The DC Extended Universe has had many hiccups and it looks like that James Gunn is going to level the playing field and start new after the upcoming Flash movie. But Black Adam is a part of HBO Max now, and while James Gunn is apparently firm on his plan to not rehire Dwayne Johnson for the role again, I definitely wanted to give it a look.

The story is set in a fictional country called Kahndaq and they have a civilization older than ancient Egypt. There’s an ancient crown of dark magic and demons that good and bad people are trying to get their hands on.

And in the chaos of trying to get the crown, Teth-Adam is awoken. He was chosen by the wizard Shazam to be the champion of his people many ages ago and he definitely has a very similar power range and abilities to Billy Batson’s Shazam personality.

Except he’s a lot darker, while he’s not technically evil in this movie, he will kill any bad guy without hesitation most of the time.

I will say that I enjoyed Pierce Brosnan as Kent Nelson/Dr. Fate. Marvel apparently based Doctor Strange on Dr. Fate and while I prefer Doctor Strange, this mystical doctor is pretty decent.

I had no idea that Hawkman was also in the movie too. I’ve seen him in the cartoons before but I’m pretty sure this is the first live action Hawkman on the silver screen. He wasn’t a bad incarnation but it’s up in the air if he’s going to return in the new DC silver screen movies.

I was actually expecting Black Adam to be worse than what it was. It’s a pleasantly delightful movie set in a very grim and fictional country. It’s kind of a shame that the DC Extended Universe had imploded upon itself and that we won’t get to see most of these actors come back in the future for new stories.