A Movie That Took So Long To Get Made It Influenced The Source Material

Yes, Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson has been trying to get a Black Adam feature made for an extensive period of time, leading to the artists starting to draw the character resembling him in the comics.

This post also is a while after the film debuted, so - spoilers!

Luckily, this devotion meant the end product had a quality coming from a loyalty to the source material that isn't always present in Warner Brother's outings.

And of course, the film isn't doing well at the box office for whatever reason, meaning Warner Brothers is going to, once more, chuck out everything they've done so far (except Batman) and start over. Here we go again. Did we lose Henry Cavill on the Witcher for nothing? 

Because then I'm going to be extra mad.

I don't get the lack of interest as the movie had boatloads of goodness.

The Rock is massively charismatic. (And massive, lets not forget that.) Therefore even though he's a "protector" not a hero, that helps align the audience with his views. He's always fun, and he is here as well. They've given him a "family" of fantastic performers that could have easily transitioned into Isis, Osiris, and whatever "Uncle Dudley" is in the language of Kandaq.

Its hard writing about a DC Universe film that I enjoyed this much and don't have anything to complain about. That hasn't happened since Aquaman. 

He's fun, its fun, go see it while it is still possible and save the franchise for Pete's sake!

I will delve further into the Justice Society, since they are my favorite team, and also (due to reprints in the Denville Library) where I started reading comics.

Characters from that team also showed up in the Stargirl series. Sadly Season Three of that one dropped back to Season One levels. I did watch it each week, because of punctuated  moments of excitement when awesome stuff from the Justice Society comics happened on screen. The teen "drama" in between was drawn out though. Even "Shooting the budget" for the finale gave only a half decent final battle, and then a bunch of sappiness to set up for future stories that won't be coming. The really cool (and likely tacked on) Shade in the museum scene at the end was amazing, though.  Networks should start taking a lesson from streaming and do shorter seasons to let the budget use pop better. Now that it's going to be cancelled, I was hoping they could have brought some of those characters into the group introduced in the Black Adam franchise. They could have even kept the same actors!

Oh well...

The Justice Society are played straight, as a team of classic characters that understand that Superheroes don't kill. This allowed both sides of the debate to be highlighted. (The JSA is on the right side, by the way.) I would have liked to see more of an explanation why they were working with Amanda Waller, as she usually favors extreme tactics. But it was nice to see some continuity in a non-Batman DC film.

Before it all goes away... AGAIN!  Grrrrr.

Come to think of it, there was very little explanation about where the JSA came from and who they were, outside of being presented as traditional heroes that have been around a long time and are working with legacies. (Then again, that's all you really need.)

As they are my favorite team, (even though neither of my favorites from that team made this version) here's a look at each of the four.

Doctor Fate, was inspiring , mysterious, and wise yet world weary. His World War Two memory from his childhood was a welcome link to the era the JSA is supposed to be connected to. The magic he used was cool looking, and different from Doctor Strange. I was bummed he died, but he did so in a very Doctor Fatey and sparkly way, meaning they could have brought him back whenever they wanted.

They mentioned Hawkman's ship being made of Nth metal. Is he the archeologist, the alien, or one of the other versions? Anything's possible. He had magically (or technologically) appearing medieval weapons. His wings worked like armor, and his strength and durability were somewhere well above that of normal humans. He was a competent leader, but prone to getting passionately involved in arguments he didn't need to. 

In other words, he was Hawkman.

The first of the junior members, Cyclone, was naïve and bubbly but also smart and effective. Sadly, they didn't reference her grandmother, Ma Hunkle the original "Pot on the head" Red Tornado. I was hoping for that in the sequel. (Grrrrrr...)  At least the Wizard of Oz references, which were not visible in the trailer, were present. She had the witch inspired stripey socks, and a flying monkey backpack.

Finally we have Atom Smasher, who was extremely powerful...

and a complete doofus. 

Its like he walked off of a comic book page! 

The beginnings of him being swayed to Black Adam's more violent world view were hinted at, and I could easily see it continuing. 

Or I could have. Grrrr...

This movie had what may be my favorite cameo in history. 

No, not the "surprise" return of the big blue boy scout in the credits scene...

Which may now be a total waste. (Grrrrr.....)  

Henry Winkler showed up in a video chat to talk to Atom Smasher as his uncle, Al Pratt.   

Now I am doubly sad that Eddie Mekka has passed away. 

Imagine if we could have had The Fonz, and The Big Ragu teaming up as the Golden Age Atom and Wildcat? It is a HUGE loss.