When I was a kid, one of the cartoons I remember was simply titled Shazam! I remember that it featured a teen reporter who, when saying the magic word “Shazam,” would bring down lightning and thunder to transform into the red-clad adult superhero “Captain Marvel.” He wasn’t alone though. With his sister Mary and best friend Freddie, they too could call down the magic that would turn them into “Mary Marvel” and “Captain Marvel, Jr.” respectively. It was a short-lived series, but the premise of saying one magic word to turn a kid into a superpowered adult is every child’s dream. Nearly four decades later, a live-action film finally captures that magic in the form of the film Shazam! from Director David F. Sandberg.
In 1974, a young Thaddeus Sivana is being berated by his father and brother Sid while on the road. Playing with a Magic 8 Ball, Thaddeus is suddenly transported to the mystical Rock of Eternity by a mysterious wizard (Djimon Hounsou). The wizard tests Sivana if he is a good person at heart and resist the temptations offered by the Seven Deadly Sins. The boy fails and the wizard returns him to the car with his family, leaving Thaddeus hysterical and getting them into a car accident. The wizard’s quest for a champion to carry on his battle against evil would continue.
By 2019, the wizard is older and weaker than ever. A 14-year-old Billy Batson (Asher Angel) has been placed in foster home after foster home as he’s run away 23 times trying to look for his mother who he was separated from at a young age. Billy is taken in by Victor and Rosa Vasquez (Cooper Andrews and Marta Milans) a couple who run their own group home for foster kids. They introduce him to the five other kids in their care: Mary Bromfield (Grace Fulton), Pedro Pena (Jovan Armand), Eugene Choi (Ian Chen), Darla Dudley (Faithe Herman), and superhero fanboy Freddie Freeman (Jack Dylan Grazer).
All of them welcome Billy, especially Freddie, but he’s already plotting his next escape to keep looking for his birth mother. In the years since his accident, Sivana (Mark Strong) has relentlessly tried to return to the Rock of Eternity and used his father’s resources to prove he wasn’t delusional. He finally unlocks a way back and unleashes the Seven Deadly Sins while attacking the old wizard.
Freddie’s geekiness and Darla’s clingy nature turn Billy off, but when the former is attacked by school bullies, Billy still defends his new foster brother. Escaping to the subway, Billy is transported to the Rock of Eternity and the wizard determines that he has finally found the champion to inherit his powers. By saying the wizard’s name, Billy would possess the wisdom of Solomon, the strength of Hercules, the courage of Achilles, the power of Zeus, the courage of Achilles, and the speed of Mercury. Billy says the word “Shazam!” and is suddenly turned into an adult in bright red costume (Zachary Levi) but retains all off Billy’s memories.
With no clue about how to be a superhero, the costumed Billy returns to their group home and asks Freddie for help in testing his new abilities. Figuring out that an adult can get away with a lot of things that they can’t as kids, Freddie and Billy buy junk food and beer while also taking videos of Billy in action and posting them online. As Billy starts to warm up to the idea of making money off his powers and skipping school, Freddie still has problems with school bullies. In the meantime, Sivana is consolidating his power as the Sins urge him to hunt down the wizard’s champion and take the power for himself.
The character now known as Shazam has had a complicated and often star-crossed history since Bill Parker and CC Beck created him in 1939. Originally known as “Captain Marvel” and appearing in Whiz Comics published by Fawcett Comics, there was a time that this character was outselling even Superman as the appeal of a kid transforming into an adult hero resonated even then. After DC Comics sued Fawcett because of similarities between Superman and Captain Marvel, Fawcett eventually stopped publishing in 1953 and after several decades, the character itself was bought by DC. Meanwhile, Marvel Comics trademarked the title “Captain Marvel” for their own character(s) to carry their company’s name. More confusion would follow before DC finally decided to rename him completely as “Shazam.”
The most basic thing about good superhero movies come down to a few things: a. they have to be fun, b. they have to be as good as the source material, c. the effects have to be good enough to make you believe that this can happen in real life, and d. they have to be able to entice a new audience to want more. Shazam! checks all these boxes and then some. Sandberg captures the basic elements of the character’s classic origin as well as the deeper story that legendary writer Geoff Johns has been adding since 2012.
The “kids” in the form of Angel, Grazer, Fulton, Pena, Choi, Armand, and Herman, are all charming with their own individual idiosyncrasies and character traits but also show believability as basically a group of society’s rejects that have come together as a family. You really feel for Angel in his quest for a real family and his scenes with Grazer that have them bickering and fighting like an old married couple.
Levi, as expected, is perfect as a man-child with the mind of a 14-year-old and the body of a Greek god. He looks like a million dollars yet pulls off the awkwardness and sincerity of someone who isn’t quite sure yet if he can be a grown man. Credit also has to be given to the story by Henry Gayden and Darren Lemke for giving a one-dimensional villain like Sivana a real backstory and connecting it to Shazam’s origins, something comics writers have largely neglected to do for 80 years.
This is what superhero films should be all about. The basic wish fulfillment that saying one magic word can turn a kid into a hero have been copied by two of Mars Ravelo’s creations in Captain Barbell and Darna, but this is the original and Shazam! is, to put it simply, fun.
About the Author:
Jason Inocencio was once the Digital Editor of adobo magazine who still loves seeing great campaigns from all over the world. He proudly shows off his love for all kinds of geeky things, whether it be movies, TV shows, comics, sports, or trivia.
