‘Black Adam’: Expensive Reshoots After A Poor Test Screening Reportedly Increased Budget To $260 Million

Yesterday, Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson decided to post an update about the “Black Adam” franchise. Keep in mind, the previous update was about how the film was profitable and things were looking good for the film, financially. Well, the new update was less optimistic, to put it lightly. Instead, Johnson thanked fans and announced that the “Black Adam” franchise was effectively dead, as it’s no longer part of the DC Studios plan moving forward. As typically happens with this sort of news, more reports eventually get published that shed a little more light on the situation. 

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First, it’s important to note that Johnson is probably 100% accurate that the main reason “Black Adam 2” isn’t happening is because James Gunn and Peter Safran have something else up their sleeve for the DC film universe. However, a new report from THR also claims that the first film’s budget probably didn’t help, especially in terms of profitability. 

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Yes, yes, yes, we’re going to talk about “Black Adam” and the financials, yet again. Recently, there was a lot of back and forth between Variety, THR, and Deadline, where the latter basically wrote a puff piece (rumored to be sanctioned by Johnson and his people themselves) talking about how “Black Adam” would be profitable and there were plans in place for “Black Adam 2” and a “Hawkman” spinoff. (Though, it should be noted that Deadline eventually silently updated that piece to remove mention of sequels and spinoffs.) 

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Now, THR has more financial information that shows the profitability is even trickier for “Black Adam,” and the film will definitely lose money theatrically. The report claims that “Black Adam” was greenlit with a $190 million budget (not including marketing). However, after a bad test screening, the film required 20 more days of reshoots, ballooning the budget up to $260 million. That’s huge, even by superhero film standards. Again, that $260 million doesn’t include the marketing costs that were likely well over $100 million. 

Considering “Black Adam” seems to have stalled out in theaters at around $391 million worldwide, there’s just no way to say (honestly) that the film will turn a profit while in theaters. Sure, the film will end up being profitable when you take into consideration the rights sales when the film hits TV and eventually merchandise sales. But, let’s be honest, no one talks about those factors when discussing whether or not a film is a big bomb. You don’t hear Marvel Studios tout the huge merchandise and TV deals when they release an “Avengers” film, right? No, the only thing that is really discussed is the box office. 

All that to say, even if James Gunn and Peter Safran weren’t pulling the plug on the old DCEU and (seemingly) rebooting in the future, you’d have to believe “Black Adam 2” likely wouldn’t be in the plans. Why would you make a sequel to a film that grossly underperformed (in relation to its huge budget) and then didn’t turn a profit in theaters? 

Regardless, it’s clear The Rock’s dreams of superhero world domination are put on hold (possibly forever). But at least he was able to get “Black Adam” in theaters, after 15 years.