Dwayne Johnson Used Henry Cavill To Takeover DC?
Sources indicate that Dwayne Johnson was using Henry Cavill's Superman as leverage against Warner Bros. Discovery.
Can you smell what the Rock is cooking? It appears that Dwayne Johnson used Henry Cavill as a pawn in order to seize control of the DC Universe, according to an insider at MovieWeb, who stated “[i]n the end, he was a pawn in Dwayne’s failed attempt to control a piece of DC.” The tumultuous nature of the DCU for the past few years has left a litany of non-canon or multiversal films, often confusing moviegoers with baffling studio decisions and a revolving door of actor arrivals and departures. Dwayne Johnson’s DCU debut Black Adam was destined to be either the spark that reignited the Zack Snyderverse back into the new James Gunn-led phase or the last dying breaths of the DC films of the past 10 years.
Black Adam, which hit the box office back in October and recently made its streaming debut on HBO Max, stars Dwayne Johnson, and features a brief cameo from Henry Cavill’s Man of Steel, teasing future interactions between the two characters. Unfortunately, it appears as though the future interactions were nothing more than a bluff, as insiders report Cavill was signed on with no contract, only a verbal agreement, before being cast aside once Black Adam underperformed at the box office. News broke earlier this week that Cavill, who recently resigned from his starring role in Netflix’s The Witcher series, would also not be returning as Superman in subsequent DC films.
Dwayne Johnson allegedly pushed heavily for Henry Cavill’s return, even threatening to go over the heads of studio executives who threatened to get in his way. One might expect that this demand for Cavill’s inclusion came from admiration or respect for Cavill’s work, but it seems as though Johnson has no intention of standing up for the Superman actor now that the film has wrapped production.
Internet sleuths have reported that Johnson quietly unfollowed both Black Adam and Warner Brothers pages on Instagram, and has stopped doing press for the film even amidst its arrival on streaming this past week.
So it seems that Dwayne Johnson used Henry Cavill as nothing more than a bargaining chip, trying to cement his role as the center of the DCU, only to quietly move on to other projects as the film failed to best Disney’s Black Panther: Wakanda Forever in the box office. As for the future of the DCU, not much is known, aside from the absence of both Dwayne Johnson and Henry Cavill. James Gunn has teased several potential projects, as well as the return of some key figures from his first foray into the studio pantheon, 2021’s The Suicide Squad, but nothing is set in stone at this time.
In the meantime, Dwayne Johnson has moved on to promoting his new Amazon Prime Video film Red One, and Henry Cavill is a free agent ready to take on the mantle of new franchises, such as a potential placement in James Cameron’s Avatar 4. Cavill is rumored to have shot an additional cameo for Ezra Miller’s The Flash, expected to hit theaters next June, but it appears that his scene has been cut from the film, making Black Adam his final goodbye to the character.
