Dwayne Johnson blames Warner Bros leadership for Black Adam sequel being shelved

Dwayne Johnson has claimed that a 'vortex of new leadership' is the reason why his superhero movie Black Adam didn't end up getting the green light for a sequel.

For those of you who haven't seen it, and judging by Black Adam's box office haul that's quite a lot of you, it's a spin-off to Shazam! which got made after Johnson persuaded producers to give him his own movie.

However, when it released reviews were rather mixed and unenthusiastic about Black Adam and the former wrestler who had been the driving force behind the film as well as it's leading star in front of the camera later confirmed that a sequel wouldn't be happening.

According to Deadline the film did manage to break even over its run and was able to rake in a bit of profit by the time it had left cinemas.

Still, with the arrival of James Gunn as the new head honcho of the DC Universe it was decided that he'd sweep the decks and largely start the stalling cinematic universe over.

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Under the guidance of Warner Bros, the DC cinematic universe had never really got up and running in the same way as comic book rivals Marvel had managed to do.

Gunn's arrival is supposed to change that and get things back on track but it's out with some of the old before he can bring in the new, with Henry Cavill's Superman among those who won't be returning.

As for Black Adam, Johnson recently told Kevin Hart on the show Hart to Heart why he thinks plans for a sequel didn't turn out the way he wanted.

Warner Bros

The wrestler turned actor said the movie 'got knocked down a bit' because of the pandemic and then 'got caught in a vortex of new leadership'.

He said: "It was so many changes in leadership. Anytime you have a company, a publicly-traded company, and you have all those changes in leadership, you have people coming in who creatively, fiscally, are going to make decisions that you may not agree with, philosophically.

"I think Black Adam is one of those movies that got caught in that web of new leadership. And that will always be one of the, one of the biggest mysteries I think, not only for me and us on our end, but also throughout our business.

"That was a question out of Wall Street, that was a question out of Hollywood: ‘Wait a minute. You had the biggest opening of your career.

"Sure, no China. That could have been maybe $100m, maybe 200m more dollars. You’re establishing a new superhero. You want to grow out the franchise. You bring back Superman and Henry Cavill. The world went crazy."

Johnson then compared the fate of the now scuppered Black Adam sequel to 'new ownership coming in and buying an NFL team' and deciding to ditch the head coach and quarterback regardless of 'how many times we won the Super Bowl' because they wanted to go with somebody else.

At least Johnson managed to get a Black Adam movie into cinemas, spare a thought for the folks who made Batgirl which got scrapped without ever making it onto the big screen.

UNILAD has contacted Warner Bros for comment.