Dwayne Johnson says he separately pressed “Black Adam” and “Shazam!” source movies

Dwayne Johnson says he pushed to split the origin stories of Black Adam and Shazam into two separate films after seeing the first draft. Shazam!lines of

During the preview of the next DC movie black adam inside vanity fairThe film’s star and producer took at least partial responsibility for the decision to split the films.

“When the first draft of the movie came to us, it was a combination of Black Adam and Shazam: two origin stories in one movie,” Johnson told the magazine. “That was the goal, so it wasn’t a complete surprise. But when I read it, I knew, ‘We can’t make this movie like this. We’re going to do an incredible service for Black Adam.’

The actor-producer went on to say that while a Black Adam character sharing an origin story wouldn’t work, a “Shazam that combines two origin stories into one movie” would be “cool”.

Based on this belief, he continued to push for his anti-hero to get his own film, with Johnson revealing that he “made a phone call” in which he shared his “unpopular” opinion.

“I said, ‘I have to share my thoughts here,’” he recalled. “Everyone was like, ‘Hey, this script is great, let’s do this movie.'” I said, “I really think you should do this.” Shazam!, record this movie yourself with the desired tone. And I think we should highlight that too.”

The decision to give Shazam and Black Adam their respective stories was first reported in 2017 following a meeting with Johnson and then DC Films co-head Geoff Johns. The actor and producer has been working on projects since 2008, but his Hollywood profile has grown significantly over the years.

According to sources who spoke the hollywood reporterKeeping Johnson as a secondary villain made little sense.