A lot of reviews have critiqued Black Adam's script and pointed out the weaknesses there, so it's not meaningful for me to just repeat these points again. For a couple of good ones look at Critical Drinker's review and Pitch Meeting coverage.
Instead, what I'll try to do is suggest some changes, which have the potential of making the story a lot better (IMO).
Theme
I like to start with the theme of the movie. What is Black Adam's theme? What is the movie trying to discuss?
Let's take one of the scenes from the movie, where Black Adam faces off with Hawk Man. Hawk Man tells Black Adam, "Heroes don't kill people", and Black Adam responds "Well I do."
In multiple different places they talk about what's right and what's wrong. Heroes and Villains. For example, when Adriana says: "It's easy to tell who's bad and who's good when you're the one drawing lines." Or when Dr. Fate says "When you've seen so many futures as I have you cease to believe in absolutes."
Beside this, one of the biggest Black Adam marketing push is Black Adam's version of justice. He's bad ass. He kills people.
Based on all this, I think a good theme would be: "Justice is not black and white"
The movie would then examine the concepts of Justice, due process and when is it okay to bypass due process for the greater good.
This can be done by creating a contrast between Hawk Man and Black Adam, since both of them embody the different ideologies.
What would make the movie good IMHO is if we never really come to a solid answer, rather show how both approaches have significant flaws.
If you wait for due process, you end up with injustice prevailing and people suffering.
If you shortcut and "kill them all, and let God sort them out", then you end up hurting people who don't deserve it.
The question now is how can we portray the theme in a compelling way?
To do that, we first need to examine the existing characters.
Characters
Black Adam
He embodies the alternative view on justice. In order to help people you have to have some darkness in you. Sometimes you have to make the unpopular choices.
Hawk Man
He embodies the Idealistic super hero. The one whose goal is to keep the peace; to maintain due process; to ensure traditional justice is carried out.
Dr. Fate
He's the mentor. The rock, no pun intended, in which the other characters find comfort and strength.
Adriana and Son
I'm going to ignore the son character, because he serves the same thematic purpose as Adraina. The only thing he adds is a connection between Black Adam's past and the present. He serves as a reminder to Black Adam of his own son. Although this doesn't come out very well in the script.
Adriana represents the oppressed people, who suffered at the hands of the Villains, Intergang. She wants justice, but lacks the power and resources to actually make it happen
Ishmail
He represents the evil in man. Him and Intergang serve the same purpose. They oppress the people of Kahndaq; mistreat them; and take away their freedom.
I think I'm going to stop here, as these characters are the only ones necessary to drive the plot forward.
Unfortunately, the theme primarily comes out via dialogue. Adriana admonishes the Justice Society for not caring about the injustice taking place in Kahndaq. She poses the question: what should Justice look like? Should it be dark and swift, as what Black Adam does, or should it be methodical and by the book as what Hawk Man does.
As you can see what is missing is a character which can bring forth the theme of the movie such that we do a lot more showing and a lot less telling.
What we need is a way to show these two opposing points of view, rather than just tell the audience about them.
What we need is a Reluctant Judas
Reluctant Judas and the Theme
Who is Reluctant Judas? You may ask. He is a character who's close and friendly with Adriana, but at the same is plotting to betray her; not out of malice but out of need (or at least what he perceives as need). I'll talk about his journey a bit later, but first let's see how we can make some time for him in the movie.
We can do two things. First, I would cut out or greatly reduce the role of Adriana's son. Make him be part of the comic relief and leave it at that.
Second, cut out the cyclone character and any time she had with Atom Smasher is now reclaimed.
Use the saved time to show how the Reluctant Judas character, starts off helping Adriana out with her quest to find the crown, but at the same time, he's feeding intel to Ishamel.
We can build up a relationship between Reluctant Judas and Adriana, thereby making his betrayal all the much worse. For example he could protect her against one of Intergang's goons. He would emotionally support her when she doubts herself. Weaving elements like this in the scene will show Reluctant Judas as Adriana's friend (a side kick character of sorts).
Reluctant Judas is not blind to the injustice in Kahndaq, but he has lost too much, and just wants a better life for himself, even if it comes at the expense of his nation. Something, which Ishamil promised would grant, if he gets him the crown.
In Reluctant Judas's journey we can see how he's both bad and good. He cares for Adriana, but at the same time he can't waste the opportunity for a better life.
Reluctant Judas's demise would come in the midpoint of the movie. When things go side ways he facilitates the kidnapping of Andriana's son's. In retaliation, Black Adam extracts the information he needs from him and kills him in front of Adriana and against her wishes.
This simple act of killing someone Adriana cares for, even though Reluctant Judas has "sinned" against her, will really bring out Black Adam's dark justice. And will make Adriana fear him, more than like him. She knows that she needs him to save her son, but at the same time fears his unpredictable violent nature.
Black Adam killing Reluctant Judas will be a precursor to him almost killing Adriana's son by mistake, and therefore, making his decision to give up his power a lot more impactful.
The addition of the Reluctant Judas character will also focus the script.
We're not going to have to waste time with Adriana's son. You can still keep all the jokes, but cut out the rest. The boy can still serve as a reminder of Black Adam's son. But this will manifest itself through Black Adam's interaction with Adriana, rather than with her son.
We would build up a three way friendship between Adriana, Reluctant Judas and Black Adam. This friendship can be used as a vehicle to bring out the hurt and the guilt Black Adam feels. This friendship story-line would culminate at the movie's mid-point when Adriana's son gets kidnapped, and Black Adam kills Reluctant Judas after he gets the information he needs.
On the villain side, Ishmail would direct Intergang from behind the scenes. We can show how he rose to prominence through his cunning abilities. This is a good way to build up his villainous nature for the confrontation in Act 3. Through the Ishamel/Reluctant Judas interaction we could better understand the motivation and politics of Intergang.
I would also cut down the time spent with the younger members of the the JSA. In fact I would cut out cyclone completely. And keep Atom Smasher for his comic relief .
Then I would use the time saved there to delve more into the Adriana/Black Adam relationship and the Ishmail/Reluctant Judas interactions. Flesh out the Reluctant Judas character and make the audience empathise with his motivation. The audience won't agree with him, but at the same time, they wouldn't want to see him die. Maybe they'll even want him to redeem himself. And when Black Adam kills him, it also makes the Audience both like and fear Black Adam for the same reason as Adriana. His actions are unpredictable.
The rest of the action and main elements in the story can stay the same.
Anywho, that's all from me. Over and Out
Why am I going through the effort of rewriting a movie? Here are my reasons:
- I find that a lot of the reviews focus on either the positive or negative elements, but I don't find a lot of reviews which attempt to suggest corrections to the negative elements they point out.
- Lots of the reviews are meant to be sensational. I understand that's how you get clicks, but beyond getting clicks, I'm not sure how useful they are.
- I'm a big believer in building each other up. My reviews are not meant to destroy, but to build. Providing pointed suggestions on how to make a movie better is a good way of achieving my goal.
- It's practice for me. The more I do this, the better writer I become.
Without further ado, here is what I would change about Black Adam.