‘Black Adam’: Dwayne Johnson allegedly leaked fake data to make it look like a hit

Did Dwayne Johnson deliberately leak false information to the press to further public perception of the hit ‘Black Adam’? They indicate the same thing from the Puck medium, which presumably has a source “various Warner executives”. DC Studios’ latest outing, starring antihero Teth Adam and the American Justice League, wasn’t the box office hit the company or the actor expected, although it can’t be called a commercial failure either. as in the case of ‘ Morbio’. In this dilemma of deciding whether or not a film was profitable for the production company, ‘Black Adam’ was rumored to cost Warners between $50 million and $100 million and then an article by Deadline, one of the most serious and important media on the industry in the United States, published the opposite.

They said it cost $195 million to produce and Warners would be investing between $80 million and $100 million in advertising, so if the film’s global gross was estimated at $390 million, it didn’t matter how bad it was for ‘Black Adam’ , at a minimum the film would generate between 52 and 72 million box office receipts. All this without including the proceeds from the sale of merchandising, which is so important to the company. With this data and the landscape left by COVID and from which we have not yet recovered, ‘Black Adam’ could be profitable enough to start its own saga.

The problem stems from the fact that, according to journalist Matt Belloni (co-founder of Puck and former editor-in-chief of The Hollywood Reporter), the reports managed by Deadline and which led to those earnings would include, unbeknownst to them, forecasts of income for sales on Blu-Ray or video on demand. Belloni says that relationship was “full of false conjecture” and you’re done generating”one of the dumbest business stories of all time”. Furthermore, he adds that those 100 million investments remain far below reality and this in spite of “almost every movie this size ends up being profitable in the end”that doesn’t mean we have to consider them a success.

The Future of “Black Adam”

Although Belloni cites only anonymous Warner Bros. Discovery sources, directly points to Johnson’s team as the authors aware and responsible for this confusion of numbers, all to improve the image of the film and the perception that the public has of it in an attempt to force the production company to continue betting on the character within the franchise.

If it is true that Johnson manipulated the medium, did he have a chance to achieve this? Ultimately it is Warners who will decide whether to continue investing in the character or not based on their internal reports, so, in that sense, it doesn’t seem like a fruitful strategy. Different is what it does with the image of the actor, who is one of the highest paid and most profitable Hollywood performers, racking up commercial hits one after another such as ‘Red Alert’, ‘Jungle Cruise’, ‘Jumanji: Next Level’ or ‘ Fast & Furious: Hobbs & Shaw’. ‘Black Adam’, such a personal bet for him and in which he also stars as a producer, would break this beautiful streak.

For now, and more taking into account the ruckus happening at DC with James Gunn and Peter Safran refurbishing the entire Extended Universe, ‘Black Adam 2’ seems unlikely to happen, no matter how hard Johnson is fighting it.

I waited to confirm with lenders before sharing this excellent #blackadam news – our film will make between $52 million and $72 million.
Invoice
With nearly $400 million worldwide we are building our new franchise step by step (the first Captain America earned $370 million) for the future DC.https://t.co/GBIgsbtnkq

? Dwayne Johnson (@TheRock) December 7, 2022

“I was waiting for confirmations with investors before sharing this great news of ‘Black Adam’: our film will have PROFITS between $52 million and $72 million. That’s a fact. With nearly $400 million worldwide, we are building our new franchise little by little (the first ‘Captain America’ brought in $370 million) into DC’s future.”

As of today, December 13, ‘Black Adam’ has grossed at least $388.9 million at the worldwide box office and will be available on HBO Max on December 16 as well as on VOD.