Black Adam

Deja-Zam!

or

"You Want to Split the World in Two"
 

It seems an odd choice—outside of Dwayne Johnson's wish to make it so—to make a movie centered around a relatively lower-tier character as Black Adam—known primarily as a villain in DC's "Shazam!" comics (so-named due to copyright restrictions imposed by DC's main funny-book competitor Marvel comics, despite their "Captain Marvel"-named character appearing later). It's rather like the pivot the MCU made when they started a series based on "Guardians of the Galaxy" (Why them? Why at that time?"). But, then, the Warner Brothers Studio has made a lot of odd choices in their perpetual game of "catch-up" with Marvel Studios—the sudden rush to make a "Justice League" movie despite one being in development for a decade, an "Aquaman" movie before making a movie of "The Flash" or a decent "Green Lantern" movie or even making another, less than morose "Superman" film (but then, Marvel can't seem to make a good "Fantastic Four" film and is only getting around to making a "Namor, the Submariner" feature—created in the 1940's—by introducing him in Black Panther: Wakanda Forever, apparently).

 

Maybe it has something to do with toy sales. I don't know. It's as good a reason as any. Certainly, it has nothing to do with "art."

But, as these things go, the resulting movie isn't bad (but, it's not good, either). In fact, for much of its 2 hours+ length, it's a murderously efficient action film that purposely (rather than accidentally) questions the moral ambiguity of vigilantism in the guise of "doing good." It just matters who thinks what is good. That keeps shifting and changing throughout the course of the movie, where heroes do bad things and villains might be useful to a greater good. It's a long way from "white hats" and "black hats." But, don't confuse that with any sort of sophistication of thought.

The movie starts...with some verrry long exposition...in ancient times. Of a king named Ahk-Ton who ruled the middle-Eastern kingdom of Khandaq with impunity and, seeking the powers of a god, enslaved his people to look for a powerful mineral called Eternium, with which he would form "the crown of Sabbac". With this, he would be able to summon the power of the gods from the Rock of Eternity, granting him the stamina of Shu, speed of Horus, strength of Amon, wisdom of Zehuti, power of Aten, and the courage of Mehen* just by saying the magic word "Shazam!" (The Breath of Sekhmet is only needed if you having to do a lot of heavy expositioning.)

Anyway, the slave-boy Hurut, who finds the Eternium, learns a valuable lesson that life in Khandaq is cheap and grown-ups are not to be trusted. Ahk-Ton learns a valuable lesson when the ancient Egyptian gods double-cross him for his hubris and give the power of Shazam to wised-up Hurut.

Then, "something bad" happens powerful enough to send us into 21st Century Khandaq, where government has broken down and the place is run by the International Crime syndicate, Intergang. A resistance movement/archaeological team (they have those?) led by Adrianna Tomaz (Sarah Shahi) is searching for the crown of Sabbac, because, you know, power and all. They get ambushed by Intergang shock-troops and only when Adrianna finds a way to resurrect Teth-Adam (or Black Adam)(Johnson) from his imprisonment in the Khandaqian version of The Rock of Eternity do they manage to escape with their lives. Intergang, however, gets cooked, poached, crushed, and blown apart by Adam's powers.

Enough damage is done that it gets on the radar of Amanda Waller (Viola Davis via zoom-call) who calls on The Justice Society of America to intervene.

Wait. Wait. Wait. 

Excuse me, your Honor. Side-bar?

Nobody may "get" this or even think it's important if they don't read a lot of DC comic-books. I have. So, what in the multi-verse is Amanda Waller doing being in charge of The Justice Society (they're the old heroes from the 1940's "Golden Age" of comics as well as...to keep things simple...younger heroes who have accepted "the mantle"). Amanda Waller (it has been established) is in charge of Task Force X—ya know, "The Suicide Squad" (whether it has the "The" or not)—the criminal sacrificial lambs who go on missions nobody else wants to do or are so illegal they have to be hush-hush. What's she doing in charge of anybody possessing or professing any sort of moral compass?

