Dwayne Johnson done with DC and Black Adam role (& why that's good)

Dwayne Johnson worked really hard to get Black Adam made. He got in the best shape of his life and gave it all he had. But sadly, that wasn’t enough as the movie was flawed on other ends, such as its writing and lack of originality. Unfortunately, it was a very short run for him as the entire DCU is being rebooted.

With James Gunn in charge, everyone from the old DCEU is getting recast. Black Adam turned out to be yet another mediocre outing from the DCEU slate, as it didn’t make a lot of money. And since there were a lot of consistency issues in the larger narrative, the decision to hit a hard reset was inevitable. So just like Henry Cavill, the Rock is also parting ways from his DC role.

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Dwayne Johnson is Black Adam no more

After speaking with James Gunn, Dwayne Johnson finally announced his exit from the DCU. The hierarchy of power in the DC universe has truly changed as James Gunn is in charge, and Black Adam has been shown the door. In his new tweet, Dwayne Johnson stated:

The Rock specifically mentions that Black Adam will not be a part of the first stage of DCU’s storytelling, but he could return in the future. However, one needs to understand that this is just industry talk as James Gunn plans to restart from scratch. Since Black Adam was connected with Henry Cavill’s Superman, he cannot be a part of the new DCU unless Gunn brings everyone back into a multiverse story.

It would also make sense if Dwayne Johnson could return as a different variant of Black Adam in James Gunn’s DCU. After all, two variants could have similar faces in the multiverse. Unfortunately, the fact that everyone in Gunn’s upcoming slate is being recast doesn’t bode well for Dwayne Johnson. However, this might be a blessing in disguise for Johnson and all his fans.

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Why it’s good for the Rock to be out of DCU

Dwayne Johnson as Black Adam (Image via DC)

Dwayne Johnson put in a lot of effort to bring Black Adam to life, but that effort didn’t pay off completely. First, he got booed at Comic-Con, which had probably never happened to him in his long career. Secondly, he embraced Black Adam and became the face of this franchise.

He ran a massive marketing campaign and vouched for Black Adam to change the power hierarchy in the DC universe. But it did not go in his favor as James Gunn got picked as the new leader of DC Studios. It was kind of embarrassing for the actor as he wanted Black Adam to begin the new phase of DC with his Seven Bucks Productions company playing a key role in the future.

The cast of Jumanji (Image via Sony)

On top of that, Dwayne Johnson had to put his reputation at stake while trying to prove that Black Adam was a success. All in all, being Black Adam hasn’t been the kind of success story that he would have wanted it to be. Leaving the DCU is good because the Rock can focus on the things that have worked well for him in the past.

The Jumanji movies, for instance, grossed almost $1.8 billion combined. And we’re still sitting on a great setup for his third Jumanji outing. So, DJ could return to that after finishing his Christmas movie, Red One. He is already set to return in the next two Red Notice outings as well, which is good for him because the first part turned out to be Netflix’s biggest movie ever.

Ryan Reynolds in Hobbs and Shaw (Image via Instagram/@vancityreynolds)

The Rock doesn’t wish to be in Fast X and Fast 11 because of his feud with Vin Diesel, but maybe he should return for a sequel to Hobbs and Shaw after Fast 11 wraps up that story. It was set up perfectly with Ryan Reynolds’s new character. So, Dwayne Johnson’s Hobbs could team up with Reynolds’s persona and take on the next supersoldier villain that Eteon throws at them.

This villain should be none other than Henry Cavill. We never got to see Dwayne Johnson’s Black Adam fight Cavill’s Superman. But maybe we could see these two beefcakes take each other on in the Fast and Furious space.

Overall, staying out of the DCU would be better for the Rock.