Shazam Movie Moving Forward Without the Rock

DC’s Shazam film was announced years ago and news about it has been all over the place since it was announced. For the longest time, Dwayne Johnson was rumored to be playing a major character. The rumor went back and forth from the main hero, Shazam, to his arch-enemy, Black Adam, until the Rock officially confirmed he would be playing the latter. However, that news came over two years ago and, as we all know, there hasn’t been a Shazam movie.

There hasn’t been much traction in getting the film made either. We still have no idea who is going to be playing the hero, meaning they haven’t started filming yet. This is partially because Warner Bros. and DC have been shuffling around their slate of comic book movies in favor of a cinematic universe like Marvel’s. There was even talk that the film would take place outside of the DCEU in order to not be held back story-wise, but that has since been debunked. As such, the Shazam movie kept getting pushed back from a combination of other projects getting in the way and not being able to find a lead actor.

However, it has recently been confirmed that Shazam is imminent. This rumor picked up a few days ago and breathed new life into the project. Now, DC president Geoff Johns has confirmed that Shazam is moving forward. Whether or not it’s the next film after Justice League is still up for interpretation but at the very least we know it’s coming. However, Johns also confirmed that the Rock wouldn’t be in the film. This is especially surprising since the Rock playing Black Adam was the first announcement made about Shazam all those years ago besides the news that they were working on the film.

Black Adam is an integral character in the Shazam comics, but they clearly have a goal in mind with this upcoming film. No doubt, they’re going to focus on Billy Batson himself before getting into his arch-nemesis. Especially considering the Rock is such a well-known actor, he’ll probably end up getting quite a bit of screen time as Black Adam. This would be incredibly distracting in an origin story about a hero. No matter what they do, at the very least it has been confirmed that Shazam is going to happen and the Rock is still going play Black Adam… eventually….