An object lesson in not opening your shirt.
Black Adam (2022) is one of those movies that’s not quite a credit card movie: it starts out in a hole, but doesn’t quite start digging deeper; instead, it improves.
Slightly.
Oh, so slightly.
Black Adam, aka Teth Adam, is the former and future protector of the fictional country of Kahndaq, a Middle Eastern country that has suffered various governmental plagues, from monarchies to autocracies to anarchies, none of them pleasant. But in this slightly futuristic world there’s an archaeologist who has tired of it all, and has found the key to Black Adam, and now need only find her way to him. Son and brother in tow. Along with this mysterious other guy.
Too bad Adam’s under a mountain.
And he’s a popular guy, at least for a God-like creature who can’t be beat. Except for the occasional blob of Eternium, he just rolls through everything. Anyways, an aspirational monarch is looking for power, as is the self-righteous League of Justice, a bunch of killjoys who forgot to take their chemistry shots before coming on stage.
Anyways, various adventures and CGI explosions ensue once the thoroughly joyless Adam is found; my Arts Editor remarked What fun is this if no one can beat him? And, indeed, it was only stubbornness that got us to the end of this movie.
If you’re heavily into the D. C. Comics Universe, then perhaps you should see this. Maybe. At three in the morning, after drinking heavily.
Otherwise, don’t bother. Duane Johnson’s talents lie in some other place than God-like invincibility.
