Black Adam
Warner Bros. Pictures | Release Date: October 21, 2022 CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION
41
METASCORE
Mixed or average reviews based on 52 Critic Reviews
Positive:
9
Mixed:
25
Negative:
18
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Critic Reviews

Critic scorePublicationBy date
60
We Got This CoveredScott CampbellOct 21, 2022
Black Adam is nowhere near the game-changing revolution for the DCEU that was promised, but it's a solid introduction for Dwayne Johnson's antihero nonetheless. Read full review
60
The TelegraphTim RobeyOct 18, 2022
The film has whizz, and bang, and you’ll forget it by tomorrow. Read full review
60
VarietyPeter DebrugeOct 18, 2022
The surprisingly serious-minded (but still plenty pulpy) project deprives Johnson of his greatest superpower — his sense of humor — while giving the now-straight-faced star a chance to play a character with some interesting contradictions. Read full review
60
Total FilmKevin HarleyOct 18, 2022
Fast, fierce, fuzzy: nicely unruly, naggingly undisciplined, Johnson’s live-action DC bow strains to entertain but struggles to breathe amid the noise. Read full review
60
The GuardianPeter BradshawOct 18, 2022
Droll, witty, and proportioned like the proverbial outdoor brick-built convenience, Johnson is well placed to realise the superhero movie’s potential as surrealist action comedy. It’s a shame that all these other DC-ensemble heroes crowding into the action are frankly not really in his class, although Viola Davis’s brief cameo as Task Force X chief Amanda Waller brings the menace. Read full review
60
EmpireHelen O'HaraOct 18, 2022
Big, dumb and only mostly fun, this doesn’t always find the right tone to marry action and charm, but Johnson’s remote and ruthless superhero is a welcome change from the norm. Read full review
58
UproxxVince ManciniNov 11, 2022
It’s not that I especially expect my superhero movies to have coherent messages or good politics (though Black Adam does dangle that possibility, tantalizingly) it’s that Black Adam’s ambiguous function in the story feels not only un-crowd-pleasing but kind of cowardly. Read full review
58
Entertainment WeeklyJoshua RothkopfOct 21, 2022
Black Adam is what happens when artists say they want to go dark but don't really have the stomach for it. Cue scenes of humorless mid-air wrestling, shake vigorously, wait for the sequel. Read full review
58
Original-CinJim SlotekOct 20, 2022
For a movie that’s supposed to take D.C. in a new direction, Black Adam sure seems like something we’ve seen plenty of times before. Read full review
50
The New YorkerRichard BrodyOct 28, 2022
Black Adam feels like a place-filler for a movie that’s remaining to be made, but, in its bare and shrugged-off sufficiency, it does one positive thing that, if nothing else, at least accounts for its success: for all the churning action and elaborately jerry-rigged plot, there’s little to distract from the movie’s pedestal-like display of Johnson, its real-life superhero. Read full review
50
New York Magazine (Vulture)Bilge EbiriOct 21, 2022
The film ultimately overloads us with so much amazing nonsense that we sort of give up and give in. Read full review
50
ReelViewsJames BerardinelliOct 19, 2022
Black Adam embraces many of the worst elements and tropes of the superhero genre, resulting in a loud, discordant experience replete with fist-fights, pyrotechnics, and an overdose of CGI. Read full review
50
UproxxMike RyanOct 18, 2022
The plot makes sense. And Jaume Collet-Serra is a good director and the movie is mostly competent. For me, it’s just a sense of disappointment. There’s nothing that interesting here, but there certainly should be. Read full review
50
The A.V. ClubPhil PirrelloOct 18, 2022
There’s a good movie, at times, a really good movie, hiding out in all the soulless clutter of Black Adam’s plot. Unfortunately, all the considerable talents here struggle to deliver it. Read full review
50
USA TodayBrian TruittOct 18, 2022
This is Johnson’s baby, a film spotlighting a complicated antihero he has championed for years. It wins some battles and packs plenty of punch, yet it just can’t get past familiar tropes and flaws. Read full review
50
The Hollywood ReporterJohn DeForeOct 18, 2022
Johnson creates a magnetic antihero, volatile and antisocial. He doesn’t fly so much as stalk the sky; he swats opponents like the bundles of weightless CG pixels they are. And this passion project serves the character well, setting him up for adventures one hopes will be less predictable than this one. Read full review
50
IGNJoshua YehlOct 18, 2022
Try as it might to capture lightning in a bottle, Black Adam never manages to find its spark. Read full review
50
Screen RantRachel LaBonteOct 18, 2022
Though suffering from repetitive plot beats and thin characters, Black Adam is powered by Johnson's performance and its promise of an exciting future. Read full review
45
PolygonSamantha NelsonOct 21, 2022
Black Adam is overstuffed with underdeveloped concepts and characters that have been done better in other shows and films. Read full review
45
CNNBrian LowryOct 18, 2022
Black Adam features a protagonist of almost unlimited power, which only makes its puny script more conspicuous. Dwayne Johnson is saddled by a very limited range of expression as the ancient mystical being featured in DC’s latest superhero epic, a film that isn’t nearly as cool as its poster, while highlighting the inherent challenge of building stories around antiheroes. Read full review
40
The Irish TimesDonald ClarkeOct 20, 2022
Astonishingly, Black Adam does seem to have once had ambitions to say something big and important about the world. But any parallel with current unhappiness is drawn and then quickly dropped like the truly scalding potato it is. Read full review
40
Time OutPhil de SemlyenOct 19, 2022
Few of the laughs land, either. Read full review
40
NMEAlex FloodOct 18, 2022
But even the fun moments are overshadowed by the writers’ constant need to over-explain each plot point. Read full review
40
Rolling StoneDavid FearOct 18, 2022
Viewed as a light star vehicle with a lot of VFX — a soft Rock movie — it’s simply ho-hum. The issue is with everything else happening onscreen around him. Even by the DCEU’s dodgy standards, it’s a mess in a cape. Read full review
40
ScreenCrushMatt SingerOct 18, 2022
There could still be some cinematic potential in Black Adam, perhaps in contrasting his grim demeanor with the eternally sunny Shazam in some kind of crossover sequel. But this Black Adam was already a long time coming. And it wasn’t really worth the wait. Read full review
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