DC may have doomed Dwayne Johnson, but Dave Bautista owes his entire career to Superman

Dwayne Johnson might have hoped he could salvage this single-handedly direct current universe, but ultimately he couldn’t even save his own Black Adam franchise after James Gunn and Peter Safran took over to completely overhaul the brand. But while The Rock’s reputation has suffered significantly as Johnson now spends his time hanging out in the woods and pondering the nature of failure in weird Instagram videos, David Bautista owes his entire post-WWE career to DC.

As previously revealed, Johnson may not have achieved his dream of fighting Superman on screen, but Bautista did almost 20 years ago. Already in 2006, the Guardians of the Galaxy star guested on Kleinville to battle with Tom Wellings Clark Kent when a Kryptonian criminal escaped from the Phantom Zone. Coincidentally, that TV role was Bautista’s first acting assignment, and it sounds like he can give her credit for piqued his interest in the profession.

“[The] Kleinville Gig was another one of those things that I got through WWE,” Bautista famously said. “At that point, I had absolutely no ambitions to pursue acting.”

While it is his turn as Aldar Kleinville Hardly a strenuous acting debut for Bautista, relying mostly on his physicality, it clearly seeded further ambitions to conquer Hollywood just as he had done in the wrestling world. Today, Bautista is confident enough to outshine Dwayne Johnson, saying he doesn’t want to be “the next rock” but would rather be known as a “respectable” and “good” actor. Quite a change from a man with zero interest in the profession. And fans of his turns in people like glass onion, Bladerunner 2049and countless others have Kleinville and to thank the worlds of DC for it.