Black Adam': Review

Dwayne Johnson as a superhero? It feels right, so why does 'Black Adam' fall flat?

Unlike the maudlin, turgid comic book movies from Zack Snyder, whose Batman V Superman: Dawn of Justice is a master class in how to make something ostensibly for kids as boring as humanly possible, Black Adam just zips along, trusting that the audience will catch up. Soon Adrianna summons the trapped hero, Teth-Adam, who is the gargantuan Johnson wearing a superhero suit and a scowl. Black Adam is a character from deep within DC Comics lore, but don’t feel like you need to have any background knowledge going into Black Adam. Much like a McDonald’s hamburger is technically food, Black Adam is technically a movie, and both can be intermittently enjoyable before you come around to ask “why am I consuming this?” Dwayne Johnson is one of the most charismatic personalities in mainstream entertainment, and by all accounts seems like a fine fella. It does have moments of value here and there, and out of respect to Mr.

There's a void at the center of 'Black Adam' — a charisma-free Dwayne Johnson — but director Jaume Collet-Serra manages to give the film a sense of style.

If there’s any superhero to write about with “Black Adam,” it’s the director, and it’s a good thing to see he still has some lightning coming out of his fingers. While the film feels cobbled together out of spare parts of other superhero movies, and it’s almost instantly forgettable, Collet-Serra manages to hold it all together out of sheer force of will and an inherent sense of style. They eventually decide to team up to take on Intergang, who have occupied the country for 27 years, mining eternium and searching for the cursed crown so that their leader, Ishmael (Marwan Kenzari), can ascend the throne as some kind of hell demon king. [“Shazam”](https://www.latimes.com/entertainment/movies/la-et-mn-shazam-review-20190404-story.html)). There’s also a refreshingly anticolonialist bent lurking in the story of Kahndaq overthrowing their occupiers, embodied by the rebellious Amon. Collet-Serra surrounds Johnson with a charm offensive of supporting actors, including Hodge and Brosnan, who are great, as well as Shahi, Sabongui and comedian Mohammed Amer as Adrianna’s brother Karim. It helps that “Black Adam” has a distinct and dynamic visual style and tone that distinguishes itself against the Marvel “house style” we’ve become accustomed to over many, many phases of superhero flicks, which have devolved into a depressing digital sludge offset by an onslaught of cutesy, quippy dialogue. Adrianna ( [Sarah Shahi](https://www.latimes.com/entertainment/tv/la-et-st-reverie-review-20180529-story.html)), who has been searching for a cursed crown made of “eternium,” awakens Teth-Adam (Johnson) from a 5,000-year slumber while escaping an Intergang faction. But in this universe, there need to be checks and balances on all-powerful beings, so the Justice Society is called up to rein in Teth-Adam (and also to introduce new characters for spin-off movies). But, it seems Collet-Serra has got his groove back for “Black Adam,” or perhaps he was saving it for this film, which is far more entertaining than it has any right to be. The trailers looked ponderous and gray, and though the film is directed by [COVID-19 pandemic](https://nam04.safelinks.protection.outlook.com/?url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.latimes.com%2Fcalifornia%2Fcoronavirus-everything-to-know-right-now&data=04%7C01%7Ckevin.crust%40latimes.com%7C52633c0a516544dd252a08d9e81168f0%7Ca42080b34dd948b4bf44d70d3bbaf5d2%7C0%7C0%7C637795983749169191%7CUnknown%7CTWFpbGZsb3d8eyJWIjoiMC4wLjAwMDAiLCJQIjoiV2luMzIiLCJBTiI6Ik1haWwiLCJXVCI6Mn0%3D%7C3000&sdata=EARyZgH1vGMtlQdur%2F61n5fLiwKXExOWtv3guJOFSn8%3D&reserved=0).