Black Adam

While watching Black Adam, I felt like I was watching a sort of mash-up of the MCU and DC films, especially considering the characters – Doctor Fate (Dr. Strange), Hawkman (Falcon), Atom Smasher (Ant-Man) and Cyclone (Storm or Enchantress) – whose almost rip-off-like similarities at times irritated me a little. In terms of action and visuals, the film is handled quite solidly, although there are way too many slow-motion sequences in places (the film might have been ten minutes shorter without them), but whatever. I found the cast a bit awkwardly chosen to the point of being second-rate in some cases (like the wannabe funny and heroic family). Too bad Black Adam isn't, as one might expect from the title, a bit darker (but not as visually badly dark as Batman vs Superman) and too bad it doesn't hold back with the humour a little. (Spoiler alert) I was "amused" that Marwan Kenzari basically reprised his role of Jafar. (10/20/2022)

They try their best, but with a stupid and muddled script that even The Rock can’t move. Dwayne's dream project has finally arrived and it's not bad, but it's not very good either. It’s average, with an excellent Brosnan, whose Doctor Fate deserves his own film. On the other hand, the rest of the JSA team, or whatever it was, is rather crap, but someone has to do that job. Black Adam has a couple of great scenes where he slices up the bad guys, rips their arms off, and doesn't coddle them at all, but he gets to the gory action for strange reasons, often with no apparent motivation. Colett-Serra doesn't have a coherent story to fill out the Snyder-esque slow motion action, but he tries; it's not much fun, unfortunately. Now we need to pray that Gunn writes the script for the sequel and that Clark will by for more than a brief chat. (11/28/2022)

It's not often that a DC film grabs my attention, but this one did. It has what many other DC films lack: humor, engaging characters, and Dwayne Johnson as the perfectly conflicted superhero Black Adam. Add in some impressive action scenes directed by Jaume Collet-Serra, and you've got an American adventure blockbuster that I thoroughly enjoyed. (12/24/2022)

#11 DCEU. Black Adam is a spin-off of Shazam!, and that is the most important thing you need to know in advance. It's not DC for adults, it's just another piece of the puzzle for teens. Unfortunately, the film was worked on for too long, so today its inclusion in the branching DCEU is only harmful. What's the point of all those winks, cameos, and Easter eggs when the whole world is constantly being restarted? Why introduce another team, the Justice Society of America, when apparently we won't see them again in this lineup and with these actors? Dwayne Johnson, Sarah Shahi, and Pierce Brosnan are fine, but all those promises leading nowhere are a problem. RIP Sups. (02/14/2023)

I went to the cinema to see Black Adam more out of boredom than pleasure and actually got exactly what I expected - (below) average. While Marvel is still more or less the same and keeps itself "in the middle" to please everyone, DC is a bit more mature and gives us either slapstick comedies like Shazam! or funny and at the same time gory action like in The Suicide Squad. It's all the more surprising that Black Adam is neither of these and is a completely sub-par superhero action caper with nothing to dazzle. In terms of acting, it's an ensemble of "no names" along with an over-aged Pierce Brosnan and Dwayne Johnson in the lead role, but he's disastrously miscast for me here. His roles in F&F or jungle movies where he more or less parodies himself are fun and are a hit with internet memes, but I just can't buy him in a superhero role, he (sadly) lacks the acting talent, facial expressions and empathy for the character. In terms of story, we don't get much either, the characters of the heroes are bland, dull and without a stronger backstory, and on the audiovisual side, the action is ordinary and there's not much to praise. All in all, a classic digital action flick that falls short of similar films with its bland characters and weak fan-service, but I guess it can survive as a weaker three-star thanks to its fun genre classification... (10/21/2022)