SHAZAM: FURY OF THE GODS reactions w/spoilers!

[Noodle]

- Where is the Justice League while Philadelphia is getting destroyed? Why would Wonder Woman only show up at the end?

Blocked by the dome around the city. Even if they did show up they wouldn't be able to get in.

[Chuck]

Either that or no one gives a crap about Philly lol

[Wildling]

Blocked by the dome around the city. Even if they did show up they wouldn't be able to get in.

I liked how invincible that dome was. It was fitting only the eldest and noblest daughter of Atlas the God who could carry the world would possess that kind of power.

[Lightning Rider]

Because Billy broke the Wizard's staff in the previous movie. It weakened the barrier between worlds.

Yeah that is true, it's not a factual plothole. I just feel like that consequence wasn't hinted at or foreshadowed at all, so it feels forced and random. We were never told they were banished in the first place (or if we were, it wasn't important).

Blocked by the dome around the city. Even if they did show up they wouldn't be able to get in.

Surely they would have tried. Or at least spoken to Billy through the dome.

[krazijoe]

Surely they would have tried. Or at least spoken to Billy through the dome.

They were dealing with The Zach Club and couldn't be bothered with it.

[krazijoe]

Yeah that is true, it's not a factual plothole. I just feel like that consequence wasn't hinted at or foreshadowed at all, so it feels forced and random. We were never told they were banished in the first place (or if we were, it wasn't important).

Wasn't there some animation dealing with them being banished and then later on we were told that it was because the Staff Shazam broke and he pretty much said Oops, my bad.

[Captain Craig]

There is literally a 3 second flashback moment to the Staff Breaking scene from the first film in this movie.

[90'sCartoonMan]

Overall, I liked the movie, but I think it made some weird choices. I was really hoping for Mr. Mind, but I liked the Daughters of Atlas more than I was expecting (I'm glad they didn't hold the Ann reveal for too long, her talking about her sister really telegraphed it).

Shazam continues to be too much of a goofball to be taken seriously. It shouldn't have been that hard to coordinate his family so that they'd feel like they have some say in things. Was Eugene mapping out those doors really a problem?

It was nice to get an explanation for the SHAZAM powers (I was expecting Steve to somehow be the manifestation of the Wisdom of Solomon), but why is Mary now the same person when she transforms? Is it because she has turned 18 and is now an adult (and how has she kept her identity a secret)? Would that theoretically happen to Billy and Freddy? I liked the angle that Mary was concerned about financially supporting the family since they will stop getting checks for both Billy and Freddy soon, but not nearly enough time was given to her story. Is she going off to college at the end and that's why she's wearing that sweater?

Freddy seemed to be the only one to get a satisfying story. I liked Pedro coming out, but I feel if they just stuck with Billy, Mary, and Freddy from the beginning, they wouldn't have to spread everything so thin (and Billy's actor would get more screentime).

At least the name had a payoff at the end. It was funny that Freddy wanted Shazam to be Captain Everypower Jr. And in his cameo, Michael Gray got to call him Captain Marvel! Speaking of, I believe Batman the Brave and the Bold was the last we got of them using the "Captain Marvel" name, and it was interesting to see Deidrich Bader here.

The whole "Justice Society under Amanda Waller" plot makes me think they are setting up a "Trinity War" style story-line (especially now the team has their very own "Superman"). Justice League VS Justice Society VS Justice League Dark.

I'd welcome that. The Justice Society were the best part of Black Adam. I wonder if Waller will be leaning on them more during her show rather than the Suicide Squad or Harcourt and her team? Or at least have operatives that are more in line with JSA characters. Incidentally, when did the Justice League start calling themselves that?

It would’ve been interesting to see Shazam / Captain Marvel interact with other heroes. I think the character might work better in that type of setting. It was a fun movie though. No worse than others I’ve seen lately. It’s a shame to think this movie & Black Adam had absolutely no connection. That is so weird.

It is weird. At least the Wizard was in all three movies. Still, three Shazam movies and no coming together? That's like having a Green Lantern movie that's a Hal origin story, then Sinestro gets a movie, then another Green Lantern movie where Hal is part of the Corps but no mention of Sinestro.

- The villains' motivation is totally uninteresting. Why show up now? Why did the Wizard take Atlas' power anyway?
- The urban monster-fighting was so uninspired.
- Where is the Justice League while Philadelphia is getting destroyed? Why would Wonder Woman only show up at the end?

It would be so cool if they linked all their mythological heroes together. The MCU has managed to do a lot with Norse myths, but it's really only Thor and Loki that have the connection. Wonder Woman, Shazam, and Aquaman all have Greco-Roman roots. Throw in Black Adam with the SHAZAM thing, and there's a lot they could do there.

[Frontier]

At least the name had a payoff at the end. It was funny that Freddy wanted Shazam to be Captain Everypower Jr. And in his cameo, Michael Gray got to call him Captain Marvel! Speaking of, I believe Batman the Brave and the Bold was the last we got of them using the "Captain Marvel" name, and it was interesting to see Deidrich Bader here.

They also called him Captain Marvel in Young Justice up until season 3.

[mace11]

I did not realize this until now but SHAZAM! FURY OF THE GODS RT critic score went down below 50% and i said awhile ago it might happen and it did.

SHAZAM! FURY OF THE GODS 49%
5.60 out of 10

[Reviresco]

Was going to see this in the theater but it didn't stay long, so I just saw this on TV and I don't get the hate. It was very much in the vein of the first one, but BIGGER. I enjoyed it for what it was. Zachary Levi remains a fun, if slightly neurotic, engaging actor to me. Not familiar with the Daughters of Atlas in mythology, but I liked how they used the mythological three aspects / ages of women.

[j9ac9k]

Just saw it on Max. I thought it was better than "Quantumania" at least - but I also wouldn't call it good. I agree with those who experienced a disconnect between Billy and Cap since Levi acts a lot more immature than Billy ever does. They just don't seem like the same person - as though the actors never watched each others' performance. The villains' motivations were paper-thin, especially since they each ended up having different agendas. I just never felt their choices were organic rather than just plot mechanics. Same with the Wizard in terms of him thinking Billy was a huge mistake at first, but at the end he's totally come around, citing how Billy chose to share his power as one of the reasons Billy was a good choice - but yeah, he did that in the first movie. So... it took Billy replaying the same story beat of offering up his power for the Wizard to appreciate it now?

Also, a bunch of stuff reminded me of "HellboyII."
-- The siblings are from an old race who's culture has been lost due to the rise of humanity.
-- The film begins with a bunch of civilians being slaughtered at an institution for presenting antiquities so the villain can obtain a powerful relic.
-- One of the siblings develops a romance with a secondary hero and betrays their sibling.
-- The main evil sibling murders a family member as they declare their intention to destroy humanity
-- The hero deals with negative media coverage throughout the film
-- There's a superfast-growing, giant tree/tree creature
-- We're presented scary versions of traditionally friendly magical creatures (unicorns/ tooth fairies)
-- There's a heartfelt moment right before the climax where Billy gains a mother, HB gets a child.
-- The hero "dies" and requires a magical resurrection

These aren't all super-unique plot points, and some of them are handled differently enough (better in Hellboy) but all together, it just makes "Shazam II" feel familiar.

[Powerboy]

Saw it earlier today. I thought it was good and worth seeing at the theater rather than waiting for streaming, but, to me, it was not as good as the first one.

I think the big problem for me was that we really didn't see the kids as kids too much except for Jack Dylan Grazer as Freddy. The first movie was all about Billy Batson and Asher Angel had major screen time and went through a character arc during the movie. In this one, Angel basically has a cameo role, which is a shame because I really liked the dynamic between Billy and Freddy from the first one.

Shazam 2 was overstuffed with characters and concepts to the point that I thought that they were all underserved from a story perspective.

Action was good, but felt redundant after awhile -- lots of growling monsters just can't get me invested in them.

Of course, I did like the cameo of Gal Gadot as Wonder Woman. I stayed away from the trailers and spoilers, but I still caught some chatter that she might be in the movie. I guess the post-credit scene where Amanda Waller's staff tries to recruit Captain Marvel into the JSA was tacked on at James Gunn's request, so even though it looks as though this movie will tank badly, Zach Levi might still have a future in Gunn's DCU -- just not in any more solo movies.

I rated the first one as A-. I'd give this one a B+ because what I did like, I liked a lot, but the lack of significant scenes with Asher Angel's Billy and the other kids was really super-noticeable to me and was something I just couldn't overlook while watching the movie.

The fact that the movie has been in wide release since yesterday and there was no discussion thread for it says a lot about how badly this movie will do at the box office. Guess that takes the heat off Marvel and Ant-Man now.

I just saw it an HBO-Max. I feel this is a pretty accurate assessment. Billy reduced to some cameos. Captain Marvel/ Every Power/ Shazam again coming across as a young child while Billy comes across as mature. Almost no focus on the real identities. I think it also suffers by having opponents most people have never heard of or care about. You probably needed Anthea there for the love interest but I suspect it would have sold more tickets had the other two been, say, Zeus and Achilles.

Like Black Adam, too overloaded with extraneous characters and action. I thought the Justice League/ Justice Society jokes were funny and the whole "JSA? Who are these people?" or words to that effect. Maybe that was a shot at BA.

I liked it though not as much as the first one. I loved the Michael Gray cameo and the fact that he actually said, "Captain Marvel".

[Ascended]

Saw it on Max. Took a couple days to get through it.

It was....fine? I don't think it deserves the hate that it got, but it wasn't a great film. The villains were boring and two-dimensional, even more than Sivana and his bad cgi Seven Sins. Ann was the only highlight there, and even that subplot was painfully obvious and you knew exactly where it was going to end the moment the character first appeared at the high school.

Focus among the characters wasn't very well balanced, and the 'hero/kid' focus was even more off kilter. Freddy got more attention than I feared he would, and I actually liked Billy's 'keep the fam together' subplot, but Pedro and Mary's subplots were barely touched on, and that's more than Darla and Eugene got. Though I did really love the unicorn scene.

I feel like, ten years ago we would have said this was an excellent superhero movie, but standards have risen since then. I didn't hate it, but I'm not likely to watch it again anytime soon.

I read that the director didn't want to do Mr. Mind because "Mr. Mind and Sivana is repeating the first film too much" but I feel like giving the focus to Mind and using the Monster Society, with Sivana in a smaller role would have been infinitely more original, weird, fun, and unique than a bunch of public domain Greek gods with a generic "Prometheus revenge" plot. And Mark Strong was one of the best parts of the first film so I don't know why more of him would've been a bad thing.

[kcekada]

Saw that it was about to leave Netflix, so streamed it on Saturday. I fast-forwarded through some scenes. Have to admit, I was actually a bit touches when everyone thought Billy/Cap was dead.

There was a lot about this that was good -- like the library at the Rock of Eternity. The action scenes were also good. While I'm not crazy about the expansion of the Marvel family to so many new people and that Mary is no longer Billy's twin sister, that aspect didn't hurt the movie.

What did hurt is how Zachary Levi played Cap. I doubt it was his choice -- and he was probably cast in the first one because they wanted him to be a goofball. But he should have gotten over that in the first film. Why did the wisdom of Solomon never kick in for him -- it's even mentioned in the sequel? He may have been able to carry it off otherwise -- I don't think the 'Marvel's have to have the physicality of Dwayne Johnson, though I wouldn't have minded Cap being a little thicker.

The villains were okay. I think it's the tone of Cap that made this off. I can't imagine beloved Marvel Family referred to as the Philadelphia Follies -- or whatever they were called in the press. While the concept of adult heroes with kids sensitibilities is interesting -- it doesn't work when the heroes are supposed to have wisdom greater than anyone in history.

omg -- wasn't aware of the Wonder Woman cameo, so that was a great surprise! It's too bad Gal won't be playing WW, because she brought a lot of charm to the role. I still think this universe could have been saved with a few changes -- instead of completely discarding it and starting over. Heck, they could even had kept Levi and had him play the role more seriously.