Movie Review: Shazam!: Fury of the Gods

 

When it comes to the crucial topic of the effectiveness of the changes they made for their second go-round in the Shazam! universe, director David F. Sandberg and writer Henry Gayden ended up with mixed results. On the positive end, Fury of the Gods boasts a tone-which is deliberately silly with frequent winks to the camera-that is much more consistent than the jarring goofball meta comedy/melodrama/kid-friendly horror movie balancing act that the original had and the Daughters of Atlas (Helen Mirren, Lucy Liu, Rachel Zegler) make for much more compelling, dynamic villains than the obnoxiously hammy Dr. Thaddeus Sivana (Mark Strong). On the other side of this creative seesaw, the "dumb, naive teenager trying to figure out to be a superhero" dynamic that was the biggest strength of the previous film is pretty much completely discarded as the more urgent stakes of the plot-which more or less boils down to The Daughters of Atlas' desire to seek revenge against Djimon Honsou's Wizard and his acolytes after an event at the end of the original film triggered their ability to leave the "God Realm" for the less divine confines of Earth-force Billy Batson (Asher Angel) into his Shazam (Zachary Levi) form for about 90% of the movie. 

Ultimately, this is a trade-off that I was more than willing to accept as its exploration of Billy/Shazam's relationship with his foster siblings (Jack Dylan Grazer, Grace Caroline Currey, Ian Chen, Faithe Herman, Jovan Armand in teenage form) as they grow older and pursue different paths in life is a heartfelt variation on the themes of found family that the first one tackled and the more efficient pacing that's largely brought on by the lack of machine gun tonal swings makes the movie more entertaining on the whole. While I have no strong feelings either way towards whatever future may or may not exist for Shazam! in James Gunn and Peter Safran's overhauled DCU, these movies managed to carve out their own goofy identity in a genre that doesn't often have a place for true individuality and for that reason alone, I'm glad that they exist. 

Grade: B-