Black Adam Parent Guide

Since antiquity, the small nation of Kahndaq has seen more than its share of hard times. Currently, it’s being occupied by an international cartel of mercenaries, known as Intergang, who have cracked down on the civil liberties of the civilians while extracting every resource they can find.

Archaeologist Adrianna Tomaz (Sarah Shahi) knows that Intergang is not just exploiting her people but exposing them to potentially serious risks: Intergang has begun digging near an ancient mountain believed by historians to house the Crown of Sabbac, an ancient artifact containing the power of six evil demons. Should Intergang find the Crown, any hope of liberating Kahndaq from mercenary rule will vanish.

Determined to prevent the mercenaries from finding the Crown, Adrianna uncovers something else in the tomb – an inscription which, when read aloud, releases an incredibly powerful figure. Robed in black, casting lightning from his hands, and slaughtering all those who stand before him is Teth-Adam. Teth-Adam lived in Kahndaq around 2600BCE (roughly when the Crown was forged) and was given incredible powers by mysterious wizards to prevent anyone from unleashing the power of Sabbac.

Teth-Adam seems to be the best hope for Kahndaq, but his violent activities have drawn the attention of other superheroes. The Society of Justice, headed by Hawkman (Aldis Hodge) and Doctor Fate (Pierce Brosnan), fear Teth-Adam’s potential for destruction, and seek to stop him. With the Crown back in the world, though, Teth-Adam might be the only person strong enough to prevent its powers from being unleashed.

The biggest problem with Black Adam is the script, which takes a page out of Eternals hideous playbook. It opens with narration tonelessly informing you that this story starts “Before Rome, before Babylon, before the Pyramids…” The story drags on from there, only improving when its titular antihero busts out of a crypt and starts brutally murdering everyone he claps eyes on. While this isn’t ideal for family audiences, it improves the filmgoing experience as the clunky dialogue stops while Dwayne Johnson disintegrates people.

Let me pause here and marvel at how badly Johnson has been miscast in the lead role. “The Rock” has made a career by being absurdly charismatic, and the filmmakers somehow decided that the best possible use of this actor was to cast him as a guy who emotes less than the Terminator. An actual rock with a strong jawline drawn on it with a Sharpie would have been a better (and undoubtedly cheaper) casting option. All Johnson does in this role is kill people, scowl at the camera, and bust through more walls than the Kool-Aid man. And no, disappointingly, he does not say “Oh yeeaah” when he does it. Trust me, I’m as bummed out about it as you are.

The remarkable levels of violence in this film are not only excessive, they are also tonally strange. Teth-Adam gets his powers from the same group of weird wizards as the protagonist of Shazam! – you know, the light-hearted, more kid-friendly DC superhero movie. It’s not a credible association. There are also a half-dozen uses of scatological curses, but frankly, I’d be more concerned about the frequent scenes of people being electrocuted until they skeletonize and collapse in a puff of burning dust. Actually, I lied. I’d be more worried about dying of boredom during the two-hour period between deciding I wanted to leave the theater and the credits rolling. And since the runtime is only 124 minutes, that means the movie lost me some time in the first five. That’s not a record, but boy is that a rough start.