Black Adam

Filmation Character
Black Adam
Information
Real name:	Teth-Adam
AKA:	Mighty Adam
Species:	Human
Homeworld:	Earth
Universe:	Earth-S Earth-1A
Hair:	black
Eyes:	brown
Relatives:	Princess Jemi (wife, deceased)
Base:	Egypt
Affiliations:	Monster Society of Evil
Rogue of:	Marvel Family
Abilities:	Various magical powers such as: Super strength Super speed Invulnerability Optic cold manipulation Flight
Voiced/Played:	Lou Scheimer

Black Adam is a supervillain and an enemy of Captain Marvel and the entire Marvel Family.

Background Information

Five thousand years ago, in the parallel universe of Earth-S, the Champion, now going by the name of Shazam, feels the need to pass along his powers to a successor. He selects the pharaoh's son Teth-Adam (which literally means "Mighty Human") to receive the power to become the superpowered Mighty Adam by speaking the word "SHAZAM!" Unlike Billy Batson, the power corrupted Teth-Adam and he turned to evil. It was in fact Teth-Adam's corruption that led Shazam to choose a young boy to be his next successor, one too innocent to be corrupted by his powers.

Continuity from Filmation animated series The Kid Super Power Hour with Shazam! (1981)

Teth-Adam was a man from Egypt who had super powers magically bestowed upon him by the wizard known as the Champion. Over time though, he began to use his powers for evil and started calling himself Black Adam. Because of this, the Champion banishes Teth-Adam to the end of the universe. It took him 5,000 years to return to earth, to claim the entombed, Egyptian Princess Jemi as his bride. After the Princess is killed, Black Adam decides to take Mary Marvel as his bride, so he casts a spell upon her, and they fly off into space to start a life on another planet where they planned to enslave the natives and force them to build the pyramids for them. But later, Captain Marvel and Captain Marvel, Jr. devised a way to trick him into saying the name of the wizard, "Shazam," which transformed him back to his mortal form, and since his mortal form was over 5,000 years old, he instantly turned to dust, and Mary was freed from his magic spell.

Later he inexplicably found a way to return to life, and attempted to destroy North America by causing a catastrophic volcanic eruption. Again the Marvels tricked him into saying Shazam, but this time he was sent back to the days of ancient Egypt.

Powers

• Divine Empowerment:

S The stamina of Shu;

H The speed of Heru;

A The strength of Amon;

Z The wisdom of Zehuti;

A The power of Aton;

M The courage of Mehen.

• Invulnerability
• Superhuman Stamina
• Superhuman Strength
• Super-Speed
• Transformation
• Flight
• Cold manipulation
• In the Filmation series he also wields Magic spells in addition to his Shazam powers, perhaps to level the field against the more numerous Marvel Family.

Weaknesses

Because Black Adam has lived for so many centuries in his superhuman form, he cannot risk turning back to a mortal being or else he will instantly revert to his correct chronological age. Uncle Marvel once tricked Black Adam into speaking the magic word "Shazam", and the magic lightning bolt turned him into a withered, ancient skeleton. Black Adam found a way to return to life however, and came back to plague the Marvels.

Appearances

The Kid Super Power Hour with Shazam!

• Black Adam's Return
• A Little Something Extra

Notes

• Black Adam was created in 1945 by Otto Binder & C. C. Beck for Fawcett Comics.
• He first appeared in Marvel Family, vol.1 #1 (December, 1945)
• Industrial Toy Werks created an action figure of Black Adam for the Super Powers Collection.

Trivia

• He was originally created as a one-shot villain. When DC revived the series he was later brought back to life by Dr. Sivana to have an ally powerful enough to battle Captain Marvel, only to try to conquer the world himself.