Movie Breakdown: Shazam!

Pre-Screening Stance:

If you’re operating at a point where the DC Extended Universe just no longer cocks your pistol and thus you don’t have it in you to be jazzed about Shazam, I get it.  Hell, even the franchise’s best movie, Wonder Woman, has a variety of issues.  Still though, there’s something about Shazam that has me feeling like it’s going to be a home run.

Post-Screening Ramble:

You’re going to dig Shazam.  It’s not a perfect film by any means, but it’s funny, full of heart and it doesn’t try to do too much.  The movie follows a teen boy by the name of Billy Batson (Asher Angel), who gets chosen by the Wizard Shazam (Djimon Hounsou), given super powers (that can be summoned by yelling Shazam!), and then told to protect the world.  And what comes with such a silly setup?  Even sillier things.  Billy and his foster home roomie/best pal/sidekick, Freddy Freeman (Jack Dylan Grazer), simply ignore the responsibility part of the gig and go about playing for most of the movie.  They use Billy’s newfound powers to skip school and exploit people for money.  They also spend a lot of time just reveling in all of the things that Billy as a fully grown super dude can do, like shoot lightning out of his fingers.  Eventually, an evil baddie, Dr. Thaddeus Sivana (Mark Strong), zooms in and demands the magic imbued in Billy, but he doesn’t have a strong presence and he isn’t threatening enough to where the film is forced to shift into anything too serious.  Honestly, I feel like you could peg Shazam as a superhero parody (it’s definitely more of a comedy than anything else), but important lessons do get learned and heroic moments certainly happen, so I’m not really sure that’s a fair label to stick on it.  Shazam is just … different, which is not only good in the grand scheme of superhero movies, but especially so for the much-maligned DCEU.

Go see Shazam.  It’s a bit cheesy and it does that thing that all DCEU movies do, which is end in a big CG fight at night, but otherwise it’s a delight.

One Last Thought:

The tone in Shazam is so different than any other DCEU entry (even the super goofy Aquaman) that I have no idea how the character will ever be incorporated into other films.  This is, of course, assuming that WB/DC even bother trying and don’t just abandon their team up films all together.