Dwayne Johnson has explained why he wanted the Black Adam character to have his own standalone film.
The 50-year-old superstar, speaking with Vanity Fair Thursday, said that he persuaded Warner Bros. to give the comic book villain a separate movie instead of blending the stories with his archrival character, Shazam.
The wrestler-turned-actor initially signed on to play the role in 2014, opposite Zachary Levi as Shazam.
The latest: Dwayne Johnson, 50, has explained why he wanted the Black Adam character to have his own standalone film. The actor was snapped at Comic-Con last month in San Diego
‘When the first draft of the movie came to us, it was a combination of Black Adam and Shazam: Two origin stories in one movie,’ Johnson told the publication. ‘Now that was the goal – so it wasn’t a complete surprise.’
Johnson said he instinctively was not a fan of the story structure, out of preservation for the Black Adam character.
‘When I read that, I just knew in my gut, “We can’t make this movie like this. We would be doing Black Adam an incredible disservice,”‘ Johnson said. ‘It would’ve been fine for Shazam having two origin stories converge in one movie, but not good for Black Adam.’
Johnson said he reached out to studio executives with his concerns, stating that combining both origin stories in the same film would not be best for the characters, and would dilute a potential confrontation between them moving forward.
Johnson said he reached out to studio executives with his concerns, stating that combining both origin stories in the same film would not be best for the characters, and would dilute a potential confrontation between them moving forward
‘I said, “I have to share my thoughts here. It’s very unpopular …” because everybody thought, “Hey, this script is great, let’s go make this movie,”‘ said the action star. ‘I said, “I really think that you should make Shazam!, make that movie on its own in the tone that you want. And I think we should separate this as well.’
In Shazam!, which arrived in theaters in 2019, a wizard character made reference to once bestowing powers on a person who used them ‘recklessly,’ at which point a figure resembling Johnson as Black Adam was seen.
In the Vanity Fair interview, Johnson said that the Black Adam character possesses powers comparable to those of Superman.
‘When you pull Black Adam out of the pantheon of superheroes in the DC Universe, he is blessed with these incredible superpowers from the gods that rival Superman,’ he said. ‘The difference is, well, a few things. Number one, Superman’s greatest weakness is magic, and one of Black Adam’s greatest superpowers is magic.
Johnson noted the villainous tendencies Black Adam has that differentiate him from the Man of Steel: ‘Superman won’t kill anybody. There’s a code that he lives by and he honors.
‘Black Adam has a unique code of ethics too. He will not hesitate – and I like to have a little fun when I’m explaining this – to rip somebody in half. Literally, he’ll grab someone by the neck and by the thigh and then rip them up, tear them apart.’
Black Adam, which is currently in post-production, is directed by Jaume Collet-Serra and also stars Viola Davis, Sarah Shahi, Pierce Brosnan, Aldis Hodge and Noah Centineo.
Collet-Serra told Vanity Fair that the forthcoming film is ‘not your typical superhero movie where a guy wants to be a superhero and gets the powers, and then you spend 50 minutes trying to figure out how the powers work.
‘This is a movie where you introduce Black Adam right away, and then throughout the movie you slowly peel back the onion and reveal what happened.’
The motion picture is set to open in theaters October 21.
