The Rock Reveals He’s Filming Black Adam Shirtless Scenes This Week And It Took A LOT Of Work

The Rock in Pain and Gain official trailer

Unless you’ve been living under a rock (ha), you probably already know The Rock is swole right now, like even more so than normal. The reason is because DC’s Black Adam is finally, finally filming and Dwayne Johnson wants to make sure our expectations regarding the superhero are met. Recently he’s had a particularly strenuous task, however: He’s had to get ready for some shirtless scenes.

Black Adam sometimes makes lists about the “sexiest men in comics,” so the fact we’ll be getting some shirtless scenes, while I suppose is a little bit spoilery, does make some sort of sense. Dwayne Johnson doesn’t seemingly want to get too spoilery with the info, however. While he did share how he’s staying ultra fit for the shirtless scenes, he has yet to share a shirtless photo. Still, it’s worth checking out, even if we only get a really nice look at the tree trunks The Rock calls “legs.”

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It's worth pointing out the Rock isn’t exactly a spring chicken. At this point, he had a career in wrestling and transitioned into a career in acting that’s been going strong for a decade-plus now, so it shouldn’t be too much of a surprise to learn he’s actually 49 years of age. While his peers Will Smith (52) and Anthony Anderson (50) are going on about their “dad bods,” Dwayne Johnson is prepping to go shirtless this year.

Now, granted Will Smith, Marlon Wayans and Anthony Anderson are all currently working on whipping their own butts into shape and getting rid of those dad bods, but Johnson’s never really been that out of shape to begin with. Even when he isn’t prepping for Black Adam scenes, he’s at the gym daily and eats healthy most days, with the exception of his famous cheat meals.

For the upcoming DC scenes, Dwayne Johnson also talked about the months of work he has put in to get his fitness into peak shape for Black Adam. This includes, as he notes in his Instagram post,

Been working extremely hard dieting, training and conditioning unlike any other role of my entire career. Manipulating water, sodium, cardio but also having to push and pull real iron to have dense, dry, detailed muscle. It’s a real science that takes months and months to dial it all in.

Just a few days ago, The Rock spoke out about hitting this particularly strenuous portion of his Black Adam training and diet with an --honestly not all that appealing -- look at his food portion. He’s also called the process of staying fit for DC “challenging” and I believe him.

The end result is that The Rock will get to fulfill his dream of playing a DC character and he’s taking fans along for the full journey. Without giving too much away about the plot (other than I suppose spoiling a shirtless scene), Dwayne Johnson has been giving us some fun teases throughout filming. It’s easy to be pretty hped about what is to come when Black Adam finally hits theaters.

It will be a little while before we get to see the actor’s work pay off in full on the big screen. Black Adam isn’t due into theaters until July of 2022, but there’s plenty of upcoming Dwayne Johnson movies on the way, including the long-delayed Jungle Cruise movie.

Jessica Rawden
Managing Editor

Jessica Rawden is Managing Editor at CinemaBlend. She’s been kicking out news stories since 2007 and joined the full-time staff in 2014. She oversees news content, hiring and training for the site, and her areas of expertise include theme parks, rom-coms, Hallmark (particularly Christmas movie season), reality TV, celebrity interviews and primetime. She loves a good animated movie. Jessica has a Masters in Library Science degree from Indiana University, and used to be found behind a reference desk most definitely not shushing people. She now uses those skills in researching and tracking down information in very different ways.