It’s difficult to grasp how Johnson Dwayne ‘The Rock’ became such an industry hero when you study and dissect his modern legacy. Johnson has been a captivating figure of public adoration with an enigmatic, pungent smell of lingering success since his days as a WWE wrestler to his life as one of the highest-earning Hollywood actors of current cinema.

Johnson’s early life followed this trend, with him playing college American football for the University of Miami’s national championship team and standing as a figure of all-American power in both his towering physical presence and his positive positivism. After enjoying great success in the sport, he chose to give up football and pursue wrestling after being cut by the Calgary Stampeders two months into the season.

Johnson, who wrestles under the moniker ‘The Rock,’ became a sporting superstar just two years after joining the WWE in 1996, developing into one of the company’s most famous wrestlers because to his explosive personality. This peaked from the mid-1990s until the turn of the 2000, when The Rock, armed with the strange tagline “If you smell what the rock is cooking!” catapulted the entertainment industry to new heights.

Johnson entered the larger entertainment world in 2001, as the Scorpion King in The Mummy Returns, a film known for its remarkably awful CGI that has aged like cream cheese on a summer’s day. The film obviously ignited a ferocious new drive in Johnson, since a spin-off starring the wrestler as the title Scorpion King was released a year later.

Johnson discussed the course of his career with followers on social media in 2020, detailing his shift into cinematic acting by saying, “Even though I wrestled for 20-50,000 people, I wanted it to feel intimate and the relationship to feel real.” So, when I wanted to transfer into acting, I found my power space in professional wrestling.”

He said, “I wanted to have a real, long-lasting career that had weight and had value. And I wanted to become a real box office presence. I wanted to have a real box office cache…That was my goal at 29-years-old and I was prepared to work my ass off but I also knew, I gave myself a 10-12 year plan”.

As the actor himself acknowledged, his path to celebrity would not be quick or simple, as evidenced by his 21st-century resume, which includes roles in video game adaptations like Doom and as a random screen comedian in films like Tooth Fairy. Even so, Johnson recognized that in order to be the best, he needed to integrate himself with current media in more ways than just cinema, and his modern career is peppered with cameos and television appearances.

Johnson worked to maintain his newfound cinematic presence when he wasn’t pedaling for box-office success, appearing as a guest star on Hannah Montana and Saturday Night Live, as well as being a funny voiceover on Family Guy, all while making regular appearances in the WWE that made him a celebrity.

Johnson finally realized his adolescent dream in 2020, becoming the highest-paid Hollywood actor for the second year in a row, thanks to his newfound fame in the Fast & Furious franchise, among other things.
If there’s one thing we can learn from Johnson’s illustrious career, it’s that he never aspired to be a standard Hollywood actor; instead, he aspired to be a globally recognized brand.

Johnson has pervaded every inch of modern culture, appealing to younger audiences with appearances in Disney’s Moana and the video game Fortnite: Chapter 3, as well as appearing in music videos for Taylor Swift and Tech N9ne, all culminating in Johnson getting his own TV show Young Rock in 2021, which looks at the actor’s history to shed light on how he became such a household name.

Johnson has showed how you can make a brand out of your own inflated personality and dominate the world of modern entertainment as a result, making him an ode to the modern American ideal.