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Black Adam


CoLA
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Anyone see it? It was...okay? It's nice to see a more morally grey type of "hero" who has no compunction to doing away with enemies and it was funny to see the Justice Society trying to keep up with him and keep him from killing the bad guys while also fighting him. Although they didn't seem to care about him killing the main bad guy at the end LOL. And a neat after credit scene, too!

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I thought the movie was pretty bad!

 

 

Don’t quite understand how Geoff Johns managed to inveigle all these huge corporate enterprises the Rock alone is a force unto himself, one must imagineinto filming a playthrough of a custom Mayfair Games DC Heroes module that he constructed for his own personal pleasure. I don’t know how how he did it! It’s an accomplishment all on its own. He got these guys to shell out cold hard cash for a movie where Hawkman, Dr. Fate, Atom Smasher, and one of those dumb dumb descendants him and David S. Goyer would pepper throughout their JSA run all fight a guy literally only him and a handful of retailers care about. Somehow this doofus managed to convince real people with real jobs to spend real money (lots of it! those shallow cuts on the soundtrack must not have come cheap!) on a movie starring a character he reinvented to minimal critical and commercial acclaim. Why did they do it? I don’t know. I guess they decided it didn’t really matter what the title character of a superhero movie is so long as the movie itself stands before the public naked and shivering as a piecemeal imitation assemblage of other contemporary superhero movies. They’d probably be right but I think it’s also pretty important to decide exactly what information needs to be exposited when and where in these kinds of movies they clearly decided to strip away any information about what exactly the deal is with Hawkman; prob. a good choice to just let the charisma of Aldis Hodge carry the day but that sort of good decision is imbalanced by so many bad ones, there’s line after line when they’re all in that car in the beginning about Isis’ (LOL!) necklace which it seems like they ... forgot to cut out when they cut out everything that stuff was leading to later???and they probably needed a different director too. Jaume Collet-Sera is pretty good at horror and at a certain kind of ersatz Hitchockian suspense, I just rewatched Unknown (‘11) and even though it’s not super duper great there’s still a pretty good scene with Liam Neeson in the hospital strapped to a gurney drugged into near-unconsciousness desperately reaching out for a pair of scissors in the breast pocket of a murdered nurse on the floor beneath him, still a good scene where Bruno Ganz and Frank Langella confront each other, my point is that this kind of blockbuster spectacle doesn’t seem to really be his deal. The parts that ARE his deal embedded within the movie are the best parts of an otherwise pretty dire movie, like it’s just fun to see Pierce Brosnan be Pierce Brosnan, tough to ruin Pierce Brosnan with a bad line, he just delivers the bad line in the best way possible, what’s my point, I guess I’m crediting the director for getting good performances from the actors in a bad movie. The core of the movie is kind of leaning as hard as possible into the adolescent power fantasy of superheroism, what if I were strong, what if I could go anywhere, what if nothing could hurt me, effortless triumph layered atop effortless triumph, but the core is surrounded by hastily tossed together garbage. They decided at the last minute they were going to tie the movie into other movies in addition to just imitating those other movies? Dumb. Gotta decide to tie the movie into other movies ahead of time, can’t hire Djimon Hounsou at the last second to show his face on camera for a moment, you gotta get value for money there.

Verdict : bad but as always for every bad superhero movie I am absolutely slavering for a sequel; let’s go, let’s have him fight Tawky Tawny, let’s have him fight Woozy Winks

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oh, yeah, the thing with

Superman is so dumb both within and without the movie. It’s kind of hilarious that The Rock is out there giving interview after interview about wanting to beat up Superman and how the balance of power in the DC Universe is about to change and how Superman is vulnerable to magic. It’d be like, I don’t know, if Ray Park back in ‘99 was telling Starlog Magazine he was going to absolutely demolish Luke Skywalker. You’re not his bad guy, dummy! That’s not who you fight!

