The Cow

It's a video teaser.

RocShemp

I get that. But the image chosen before you press play makes him look like Popeye cosplaying as Black Adam.

dex14

HBO Max first or second week of December seems likely.

Draven

I'll buy it on digital when it's $9.99 - not worth $24.99 right now.

OldBoy

this would be great as a Blu-ray 3D. some of the scenes just cry for it. the movie, however, started strong and then after the prologue things go decidedly generic.

DJariya

Looks like Black Adam was a box office disappointment no matter how hard Dwayne Johnson tried to sell it.

Runaway

While I did like the movie, it just wasn't something special, that would get great word-of-mouth. So I'm not too surprised the movie is losing money.

DJariya

https://deadline.com/2022/12/dwayne-...it-1235191135/

Apparently Black Adam was actually profitable after all. Deadline did the math and it’s profitable counting home entertainment profits.

Giantrobo

Hollywood Math?

-Black Adam costs WB 200 Million to make
-"Insiders" say film needs to make 3x that to "break even"

(Googles "Break Even")

IBJoel

Because gorsses are just that: gross. Net revenue is much lower and production costs do not take into account marketing or distribution costs. Now does it need 3x production budget? Beats me.

dex14

Feels like Johnson is still trying to sell it and got on the phone to someone.

dex14

Will be on HBO Max starting December 16th.

dex14

Bingo.

Josh-da-man

Yeah, there's a lot of math involved here.

You have your production cost, which is fixed and usually publicly known. Then you have your advertising costs, which is buying up tv commercials, billboards, and other stuff to promote the film.

And, on top of that, the studio doesn't get all of the money that a movie makes at the theater; they have to split it with the theaters, and, unless something has changed, that number changes week to week. I think that, the longer a movie plays at a theater, the smaller the percentage of the gross the studio gets. So the first week a movie is out, the studio might get 80% of the ticket sales, and, by the third or fourth week, it might be a fifty-fifty split.

And there are also things that can add to profitability of movies like selling merchandising rights and selling the movie to foreign distributors.

But, as a general rule, the studios generally considering a movie needing to make twice its production costs in order to be profitable. Might be more or less, depending on the individual film.

And nobody wants to spend two hundred million dollars on a movie for it to only make a ten million dollar net profit, even if it was technically profitable.

PhantomStranger

It's always hard knowing what is being thrown into the budget figure for a studio flick as an outsider. Black Adam has been in development for years and years. It appears the Rock and studio execs believed his starpower could hit bigger at the box office than it did.

fujishig

I still don't get all the blame for the Rock, as usual he's done a ton of promotion/self promotion on this and it seems like he just wants it to succeed. Unless most of that budget went to his contract or something I'm not sure anyone can blame him for this movie underperforming.

rocket1312

I haven't seen the movie, so I can't comment specifically on its quality, but this has been the Rock's baby for years, has it not? It's not like he was just hired to play a part. His hands are all over this production. If the movie underperformed, maybe it's because people just didn't like it? And if that's true, then I think it's very easy to blame Johnson.

Giantrobo

The Rock suffers from the same issue Tom Cruise suffers from...People generally believe both make their films all about THEM and lots a folks hate that. I heard lots a "DC Fans" saying they wanted to see Black Adam but would skip it because The Rock was seen as promoting the film in a way to centered him and not the film. Go figure...

I'll say it again and again...The Rock has been DC Films BIGGEST Hype Man and Promoter for years when no one else had the same energy. Jason Mamoa being the other big DC promoter.

IBJoel

For me, knowing The Rock has stupid bullshit in his contracts like "I can't lose a fight" and knowing his relatively limited range in acting on top of the kinds of films he makes really makes me not want to see any but his most unique or low-stakes films. And them him acting like Black Adam was going to be the biggest thing in the world... like maybe 15 years ago it would have been, but a cookie cutter superhero movie in 2022 has zero draw to me. Oh, he kills people. So does Venom, so does Iron Man, so does fucking Superman in this movie universe. Why was that like a big marketing point in the trailers?

Tom Cruise will lose fights, he'll do insane practical stunts, he'll ACT when necesary.

fujishig

Yeah, I'd think being a hype man is a good thing (if you like the property). I'm not sure what people want instead, like an Alec Guinness or Jennifer Lawrence?

He's not on the level of Tom Cruise in acting or as a draw, but really nobody is as much of a draw as Cruise in this age, and if you replace Dwayne with another actor I don't think that would've elevated this in the box office. Sans Rock I'm kind of afraid to think what this would have drawn.

Runaway

Without Johnson there is no Black Adam stand alone movie. Black Adam would be the villain in a Shazam movie. Johnson used his influence to make it happen and he promoted the hell out of it. But since his ego is even bigger than his body, he probably cannot fathom the movie bombed. At one point he was called a franchise savior, so it must be disappointing to underachieve with your own franchise starter, especially if you have the plan to establish Black Adam as a major player in the DCU.

RocShemp

That would have been for the best. The Rock felt two origin stories would have been too much for Shazam! and he's right. Instead, Black Adam should have been the antagonist and co-lead of Shazam! 2. You can flesh him out and contrast him against Billy. Then you can spin off Black Adam into his own movies. But hindsight is 20/20...

Artman

Except it's really just about himself, I don't think anyone really believes he's just doing this out of a pure love of this character. He's a showman, that's who he is...and there's nothing wrong with that, but it blew up in his face here. And he's making it even worse by not simply letting it go and moving on to sell his next project.

Giantrobo

Black Adam needed 3 solo films before being in a film with other heroes

DJariya

Well, don't even bother with the Black Adam post credit scene. It's officially pointless:



I assume James Gunn and Peter Safran are going to kill Black Adam from the DCU as well.