It wasn’t that long ago that Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson said that the DC Comics property he was going to star in was Shazam, the hero formerly known as Captain Marvel. However, no one knew if he was going to play Shazam himself or the villain Black Adam, who The Rock always said was one of his favotire DC Comics characters. Well, The Rock announced today on Twitter that he will be playing Black Adam in the DC Comics movie.
“Kneel at his feet or get crushed by his boot.” My honor to become.. #BlackAdam #TheAntiHero #DCComics pic.twitter.com/Qk55eNf3R7
— Dwayne Johnson (@TheRock) September 3, 2014
This is awesome news.
For people who don’t know comics, Black Adam spent most of his career as the main villain for Captain Marvel, but starting around the time of the series “52” (not to be confused with the New 52), he became awesome. In that series, DC Comics released a comic a week for a full year where Batman, Superman and Wonder Woman all disappeared. That allowed them to focus on minor characters and Black Adam was one of those characters.
In his story, he married and developed a family unit of his own. He also ruled over a small Middle Eastern country that saw him as their savior and not as the evil villain the rest of the world knew him as. Despite this, the rest of the world still feared him and caused a lot of political tension with his country. When a villain attacked and caused the death of his family, Black Adam lashed out and started World War III.
In the end, Black Adam was a perfect anti-hero, fighting for what he believed in while the world’s “real heroes” fought to stop him without ever understanding him.
Honestly, Shazam himself is a boring character – a child who has the powers of a God but retains his childlike personality while fighting as a hero. In classic comics, he was extremely boring and in the New 52 he is just annoying. However, Black Adam is charismatic and very arrogant. The Rock fits the Black Adam character like a glove and this is much better news than if he was cast as the hero of the title.
While the Warner Bros. DC Comics Shazam movie has no release date, the rumors indicate it might come in 2016 after the “Batman V Superman: Dawn of Justice” movie.