Warner Bros. and DC Films’ Black Adam is going to have to really hustle over the next couple of weeks if it wants a shot at passing the $400 million mark at the global box office. Now in its fifth week, the superhero film starring Dwayne Johnson as a vengeful godlike being has made $366 million worldwide, with Japan being the only major territory left.
Black Adam added another $5.1 million from 76 overseas territories this weekend, pushing its international haul to $209 million. While a $366 million global cume sounds impressive, taken in context, this is hardly the sort of finish that Johnson and co. would have been hoping for. Black Adam is essentially tied with the lifetime haul of Shazam!, which was produced at approximately half the cost and didn’t feature one of the world’s biggest movie stars in every scene. The film also had the wind knocked out of its sails by rival Marvel's Black Panther: Wakanda Forever, which debuted to significantly better reviews and greater interest among general audiences last week.
Black Adam opened with a career-best haul for a solo Johnson vehicle domestically, but despite topping the box office for three weekends in a row, didn’t display the kind of week-to-week holds that it should have. The film’s running domestic total currently stands at around $160 million, which is less than the $166 million that fellow DC Extended Universe film Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice made in its first weekend.
Johnson’s top-performing non-Fast & Furious movies remain the two Jumanji reboots, which have made a combined total of $1.7 billion globally. Even some of his original blockbusters — Rampage ($428 million globally) and San Andreas ($474 million worldwide) — have performed better than Black Adam probably will.
As far as the troubled DCEU is concerned, Black Adam will come up short of Justice League’s disappointing $655 million global haul, but will soon top Shazam!, although this isn’t much of a victory, given the film’s reported $195 million budget. The top DCEU film remains Aquaman, which made $1.1 billion globally. It’s followed by Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice ($872 million worldwide), Wonder Woman ($817 million worldwide), and Suicide Squad ($745 million worldwide).
Johnson has been talking about the importance that the character Black Adam will have in the DCEU going forward. The film ended with a tease of the future, which will likely involve Henry Cavill’s Superman making a long-awaited return, which will consequently build towards a potential face-off between the two godlike superheroes. But there has been no firm indication of the direction in which new DC Studios CEOs James Gunn and Peter Safran would be taking the franchise. Films that are already lined up for release include Shazam! Fury of the Gods, The Flash, Blue Beetle, and Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom.
Black Adam also stars Pierce Brosnan, Noah Centineo, Aldis Hodge, Quintessa Swindell, and Sarah Shahi. You can watch our interview with Johnson here, and stay tuned to Collider for more updates.