All his roles are so generic and interchangeable. I don't even remember any of his character's names, not the Jumanji one, not the Fast & Furious one, not Rampage one, not the San Andreas one. They are all are just him, Dwayne Johnson.
The Scorpion King was maybe his most iconic role, and that's how many years ago? He got no T-800 or Rambo or Rocky or John McClain character that he can call his own.
I like The Rock, but man I'm getting sick of him.
shareWhat's your name again?...
...IT DOESN'T MATTER WHAT YOUR NAME IS!!!
I’m gonna take this size 17 boot, I’m gonna shine it up real nice, I’m gonna turn that some bitch side ways ...
shareScorpion King his most iconic role? Ok, exactly when do I stop laughing in your face? If anything his stint as Hobbs in The "F&F" movies is one of the roles he's reprised the most.
I'd say wait for this turn as "Black Adam" which "might" if all things go well & he does a reasonably good job with the part might very well be his career defining role, but we'll have to wait & see.
Agreed, Black Adam sounds interesting.
shareIt is in part poorly written and developed scripts, and for his part mediocre acting ability. With those two things going against you, you aren't going to be getting any Captain Jack or Indiana Jones level characters.
shareI think it's more the former than the latter. Arnold was never a great actor but he was handed great scripts and worked with great directors, and we know what the result was.
If The Rock found his way into a film that was the quality of T2 or even Total Recall it would do a lot for him.
I think it's really this right here. If he got a few prime Arnold type roles he would have that same effect. One problem is that these days there isn't the same magic as earlier. I don't mean that in a nostalgic way because that was before me. More in the sense that in the 80s and 90s films were bigger events. Now we have media overload, and what we might have given a chance to and found endearing before, people just jump to something else. It all kind of runs together and so you don't have the cultural impact with even a big hit that a smaller movie in the 80s would have had.
shareYou're definitely right about media overload. There is no doubt about that. Today it's just a constant stream of new movies, shows, YouTube personalities, podcasts and so on, all available at your fingertips because of the Internet. And when something becomes too common and too accessible it begins to lose its specialness.
It seems that these days when we do see a piece of screen entertainment become a phenomenon, it's a TV show--like Game of Thrones, True Detective or Cobra Kai--and not a movie. But of course some movies do become huge hits, though this is increasingly rare outside of superhero films.
I do think one problem The Rock has that comes down to him personally is that he always has this "gee whiz" likable factor, as if he never stops winking at the camera. Arnold, while not necessarily a better actor, did have the ability to come across as genuinely cold and dangerous, like he did in the first Terminator film. It's hard to imagine Dwayne pulling that off.
There is truth to that as well, Arnold had goofy charm at times, but could be dead serious at other times, and Rock never seems to pull that off. I would have trouble seeing him as genuinely dangerous or violent. You sense that he tries to be this PG version of Arnold and that holds him back
shareHe stars in mostly shitty movies, and his acting is quite shitty too.
He's fine playing the same role, which is himself.
Nobody is going to remember him playing yet again himself in a yet again shitty movie built around that same character.
Indiana Jones was not Harrison Ford. Same for the Terminator, McClane, Rocky etc.
The Scorpion King is indeed his most iconic role: it has a name, a story, and a character that is not the same he always plays. Still a shitty movie, but at least he plays a bad guy in the original movie, so he's not allowed to fully play the same likeable character he always plays.
No chance would a survey asking 100 random people what movie they think of when they think of the Rock, have results with Scorpion King being the majority,sorry.
shareNo chance anybody of those, will remember what is a single name of his blurry characters other than "the Rock". Except for the Scorpion King.
shareYep. Love the Rock but he seems to intentionally take bland roles so as to be as universally appealing as possible. He's gonna regret that when he's old cause he ain't gonna have no beloved franchise to lean on. He's just gonna be old Rock and who cares? All Arnold and Sly's non franchise films bomb now. Vin Diesel has a few characters he can ride into old age. But Hobbs ain't Dom. He needs to develop his San Andreas character. Disaster Man. Keep throwing this same dude into a series of global disasters, each one bigger than the last. Something like that.
shareThat didn't pan out well for Gerard Butler. He tried pulling the "president savior" character a few times hoping it intact as his "signature" role. It faded into oblivion.
I think how Bruce Willis came to be McClaine, Stallone Rambo and Rocky, Schwarznegger Terminator, etc. were pure luck. Trying to "engineer" these roles would be futile.
Nonsense. Those movies are awesome and they're making a fourth one. With plans for two more to follow. They make money.
shareThanks to your post, I just did some research and learned that not only is there a fourth Has Fallen movie in the works, but apparently there are actually three more on the way.
I agree with you that those movies are pretty fucking rad, especially the first two.
Butler's "Has Fallen" series has made money. That's why there are three of them, with a fourth greenlit. I love those films, especially the first two.
In regard to your second statement, there was no luck with Stallone becoming Rambo or Rocky. He made that shit happen through sheer force of will. And sure, there was some luck involved with Bruce and Arnold landing their iconic roles, but at the end of the day it's about working with talented writers and directors.
Hobbs seems to be the most iconic so far
shareI think The Scorpion King is it. I'd be down to see him play that character again.
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