The DCU is on such a terrible run at the box office that Black Adam stands tall as the franchise’s highest-grossing theatrical release in five years, which says it all about the brand’s current misfortune.
Despite boasting the biggest star on the planet in the title role making his debut in the industry’s most consistently bankable genre, Dwayne Johnson’s passion project that was 15 years in the making couldn’t crack $400 million globally, and was swept under the rug the instant James Gunn and Peter Safran came to power.
The Rock had been touting sequels, spin-offs, and crossovers aplenty, but Gunn’s own Superman: Legacy has only gone ahead and stolen every ounce of his thunder. David Corenswet replaced Henry Cavill – who Johnson had spent years trying to bring back into the fold for a cameo – as the Man of Steel, while Isabela Merced was recently announced as Hawgirl.
Of course, Aldis Hodge played Hawkman in Black Adam, and he was planned to headline a Justice Society solo project that would have brought his opposite number into the mix, only for the latest shift in DC’s strategy casting both the Kal-El showdown and JSA offshoot into the ether.
There’s one move left up Gunn’s sleeve that would take the biscuit, though; the filmmaker has noted on several occasions that he’s a huge fan of Krypto the Superdog, who was of course voiced by Johnson (and set up for a second Superman crossover) in DC League of Super-Pets. Only time will tell if he ticks off that box, too.
