Nichola Beckford/Our Today Contributor
The long awaited, much anticipated, newest instalment in the DC Extended Universe (DCEU), Black Adam had its Jamaican premiere on the October 21 weekend.
Fifteen years in the making, the action movie stars Dwayne ‘The Rock’ Johnson as the anti-hero from the Shazam and DC comic books, as created by Bill Parker and C.C. Beck.
The movie, with a reported budget of US$195 million, has been met with a mixed response.
On the critics’ side, Black Adam went into its opening weekend with pre-release reviews just over 53 per cent positive, falling to 40 per cent after its three-day weekend.
But fan response to Black Adam has been much better, countering the poor critical response with a 90 per cent audience score on review aggregation website Rotten Tomatoes.
At the box office, Black Adam raked in US$67 million on its North American debut. This alone makes it one of the top openings of the year, Johnson’s highest non-sequel opening, and his biggest as a movie lead. As last Monday (October 24), Black Adam’s global total stood at US$142.9 million.
A quick chat with several members of the Jamaica Cosplay Club (JCC), who organised a Black Adam Movie linkup last Saturday (October 25) at Carib 5 in Cross Roads, St Andrew, provided some local perspective.
Giving it a glowing review was cosplayer Jerome Wilson. Putting his loyalties on the Marvel side of the comic book studio blockbuster movie war, he was enamoured enough by the pull of Johnson and early word of mouth to attend the movie dressed as Dr Fate, the character portrayed by Pierce Brosnan in the film.
“It didn’t disappoint,” said Wilson.
He stamped the movie with a 9 outof 10 rating, revelling in the action and story, with a small caveat.
“I really love Dwayne ‘The Rock’ Johnson. He brought some action and some real hype,” Wilson explained.
The caveat came next, as Wilson, with his knowledge of the comic book, was not a fan of the portrayals of Hawkman and Dr Fate.
“I thought he’d [Hawkman] have a little more character development instead of being like a punching bag for everyone. Secondly now, Dr Fate, he’s a stronger, wiser character than his movie depiction,” Wilson stated.
Marvel fanatic Shanique Barnaby wasn’t as gung-ho as Wilson to see the movie.
“Why I’m really a Marvel fan is because they do the execution a lot better. DC always falls flat some of the time. I don’t know why,” Barnaby stated.
Still, at the end, she blessed Black Adam with a 7 out of 10 as she liked the action, but was not wowed by the story and the lack of development in the characters other than Johnson.
Johnson’s star power continued to be the factor for others to attend and, for Ricardo Carter, president of the JCCt, the movie couldn’t have come quick enough.
“I’ve been waiting, what, 15 years from the announcement way back when of The Rock playing Black Adam. Yes, I was literally looking forward to it,” Carter said with a laugh.
After shuffling back and forth with a number rating, Carter gave Black Adam an 8, citing the incredible action sequences.
“I loved the action. It was action packed non-stop. From the beginning to the end it’s full of action.”
However, that’s where the praise stopped. Despite him professing his love for DC, he didn’t enjoy the rather weak storyline.
“The story needed a bit more work. There are plot holes that needed to be worked on,” Carter noted.
In all, he termed Black Adam an action-packed popcorn flick.
Wilson’s fellow cosplayer, Jamaal Miller, wasn’t so kind, giving Black Adam a rating of 4.5 out of 10, his knowledge base from the comic books dropping the movie below average. While he did like Johnson’s interpretation of the anti-hero, he wasn’t a fan of the on-screen personas of the rest of the characters, feeling there was too significant a difference between that and their comic book origins, and even the links to the 2019 Shazam movie.
Gordon McFarlane best represented the average movie patron, having no former knowledge of Black Adam.
“I personally didn’t have much backstory to the Black Adam movie, so I went in not knowing what to expect,” said McFarlane.
With no expectation, he gave it a solid 7 out of 10 due to what he termed spectacular action scenes. The negative for McFarlane was the story not having a clear path to resolution.
The next step for Black Adam is to survive in theatres until its next big box office opening, in China, for December. It will spend November up against another long awaited movie from rival studio Marvel, Black Panther: Wakanda Forever, the sequel to 2018’s Black Panther.
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