarah Shahi, Marwan Kenzari, Quintessa Swindell, Bodhi Sabongui, and Pierce Brosnan
- Johnson served as a producer
- Johnson was attached to Shazam! early in development and confirmed to portray the villain Black Adam in September 2014
- But the producers later decided to give the character his own film
- Sztykiel was hired in October 2017
- Collet-Serra joined in June 2019 for a planned release date of December 2021
- This timeline was delayed by the COVID-19 pandemic
- Additional casting took place over the next year, including four members of the Justice Society of America (JSA)
- The script was rewritten by Haines and Noshirvani
- Filming took place from April to August 2021 at Trilith Studios in Atlanta, Georgia, and also in Los Angeles.
- Black Adam had its world premiere in Mexico City on October 3, 2022
- It was theatrically released in the United States on October 21, 2022, by Warner Bros. Pictures.
- Critics praised the performances of Johnson and Brosnan
- They criticized the screenplay and villain
- While the action sequences drew polarized responses
- New Line Cinema began the development of a Shazam! feature film in the early 2000s, based on the DC Comics character Captain Marvel
- The title came from the wizard Shazam who gives the hero his powers, with DC unable to use the title Captain Marvel due to legal issues
- Peter Segal signed on to direct the film in April 2006
- And Dwayne Johnson was approached about portraying Captain Marvel later that year
- By November 2007, Johnson was also interested in the film’s antagonist, Black Adam, and had received positive responses from fans about him possibly playing that character
- Development on the film was placed on hold by January 2009
- It had begun again by April 2014 when Warner Bros. (the parent company of New Line) and DC began planning a slate of superhero films for its shared universe, the DC Extended Universe (DCEU)
- That August, Johnson said he was still attached to the film but had not yet decided if he would play Captain Marvel or Black Adam
- A month later, Johnson announced that he would portray Black Adam
- In January 2017, Johnson met with DC’s Geoff Johns to discuss the project after studio executives grew concerned that an actor of Johnson’s profile was being used as a villain and supporting character in the film instead of starring in it
- Following that meeting, they decided to split the project into two films: Shazam! (2019), starring the hero Captain Marvel who DC had since rebranded as Shazam; and Black Adam, with Johnson starring as the title antihero
- Johnson said the two characters would meet onscreen in the future
- Johns confirmed in July that Johnson would not appear in Shazam!
- Though his likeness is used in that film for a magical hologram of Black Adam conjured by the wizard Shazam
- Adam Sztykiel was hired to write the screenplay for Black Adam in October 2017, with Johnson set to produce the film with Dany and Hiram Garcia of Seven Bucks Productions along with Beau Flynn of FlynnPictureCo
- At that time, there were plans for Johnson to first appear as Black Adam in the sequel to Suicide Squad (2016), which had Gavin O’Connor attached as writer and possible director
- The intention was for the members of the Suicide Squad to be tracking a weapon of mass destruction which would be revealed as Black Adam in a small role for Johnson
- These plans were abandoned when O’Connor left that film in 2018
- Sztykiel completed a draft of the Black Adam script by April 2018, when Johnson said there was potential for filming to begin in 2019
- At the end of August, Sztykiel handed in another draft and further revisions were underway
- Hiram Garcia said then that giving Shazam and Black Adam their own films was allowing the best movie for each character to be developed
- He added that their depiction of Black Adam was not going to be “softened up for audiences”, explaining that he is “not the boy scout superhero, he’s the guy that’s like, okay, you cross him? Well, I rip your head off”
- In December, Johnson said filming would not begin until the end of 2019 at the earliest due to his commitments to Jumanji: The Next Level (2019) and Red Notice (2021)
- After the successful release of Shazam!, Black Adam became a priority for New Line
- By June 2019, Jaume Collet-Serra was in talks to direct the film after impressing Johnson as the director of Jungle Cruise (2021)
- Collet-Serra described Black Adam as the Dirty Harry of superheroes, and said the film would show a darker version of Johnson compared to the adventure comedy Jungle Cruise
- Johnson revealed in October that filming would begin in July 2020
- He announced the following month that Black Adam was scheduled to be released on December 22, 2021
- He also said Shazam would not appear in the film, but members of the Justice Society of America (JSA) would be introduced
- In July 2022, it was announced that Lorne Balfe, who previously wrote additional music for Christopher Nolan’s The Dark Knight Trilogy and composed the music for The Lego Batman Movie, would compose the score for the film
- Black Adam and the Justice Society’s themes were released by WaterTower Music as singles on September 29 and October 7, respectively
- The full soundtrack was released on October 14
- In the United States and Canada, Black Adam was released alongside Ticket to Paradise
- The film is projected to gross $50 – 60 million from 4,350 theaters in its opening weekend
- The film made $7.6 million from Thursday night previews
- This is the highest solo outing of Johnson’s career and besting Shazam!’s $5.9 million
- Rotten Tomatoes and Deseret News called film reviews mixed
- While Variety and Yahoo! News stated the film received negative reviews
- On Rotten Tomatoes, the film has an approval rating of 42%
- Based on 201 reviews
- With an average rating of 5.10/10
- The website’s critics consensus reads: “Black Adam may end up pointing the way to an exciting future for DC films, but as a standalone experience, it’s a wildly uneven letdown”
- On Metacritic, the film has a weighted average score of 41 out of 100
- Based on 49 critics
- Indicating “mixed or average reviews”
- Audiences polled by CinemaScore gave the film an average grade of “B+” on an A+ to F scale
- In February 2015, Johnson told Total Film that Black Adam would fight Superman or Batman in the future
- In April 2017, he stated that DC Films plan on Black Adam and Shazam appearing in a future film together
- Henry Cavill, who portrays Superman in the DCEU, said in April 2018 that there were plans for Johnson’s Black Adam to face off against Superman in the future
- Though he believed this will take place after Black Adam and Shazam collide
- Dany Garcia stated in May 2021 that Johnson and the other producers planned to make multiple Black Adam films during their “long-term relationship with DC”
- Hiram Garcia reiterated in July that there was potential for Cavill and Johnson to appear in a future project together as Superman and Black Adam
- That November, Hiram elaborated that they already had an outline for future films and spin-offs featuring Black Adam and the JSA that would be dependent on the first film being a success
- He added later that other characters beyond Shazam and Superman were being considered as potential future rivals for Black Adam such as Wonder Woman
- In October 2022, Johnson confirmed future plans for Black Adam to fight Superman in the DCEU, and reaffirmed plans for the character to crossover with Shazam
- In a separate interview, Johnson stated that the character will interact with various characters within the DCEU continuity
- While there are also options for iterations of characters that exist in their own separate universes (namely The Batman and Joker) to crossover through a multiversal scenario
- Furthermore, he confirmed Black Adam serves as the first film in Phase One of a new storytelling initiative in the DCEU, in the same vein as the Marvel Cinematic Universe’s manner of presenting their film slates in phases
- Producers Hiram Garcia and Beau Flynn confirmed to ComicBook.com on October 21, 2022 that a sequel was planned and it and hoped to release it as soon as possible
- Garcia added that they envisioned the film to be a buildup towards an eventual clash between Superman and Black Adam
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