Well, that's troubling. Not just because the "good guys" are being run by "bad guys" but because the mission they're being sent on is to corral the "new threat" while absolutely ignoring the "old threat" that has been plaguing the populace—out in the open—for years. Huh, some heroes—those being Dr. Fate (Pierce Brosnan), Hawkman (Aldis Hodge), Atom-Smasher (Noah Centineo) and Cyclone (Quintessa Swindell). Trust me, you don't want to dig too deep into these heroes and their origins, because a couple of them are either confused (Hawkman) or ridiculous (Cyclone).** 

It is nice to see Dr. Fate and Hawkman put in the movies, though—Brosnan does a fine, fine job in the role and it's good that they gave Hawkman a look that isn't completely stupid (he's appeared in the CW Arrowverse shows and in "Smallville"). It is not nice that they're basically little tin soldiers heroically doing things that aren't heroic. In fact, for much of the movie, the JSA can be seen as being "the bad guys" as they hector among themselves before considering what it is they are actually doing (rather than the requisite property damage while single-mindedly doing "the job" they were ordered to do).

In fact, Johnson's performance here is so "johnny-one-glower" that the movie naturally gravitates towards these new heroes (that the average movie-goer knows nothing about) for any sort of sense of what it is going on. They banter and bicker until Teth-Adam miraculously learns English from his ancient Khandaqian and joins in the snark. Well-paced and edited snark, but snark—and relentless snark—nonetheless. Everybody learns to play nice while kicking the crap out of everybody so they can defeat their common enemy—a villain that nobody and, indeed, Amanda Waller, have ever heard of. There is one super-hero death (which actually affected me—"Awww, they were pretty good!"), a switch-out on the principal origin story, and one scene of conflicted conscience that is dismissed with a quip and then forgotten about like one more tossed-to-the-horizon bad guy.

I'd like to say I enjoyed it, but all I can do is give it some tight-lipped respect for its pace for most of its length, and wonder at how the dark tone of this one—they had to go through four edits before it was dropped from an "R" to a "PG-13" rating—is going to merge with the inevitable mash-up between the larky "Shazam!" movies and this franchise off-shoot. It'll be like mixing ice cream with jalapeños.***

Or like mixing super-heroes with real-life problems. That trick never works. Since the time that cars started to be thrown around city-streets, nobody has ever paused to discuss the insurance implications. No super-hero has ever tried to stop poverty, homelessness, or severe drought or mass-starvation (Hell, it doesn't even happen in the real world, where Super-Democrats throws several tons of cash at it and Super-Republicans use their "Ignore-it-it doesn't exist" vision). It doesn't even work in super-hero satire. Superheroes are fantasy-land, a panacea to distract us from real world problems in a constant loop of goofy star-fish shaped alien threats and killer clowns that we see again and again.

Black Adam is no different. It is the same sort of feint that implores us to "look up in the sky" so we don't see the problems on the ground.

 

And not even a "last minute" cavalry appearance by Superman can save the day.

* Confused? Yeah, sure, if you've read Captain Marvel Comics. All this Khandaq stuff happened way, way before the Greco-Roman gods that Captain Marvel/Billy Batson siphons off every time he yells "Shazam!": that would be the wisdom of Solomon, the strength of Hercules, the stamina of Atlas, the power of Zeus, the courage of Achilles, and the speed of Mercury. What I want to know is: where did the Khandaq gods go when the Greco-Roman gods showed up and were looking for accommodations in Mount Olympus or Valhalla or wherever. Evidently,all these gods didn't die—despite what Wonder Woman says—because their batteries are still fully charged to torch the pilot lights of Captain Marvel, the Marvel Family, and Black Adam! They must have gone somewhere...and we're not even mentioning Rock n' Roll Heaven (where you know they have a helluva band!) 

 

** When I saw the Justice Society line-up before seeing the movie, I thought "Huh! That's interesting! They're putting in two super-heroes (Fate and Hawkman) who have origins in Egyptian lore! Maybe they'll do something interesting with that!" No such luck. They might have at some point, but nothing is made of it in the movie. At all.  As for the confusion surrounding Hawkman's origin (or origins), you couldn't figure it out even if you put on an Absorbascon.

 

*** What the hell! Someone's actually done this! Okay, bring on The Apocalypse, the world has finally gone absolutely mad!!