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2023 will see the end of the DC Extended Universe as we know it. Under James Gunn and the newly minted DC Studios, the DCEU will be softly rebooted into simply the DC Universe, with some elements and actors carrying over from the previous universe while others such as Superman and Batman confirmed to be recast. Gunn's plans don't kick off until 2025 with a new Superman film, so we still have four DCEU films this year to wrap things up. The first is "Shazam: Fury of the Gods".
Much like "Deadpool" and its sequel, a lot of the magic that made the first "Shazam!" special is still there, but some of it becomes lost in the usual superhero tropes.
Many of the returning actors from the first film continue to do a good job as their characters, and I feel there's a good balance to give the Shazam kids enough time between their normal and superhero forms. That is except for Billy, though this is by intent. Much like the first film, Billy uses Shazam as an escape to ignore the real-life issues he's facing. This time around, now that Billy has found a family and home that accepts him, he worries about everyone growing up and drifting apart, yet his attempts to keep them together shows signs of pushing them away. It leads to him learning they're family even when they're apart; it's a lesson that's been seen in other stories, but it's still somewhat effective.
Going off the "growing up" part, they do make it clear that some time has passed since the first film, but this does cause an issue when it feels like some plot points were written to follow up directly after the first film. I feel like they should have realized that some things that seemed fine during the script writing process needed to be reworked once filming began.
Going off the "growing up" part, they do make it clear that some time has passed since the first film, but this does cause an issue when it feels like some plot points were written to follow up directly after the first film. I feel like they should have realized that some things that seemed fine during the script writing process needed to be reworked once filming began.
The Daughters of Atlas are well done as the film's villains and the relationships with each other and where they go serve as a good parallel to Billy's family issues. Each one comes off unique in terms of motivation and demeanor; Helen Mirren is the levelheaded leader and seeks a sense of justice for their father as Hespera, Lucy Liu is more bloodthirsty and vengeful as Kalypso, and Rachel Zegler seeks a peaceful solution that can be seen as a sense of naivety as Anthea (and I also enjoy her relationship with Freddy, giving me shades of Aladdin/Jasmine).
Elements at the disposal of the daughters were entertaining to me as well. Their dragon Ladon reminded me of a few different versions of Godzilla, with the fire breath being reminiscent of the Legendary version's atomic breath while the sharp texture of its skin I found similar to Shin Godzilla's. And the Tree of Life they plant made me think of a mix of the Tree of Might from Dragon Ball Z and the black goo from the two Alien prequels with a Greek mythology twist. The latter element plays well with director David F. Sandberg's horror roots, similar to James Wan's use of the Trench in "Aquaman."
Elements at the disposal of the daughters were entertaining to me as well. Their dragon Ladon reminded me of a few different versions of Godzilla, with the fire breath being reminiscent of the Legendary version's atomic breath while the sharp texture of its skin I found similar to Shin Godzilla's. And the Tree of Life they plant made me think of a mix of the Tree of Might from Dragon Ball Z and the black goo from the two Alien prequels with a Greek mythology twist. The latter element plays well with director David F. Sandberg's horror roots, similar to James Wan's use of the Trench in "Aquaman."
If I could pinpoint the big problem with the film, it's the ending, and yes, I will be going into spoilers. So after Billy sacrifices his life to defeat Kalypso and Ladon to save the world, the wizard says they could bring him back if his staff hadn't been drained of godly magic. And that's when Gal Gadot's Wonder Woman (a daughter of Zeus for those who've forgotten) shows up, charges up the staff, which is then used to revive Billy and grant all the kids their powers back.
The first problem with this is that WB chose to spoil Wonder Woman's appearance in the film in commercials less than a week before release. As nice as it was to see Gal again, especially since her future as the character is up in the air at this point, I would have been geeking out as hard as when Henry Cavill's Superman appeared in the mid-credits scene of "Black Adam" if they kept it a surprise. It also takes away some of the impact of Billy's sacrifice when we know he's going to interact with her as Shazam pretty soon. At least when they spoiled Mystique's death in "Dark Phoenix", it still left an emotional impact because of the characters' reactions to it. I don't know if it's WB not caring about the rest of the DCEU slate this year or if they think showing Wonder Woman would boost the box office, but this was a bad move.
The in-story problem though is it's a literal deus ex machina. Diana just comes out of nowhere after not appearing anywhere prior with the only mentions of her having to do with Billy's crush on her. If they were going to do this, she should have had a bigger part in the story. Maybe not necessarily a team-up film, but at least more involvement. I'm going to chalk this up to the lack of a cohesive vision the DCEU films have faced since "Josstice League" and they couldn't use Wonder Woman in a big way without Patty Jenkins' say. Hopefully this won't be much of a problem under Gunn's direction.
And going off of that, the two post-credits scenes seem kind of a waste since we don't even know if they'll be followed up on.
The first problem with this is that WB chose to spoil Wonder Woman's appearance in the film in commercials less than a week before release. As nice as it was to see Gal again, especially since her future as the character is up in the air at this point, I would have been geeking out as hard as when Henry Cavill's Superman appeared in the mid-credits scene of "Black Adam" if they kept it a surprise. It also takes away some of the impact of Billy's sacrifice when we know he's going to interact with her as Shazam pretty soon. At least when they spoiled Mystique's death in "Dark Phoenix", it still left an emotional impact because of the characters' reactions to it. I don't know if it's WB not caring about the rest of the DCEU slate this year or if they think showing Wonder Woman would boost the box office, but this was a bad move.
The in-story problem though is it's a literal deus ex machina. Diana just comes out of nowhere after not appearing anywhere prior with the only mentions of her having to do with Billy's crush on her. If they were going to do this, she should have had a bigger part in the story. Maybe not necessarily a team-up film, but at least more involvement. I'm going to chalk this up to the lack of a cohesive vision the DCEU films have faced since "Josstice League" and they couldn't use Wonder Woman in a big way without Patty Jenkins' say. Hopefully this won't be much of a problem under Gunn's direction.
And going off of that, the two post-credits scenes seem kind of a waste since we don't even know if they'll be followed up on.
Aside from the ending, "Shazam: Fury of the Gods" still delivers a fun film for the most part, even if it doesn't leave the same impact its predecessor did.
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