Dwayne Johnson to play Black Adam in DC Comics’ Shazam! movie

Former WWE champion Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson today confirmed that he will be playing Black Adam in DC Comics’ movie Shazam!

“’Kneel at his feet or get crushed by his boot.’” My honor to become.. #BlackAdam #TheAntiHero #DCComics,” Johnson revealed on his Twitter today.

Johnson was a lock in the movie but was still not sure who he would be playing – the hero Shazam or the anti hero, Black Adam. For this movie, Johnson decided to turn heel and chose to be the villain.

The Black Adam character is described as a corrupted, ancient Egyptian predecessor of Captain Marvel (now Shazam!), who fought his way to modern times to challenge the hero and his Marvel Family associates.

No production date has been set, and Darren Lemke has just been tagged to write the script.

“We Love Dwayne and have had nothing but success with him over the years,” said Toby Emmerich, President and COO of New Line. “When I look at Dwayne both off screen and on screen, he is such a larger than life character and it just made perfect sense to me that we put him in a DC comic movie. You look at these comic book characters and they have this certain swag and charisma that Dwayne carries with him where ever he is so that’s why this always made sense.”