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Another dumb thing

 

in the promotional tours The Rock was doing is when he talked about being a fan of the character even as a child. Really? I mean, it’s what they all say for every role of this type, they all go on the talk shows and stare dead-eyed into the camera and earnestly declaim to the world at large that as far as back as they can remember they’ve always wanted to be a T.H.U.N.D.E.R. Agent but in this case it’s extra egregious. You really always loved Black Adam, Dwayne? Is that going to come up on your show about your life? Are we going to see the version of you in the nineties [edit: that guy is in the movie itself as the Shazamified version of his son!!!1!] flipping through issues ofThe Power of Shazam!?!? I just don’t believe that Dwayne Johnson had even heard of Black Adam before Geoff Johns decided to retool the guy in the 00’s, sorry, he’s not Jack Black making songs about Young Nastyman, I don’t believe Dwayne Johnson engages with nerd material at the level of detail where this sort of second-tier villain would impinge on his consciousness.

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15 hours ago, R.CAllen said:

oh, yeah, the thing with

 

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Superman is so dumb both within and without the movie. It’s kind of hilarious that The Rock is out there giving interview after interview about wanting to beat up Superman and how the balance of power in the DC Universe is about to change and how Superman is vulnerable to magic. It’d be like, I don’t know, if Ray Park back in ‘99 was telling Starlog Magazine he was going to absolutely demolish Luke Skywalker. You’re not his bad guy, dummy! That’s not who you fight!

It's also weird since Billy Batson exists in this universe and is currently Shazam. They're arch enemies, have them face off instead. I'll spoiler this since it's for the after credits scene but

why is the assumption that Black Adam or Shazam can hurt Superman because he's vulnerable to magic? Like, yeah he doesn't have any more defense to it than the average person but it's not like BA or Shazam's punches should hurt him more because their strength is magic based. Do they have magic fingers?

:P

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Yeah, vulnerability just means you are open to a certain attack.  The idea of making a big deal that Superman is vulnerable to magic and therefore will be defeated is dumb.  Superman is just vulnerable to magic, but doesn't mean it will defeat him.  Practically everyone in DC is vulnerable to magic, not just Superman.  Magic is just another superpower is all.  In Kingdom Come, Superman and Shazam (back when they called him Captain Marvel!) faced off, and yeah, Shazam brought down some pain on Superman with his lightning, and nearly won. They are pretty much equal in all respects except Shazam has a lightning attack, whereas Superman has better speed and heat vision.  Superman was able to defeat Shazam because he was faster and able to cover Shazam's mouth to prevent him from speaking, anyway.   Since Black Adam has all the same powers as Shazam, it would likely be the same outcome if Superman and Black Adam fought. The only advantage Black Adam has over Shazam is he is more seasoned, but usually Shazam defeats Black Adam when they fight. 

 

Besides, DC won't allow Superman to be defeated in a movie.  He's the flagship of DC, after possibly Batman.

 

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No way. Superman is awesome. :)

I was trying to distinguish between a weakness, like Kryptonite, which Superman/Kryptonians are uniquely susceptible to, VS a vulnerability like magic, which practically everyone in DC is susceptible to.  It doesn't mean Superman can't be hurt or even killed by magic.  Just saying it isn't a vulnerability unique to Superman.  Distinction without much difference, perhaps?

Really, anyone in the Justice League, and Black Adam too, can potentially defeat Superman, now.  Wonder Woman, Supergirl, Batman, Green Lantern, Shazam, FLash, or Martian Manhunter all have that potential to fight Superman to a standstill, if not beat him.  Some, like Batman, HAVE beaten Superman.   So I don't buy the boring argument, either.   It just depends on who is writing the story. 

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3 minutes ago, CoLA said:

They even gave BA his own kryptonite, called Eternium! I thought was kind of lame but they always have to add a weakness for the really powerful characters. Except for Thor! But Thor's awesome.

I haven't read DC in ages, but I don't remember Eternium being a weakness when I was actively reading. Must be a more recent thing, or just made up for the movie.  

As for Thor, wouldn't being unworthy be his weakness?

