It seems somewhat odd that in this era of superhero movie domination, we have yet to see Dwayne Johnson headline as a bona fide comic book superhero. He’s played plenty of heroic figures in fun action-adventure films, but the actual superhero genre has yet to snag the former wrestler. He has long been associated with the DC title Shazam!, but with this remaining unconfirmed and unannounced, it has been left to an entirely different creative team to apparently lock him in: director Shane Black and his adaptation of Doc Savage.
While it has not been officially announced, Dwayne Johnson seems to have dropped a sizeable hint about his involvement in a Doc Savage project via his Instagram account.
With director Shane Black having previously discussed his desire to make a Doc Savage movie in 2017 with Johnson in the title role, it doesn’t take much detective work to connect the dots and draw a fairly clear conclusion that Johnson is all in for the adaptation of this character.
Doc Savage appeared in American pulp magazines in the 1930s and 1940s, and was created by Henry W. Ralston and John L. Nanovic. Actually named Clark Savage Jr., he was a man of many talents – including undertaking adventures as a scientist, inventor, explorer and researcher. The main thrust of his story, however, is that his father trained him to have almost superhuman abilities – which means this Shane Black-Dwayne Johnson partnership has franchise written all over it.
