After yesterday’s Black Adam trailer blew our socks off, more details have been unveiled about Dwayne Johnson’s anti-hero, and how he will fit into the rest of the DCEU!
The Black Adam film has been a long time coming, with the first whispers of Dwayne Johnson playing the character starting as far back as 2007. Though he was originally intended to be the main villain of the Shazam! film, the character of Black Adam eventually spun off into his own project and was given an official announcement in 2017. All these years later, we are finally seeing the Rock suit up as the iconic DC supervillain… and it seems to be well worth the wait! But how will Black Adam fit into the larger DCEU?
After all, the DC Universe isn’t the same as it was when this movie was first announced. Back in 2017, Warner Bros. was neck-deep in Joss Whedon’s horrendous Justice League film, which hit theaters like a brick and sent massive shockwaves through the nerd community. What was supposed to be the lynchpin of the entire DC film universe had ended up being an unmitigated disaster, which was quickly followed by actors and directors stepping down, movies being canceled, and serious allegations coming out against the studio.
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Then came the release of Zack Snyder’s Justice League film, and all the new projects that have happened since. With the DCEU now flying in a thousand bold and exciting directions, the universe looks very different than it did when Dwayne Johnson first announced himself in the role of Black Adam. Because of this, many fans are wondering how these changes affected the film.
Did scripts have to be rewritten? Will Dwayne Johnson interact with any other DC heroes?
And what will his role be in the future of the DC franchise?
HOW BLACK ADAM FITS INTO THE DCEU
According to producer Hiram Garcia, the plans for the Black Adam movie have remained unchanged throughout all the chaos of the last few years. In a recent interview with ScreenRant, Garcia revealed that all the changes at Warner Bros. and DC never affected the core story that he and the crew wanted to tell.
“Luckily, we didn’t [have to go back to the drawing board],” he said, “Because we’ve been functionally within our section. Basically, we knew the characters we had: we had Black Adam and JSA, and we were launching things attached to that. Our world has stayed very much intact, so even though there has been some changes, it hasn’t really affected us. That’s been a very fortunate thing. There’s been a lot going on, but we’ve been able to maintain our bubble and our lane. We continue to build it out.”
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This is an interesting quote coming from a producer involved in one of the most tumultuous universes in the film industry. While chaos reigned throughout the rest of Warner Bros over the last few years, the crew behind Black Adam seems to have stuck to their guns, never straying from the story they wanted to tell. This is extremely refreshing to hear, especially in a world where many Hollywood producers seem incredibly overly reactive to the audience…hacking and morphing their IP’s into what they think the public wants to see.
This often results in a Frankenstein’s monster of a movie; a stitched-together story composed of several different ideas, each one added by a creator who had their hands in the pie at one point and time. It’s great to see that the Black Adam film never changed to align itself with the other DC properties. It knew its lane, and it forged its own path.
That’s not to say that it isn’t connected to the broader universe, however! Black Adam is part of the DCEU, and will surely cross over with Shazam at some point in the future. Hiram Garcia has also hinted that the movie might spin off into other side-projects, including a possible film about Doctor Fate (Pierce Brosnan), or Hawkman (Aldis Hodge). Further, he also told ScreenRant that Black Adam is aware of the existence of other heroes in this universe, such as Batman and Superman.
“You’ll feel the effects in our world,” he says. “We know that those guys exist. There’s even conversations where he’s told that there’s other heroes out there, but he’s very specific to the kind of hero he is. We like the idea of knowing that he has now been put into this world, and he’s kind of a disruption, because they’re not used to having a person that powerful be that much of a livewire. They can’t figure out how to control him.”
THE FUTURE OF DWAYNE JOHNSON’S BLACK ADAM
Garcia’s quotes get us excited for the future of this franchise, but it’s the power and resolve of Dwayne Johnson that really sells us. From the very beginning, Johnson has been deeply involved in the creative process of this movie, continuing to champion the project despite his incredible workload. Over and over, he has insisted that this movie would see the light of day, and that it would change the hierarchy of power within the DCEU. Speaking to ScreenRant in a recent interview, he expounded on his plans for the future of the franchise:
“I am 100% committed to not only Black Adam, but then expanding the Black Adam universe and the DC universe. I am an optimist from the word go, so to me – and to all of us up here – all universes exist in our heads. We all will work very hard to make sure that we’re honoring the mythology, but also giving the fans what they want. And I hear [them]; we all do. I pick up everything that they’re putting down, and it doesn’t get by me; it doesn’t get by these guys.
This is the beginning – hopefully, fingers crossed – of a very long storytelling road where Black Adam is the anchoring jet fuel that will then push and press this universe out.”
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All of this points to a film that will be well worth the wait! We cant wait to see what the Rock’s been cooking…
Black Adam releases in theaters on October 21, 2022
What do you think about the Black Adam movie? When do you think he’ll meet up with Captain Marvel/Shazam? Do you want to see him take on Superman? Let us know what you think in the comments below and share your theories with us on Twitter.
Source: ScreenRant
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