Dwayne Johnson’s Black Adam received a mixed reception at the theaters and reports strongly suggested that the film failed to break even at the box office. But that’s not how Johnson viewed the reception of the film. Black Adam was the biggest opening of his entire career and it baffled the Fast & Furious actor that DC decided to discontinue his story after one film.
Johnson claimed that James Gunn’s decision to cut short the reign of the Kahndaq anti-hero wasn’t financially well-informed. He shared that even business people and Wall Street questioned the move. He shared that the film had great numbers despite COVID-related challenges.
Dwayne Johnson claimed James Gunn canceling Black Adam was a bad business decision
Black Adam was not a cheap film to make considering that sources mentioned its budget anywhere between $190 million and $260 million. According to Box Office Mojo, the film grossed $393 million at the worldwide box office. Reports suggested that the film failed to break even despite the decent box office collection post-COVID (via THR).
Dwayne Johnson earlier shared that Black Adam was a “once-in-a-career character” and that he gave his best to the film (via Total Film). When Black Adam 2 didn’t take off, Johnson blamed it on the new leadership under James Gunn. Johnson appeared on Kevin Hart’s Hart to Heart talk show and discussed the “biggest mystery” of discontinuing Black Adam. Johnson shared:
Any time you have a company, but especially that size and magnitude, that’s a publicly traded company and you have all those changes in leadership. You have people coming in who creatively, fiscally are going to make decisions that you may not agree with philosophically.
Johnson shared that it was baffling for him because he believed he did everything right for the film. He shared that it wasn’t just he and Hart who found the cancelation to be shocking, he shared that even Wall Street was mystified by the decision. He shared:
That will always be one of the biggest mysteries, I think, not only for me and us on our end, but also throughout our business. Because that’s a Kevin question. But that was a question out of Wall Street. That was a question out of Hollywood. That was a question like, ‘Wait a second. You had the biggest opening of your career. You’re establishing a new superhero. You want to grow out the franchise. You bring back Superman and Henry Cavill. The world went crazy.’
Johnson also shared that Black Adam created a diverse superhero portfolio, suggesting the introduction of Justice Society of America in the film. Johnson shared that they had men and women of color in the film playing these roles.
Dwayne Johnson brought in an NFL analogy to explain Black Adam 2 cancellation
Dwayne Johnson further shared with Kevin Hart that he and Hart always thought of the audience first as business-minded people. He shared that the viewers were their first boss and they focused on “creating things that are fresh.” He shared that when people come in at the top and disregard this one thing, they wouldn’t be able to agree with them.
However, Johnson shared that they had to eventually go along with these top-tier people on such decisions. He used the perfect NFL analogy to explain the circumstance. Johnson shared:
It’s like new ownership coming in, buying an NFL team and going, all right, not my head coach, not my quarterback. Doesn’t matter how many times you won a Super Bowl, doesn’t matter how many rings we got, I’m going with somebody else.
It wasn’t just a second Black Adam film that eventually got kicked off the DCEU roster. The entire universe was scrapped and replaced with the new DCU, with Gunn starting over with every single character.
Black Adam is now available for streaming on Max and Netflix.
This post belongs to FandomWire and first appeared on FandomWire
