Black Adam’s Hawkman gave Aldis Hodge wild DC comics lore to chew on

Although superheroes have a complicated backstory, they are known for being incredibly sloppy. Cable of The X-Men. Donna Troy of Amazons. Ben Reilly, Spider-Man. Only one star is in Black AdamHawkman is the costumed adventurer best known as a modern archeologist or a reincarnating explorer, but it’s also a space alien.

Aldis Hodge plays the role in this film as actor Aldis. Black AdamHe is acutely aware of the fact that his personality is a bit chaotic.

“It was sort of a running joke for a bit when I first started dipping into research,” he told Polygon via Zoom ahead of the film’s release. “OK, but which story? I know all of the stories, all of the backstories.”

What is Hawkman’s backstory?

Image: DC Comics

Hodge truly is brave. If you’re familiar with the Hawkman of DC Comics (or TV’s Arrowverse), you probably know Hawkman one of two ways: as Carter Hall, a modern adventurer who happens to be the reincarnation of the ancient Egyptian prince Khufu, or as Katar Hol, a cop from a planet where everybody wears wings.

Perhaps you know Hawkman/ Hawkwoman as a result of the Justice League Cartoon that combines both these backstories into Carter Hall. Carter Hall is the human incarnation of an alien bird fighter who crashed-landed in Egypt, becoming pharaoh.

What is the name of one of them? Black Adam? Hodge didn’t want to give too much away (though to be fair, the movie doesn’t have much time for Hawkman’s backstory either, given that the focus is on its titular character). But he talked about his own personal quest, before the movie began shooting, to find a “stream of synergy” between all the versions of Hawkman.

“For me,” Hodge said, “it was Carter Hall, the version that most of us are quite familiar with. […]The nature of the reincarnated form, which is derived from the original, was something I loved. […]He was also a pharaoh. I connected with that the most.”

Hodge also had Carter Hall to help him find the parallels between his character, and that of Hodge. Black Adam’s mercurial protagonist, played by Dwayne Johnson. “Both he and Black Adam come from a healthy line of legacy. They’re both warriors in a new age and a new space, but their principles come from a very different time period. So there’s a regal nature. Those are the elements that inspired me the most when it came to who this person is.”

How does this all relate to hawks?

Warner Bros.

In Hawkman’s first appearance in 1940s Flash Comics #1, writer Gardner Fox and artist Dennis Neville have him take on the guise of a hawk in homage to, quote, “the ancient hawk-god, Anubis.” (Who, uh, famously has the head of a jackal, not a hawk, or any other kind of bird.) This is how Hawkman ended up dressing like a Hawkman. It was cool because it appealed to some 1940s men. To be honest, it is.

Hawkman’s powers have usually amounted to warrior skills, mostly in the medieval sense of having a giant morning star to swing around. Hawkman can fly by strapping on an antigravity belt, and using a set of massive wings made out of the mystical Nth metallic.

That’s right: The wings are not a part of his body, and he can take them off. Over the years, Hawkman’s costume has run the gamut from a full tunic to a barely-there leather harness. He’s definitely a superhero who believes in the maxim of “sun’s out, guns out.” But when I asked Hodge whether he was disappointed that Carter’s movie look was going to cover up all the hard work he’d done to achieve a superheroic physique, he laughed it off. He repeated his claim that he did the research.

“Not at all! Hawkman’s Hawkman armor is entirely made of Nth metal. You can find different versions of the armor. Some have a cuirass which I wear in the film. The thing I loved about it was that we got to really see the full-on talent of our art team, the designers Kurt and Bart, and then also Legacy Effects studio, that actually made the armor — this guy Darnell Isom, who was amazing, he modeled the helmet and the armor and the gear.”

Hodge’s appreciation for the costume comes in part from studying to BeHe was an actor before he became a successful designer. He keeps his foot in design.

“I’m literally wearing museum-piece art!” he said of his Hawkman costume. “I love being able to see that, because I co-own an art studio myself. […] We worked alongside the team from DC’s Blue BeetleSo I can see things from a new perspective. I get to appreciate the work in its full intensity, and I think it’s amazing.”

It just goes to show that in the world of comics, it sometimes doesn’t matter how convoluted a character’s backstory is, as long as they look dope in action.