Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson recently declared that the halted follow-up to DC Studios’ Black Adam got “caught in a vortex of new leadership”.
On an episode of Kevin Hart’s Hart To Heart, Johnson reflected on changes to DC Studios’ film slate when James Gunn and Peter Safran were tapped to helm the company last year.
“At that time, as we were creating Black Adam, developing it, shooting Black Adam… there was so many changes in leadership,” Johnson said on the talk show.
“And as you know, anytime 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 and fiscally — are going to make decisions that you may not agree with philosophically.
“I think Black Adam was one of those movies that got caught in that web of new leadership.”
Black Adam handed Johnson the best opening weekend of his career — at $67 million — for a movie in which he was the leading man.
Still, a number of publications considered the 2022 film a disappointment at the box office, as it reportedly needed at least $560 million to $600 million to break even.
The film grossed $393 million worldwide during its run, according to IMDbPro’s Box Office Mojo.
In December, Johnson cited Gunn as he revealed that the Black Adam character would not be in DC Studios’ “first chapter of storytelling”. But Johnson noted that he felt “very proud” of the released film, which was years in the making.
During his conversation on Hart To Heart, Johnson said that the dropped sequel “will always be one of the biggest mysteries.”
“You had the biggest opening of your career. Sure, no China — that could’ve been maybe 100, maybe 200 million more dollars. You’re establishing a new superhero and you want to grow out the franchise. You bring back Superman and Henry Cavill — the world went crazy,” he said.
“And we created a diverse superhero portfolio, where we had just men and women of colour in Black Adam, and Black Adam 2 as well.”
Watch clips from Kevin Hart’s conversation with Johnson below: