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Producer Hiram Garcia On Black Adam’s Current Status, Potential HBO Max Spinoffs, Next Jumanji

January 2, 2022 | Posted by Jeremy Thomas
Black Adam, The Rock Image Credit: Warner Bros. Pictures

Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson has a busy film schedule with Black Adam, a new Jumanji film and more on the way, and producer Hiram Garcia discussed them in a recent interview. Garcia, the president of Johnson’s Seven Bucks Productions, spoke with Collider for a new interview and you can check out a few highlights below:

On Johnson’s 2022 schedule: “2022 right now is looking like we’re going to do a movie called Red One for Amazon, which is our big Christmas movie that we’re very excited about that we announced that Jake Kasdan, who directed the Jumanjis for us, is going to come on and lead the helm. We’re very fired up about that and involved with that as well. Probably that year, we’ll… Knock on wood, would probably be some Young Rock stuff as well. But that’s what we’re looking at right now for that year, with some potential other things that I don’t want to say if they pop in because we haven’t green-lit them yet to go that year. But there’s another chance for another big movie to go that wouldn’t necessarily be a Dwayne Johnson vehicle but would be something else for Seven Bucks.”

On if they considered doing a post-credits scene for Red Notice: “We do have a really fun blooper reel, but we did like where we ended. In regards to the end credits, with something like this that, in essence, you could view as a franchise starter, we never really like to get ahead of ourselves too much. I think ultimately it’s the fans that dictate if they want a sequel, we’ll be ready to deliver them one. But there was never really a talk about doing some kind of post-credits scene because we always knew how we wanted the movie to end. We knew we wanted to tee up something big, but we didn’t feel that there was really any need for any kind of a post-credits scene. I think we have ideas in our head in terms of where we’d like the story to go, and if the fans respond to the movie the way we’re hoping they will, then it’s on us to be ready to deliver that, and we do have some really good ideas on deck.”

On a third Jumanji film: “It’s going to happen. It’s going to happen, for sure. We have a really big vision for that third Jumanji movie. We just were discussing the pitch the other day. We’re bringing it into Sony shortly. But that movie’s going to happen. It’s going to happen after Red One, but that timing actually works out well with all of the actors scheduled anyway. As you can imagine, Kevin is super busy doing a million things, just like DJ is. All of the actors are super busy. So the timing is going to work out great, but we have a really great pitch for the movie we’re about to bring into the studio, probably going to get a script written soon. Sometime after Red One, Jumanji‘s going to be on deck once it’s ready to go, and we have a really big vision for that movie.

On Black Adam: “Oh, we just saw the director’s cut recently, and we were really excited. Like you know, a lot of times when you see that early cut, it sets a table where you realize, “Okay, now we understand how much work we got to do.” Granted, the movie’s in a stage where there are no effects done. It’s so fresh after filming. But anytime the movie is that entertaining and good in that raw of a form, it makes us very confident. So really excited with where the movie is. [Director] Jaume [Collet-Serra] has done such a good job. The movie is big. It’s fun. DJ was born to play Black Adam. I got to tell you, if there was ever anyone who is just perfect for this role, it’s him. Then seeing him with the rest of the JSA and all those characters and Pierce and Aldis and Quintessa and Noah, it’s a pinch-me moment. It was one of the most fun movies we’ve ever made and also just the coolest to be making something on this scale and with a character who’s going to have this much of an effect on the DC Universe. It’s really been awesome, and I think you’re really going to dig it.

“Look, for us, it was very important with the fandom piece to… Even though we didn’t show much, we really wanted to just let fans know and people around the world know that we were setting a tone here with Black Adam and that this is a guy who doesn’t pull his punches. We didn’t go soft with him. There’s a reason why we wanted to show the first person that approaches him is no longer is on the planet. So I think we let people know this guy is a very different character than Shazam or Superman or so forth. He is a bad dude. He’s probably the most powerful person in the DC Universe right now, and he’s a handful, but DJ does a really good job of bringing him to life, and I think fans are going to have a lot of fun watching him.””

On if they’re discussing possible HBO Max spinoffs for Black Adam: “Yeah. Look, I think when it comes to the DC Universe, this is the great thing about being at Warner and DC, is you have gigantic conversations with all the tentacles there of being able to generate content and tell these stories. So we have met with everyone from every corner of DC Universe about how we can bring certain characters to life, how we can continue and build out the worlds on some of these characters, and it’s just about finding the right home for it. But nothing is left off the table when you’re dealing with characters of this nature and scale and in terms of how we can best deliver more content to the fans. So that continues to go, and you’re going to start to hear announcements regarding some of these characters and who we’re going to finally be able to tell a little bit more on going forward.”