After months of teasing, Dwayne ‘The Rock’ Johnson has confirmed that he’ll play Black Adam, one of DC Comics’ greatest anti-heroes in an upcoming DC Entertainment project for Warner Bros. Now if you’re wondering ‘Who the hell is Black Adam?’ here’s some info for ya.
Black Adam first appeared in The Marvel Family No. 1 back in 1945, and was originally Captain Marvel’s predecessor, having been given identical powers by the wizard Shazam during Ancient Egyptian times only to become corrupted by them. Having been banished to outer space by Shazam as punishment, he came back to Earth only to be tricked into saying his magic word and transforming into a regular human again, which meant that in an instant 5,000 years’ worth of ageing caught up with him.
After this, Black Adam wasn’t really heard from again until Shazam! No. 28 in 1977, where he quickly replaced the brainy (and admittedly goofy) talking space worm, Mr Mind, and mad scientist Dr Sivana, as a major player in Captain Marvel’s rogue’s gallery. When writer and current DC Entertainment chief creative officer Geoff Johns showed up, Black Adam became more well-known than Captain Marvel himself before receiving his own series, Black Adam: The Dark Age, in 2007.
Since DC’s ‘New 52’ reboot in 2011, Black Adam has only had a few appearances; he appeared in Johns’ Shazam! series with artist Gary Frank only to apparently die at the end, similar to his death in the original 1945 storyline. That only lasted a few months, with Johns then resurrecting Black Adam for the Forever Evil event series, when he teamed up with supervillains Lex Luthor, Sinestro and Captain Cold to save the world in the absence of the Justice League, placing him firmly in the anti-hero camp.
This morning, Johnson tweeted “’Kneel at his feet or get crushed by his boot.’ My honor to become.. #BlackAdam #TheAntiHero #DCComics.” Check out the tweet below:
The script is currently in development and production hasn’t yet started, but we’re happy as hell to see that Black Adam is going to be brought to life by one of our favourite action stars and we think it’s going to be spectacular. So be sure to come back for more info and the rundown on developments for the Shazam movie.
Johnson has said that he has ‘always been a fan of antiheroes,’ so it’s really no surprise that Black Adam is a character that would appeal to him, especially the current version of the character. The question now is, with Johnson playing Black Adam, who’s going to end up playing Shazam?