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4 minutes ago, Zathras said:

I haven't read DC in ages, but I don't remember Eternium being a weakness when I was actively reading. Must be a more recent thing, or just made up for the movie.  

As for Thor, wouldn't being unworthy be his weakness?

I wikied Eternium, it's been around since 1998. I think that was around the time Black Adam started to become more than just a Captain Marvel villain, so they probably wanted a weakness so he wouldn't whoop Superman.

I guess for Thor? But it's only happened a couple times and he is still strong and invulnerable without it. Can't fly, though!

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  • 3 weeks later...

I had more fun watching it than I thought I would. It definitely wasn't GOOD, but it was fun. Hawkman and Dr. Fate were pretty good. DC movies do a better job of super speed than Marvel films do. I didn't read any other posts in this thread so I'm not gonna go in detail, but it was a decent 2 hour already been drinking kind of movie to watch.

Comic people: was it supposed to be Blaze and/or Satanus that resurrected the bad guy and I just missed some dialogue or something? Cuz it sure looked like it could/should have been them. Again I didn't read previous posts so my bad.

Also it's pretty hilarious thinking about how Henry Cavil Superman was in the credits and now James Gunn is about to reboot the whole DC movie universe. Very DC move. Reboot reboot reboot.

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On 11/30/2022 at 11:15 AM, CoLA said:

I wikied Eternium, it's been around since 1998. I think that was around the time Black Adam started to become more than just a Captain Marvel villain, so they probably wanted a weakness so he wouldn't whoop Superman.

I guess for Thor? But it's only happened a couple times and he is still strong and invulnerable without it. Can't fly, though!

Thor’s weakness is that for all his bravado he can’t handle failure. This is why Marvel’s always better in my eyes. Marvel heroes have human weaknesses, DC years are allergic to space rocks and primary colors or whatever.

9 hours ago, Quetzalcoatl said:

I'm all for a DC movie universe reboot.  Aside from the first Wonder Woman film, everything else has been pretty bad.  A reboot can only mean an improvement.  

Yeah, these movies have been trash, just start over. You lose some good casting but they can do better.

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9 hours ago, Tank said:

Yeah, these movies have been trash, just start over. You lose some good casting but they can do better.

Well, I agree there.  I am not against a reboot.  Just saying that it sucks you had a good casting (Gal Gadot and Henry Cavell especially), but were tied to bad writing.  Plus I just hate when movies tease a sequel and get shit canned, thus leaving you hanging.  I would have liked to see one more Henry Cavell Superman movie VS Black Adam.   But with Gunn, there is the potential to do Superman right. 

The only thing I thought was weird is you still have upcoming an Aquaman 2 and a Flash movie.  Now that word is out that the Snyderverse is officially dead, who is going to bother seeing those movies?  I wonder if Black Adam underperforming was the final straw and WB is just chalking those movies up as lost causes?

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On 12/20/2022 at 2:14 AM, Tank said:

Thor’s weakness is that for all his bravado he can’t handle failure. This is why Marvel’s always better in my eyes. Marvel heroes have human weaknesses, DC years are allergic to space rocks and primary colors or whatever.

And wood! LOL, that one has always been funny to me. Imagine a fight between the OG Green Lantern and Groot, there's one that will be over in a few seconds.

 

I also think it's funny how the DC movies are getting to be like the comics with reboots whereas Marvel just keeps chugging along.

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Agreed, do a clean start! The problem with DC is they do a reboot but not quite everything. Like the original Crisis kept some stuff around, like the Legion who still remembered Superboy. Nu 52 still had all the GL Blackest Night stuff that had happened a few years before and somehow Batman had gone through three Robins in a 5 year period.

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So looks like they are rebooting DC universe and they screwed Henry Cavil in the process. He quit the Witcher to play superman, the studio told him to announce his appearance as superman, and then did a u turn and told him, "actually you arent superman anymore we are rebooting the franchise".  Henry Cavil fans are pisssssed! Poor dude. Oh well, at least he's got a Warhammer 40k series in the pipe 

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