The ‘Shazam!’ Sequel Is a Good Family Movie

There's room for improvement, but I had fun watching it.

I’ve previously said that the first Wonder Woman is the best of the recent DC movies. The second best is 2019’s Shazam! starring Zachary Levi.

I had skipped the first Shazam! when it was in theaters because the trailer left me cold, but that was a mistake (or an ineffective trailer). While I wasn’t sure about the movie during the first half, it all came together wonderfully in the second half. It had a sense of fun that many other recent DC movies have lacked, and the foster family dynamic gave the movie a lot of heart.

So I rectified my previous error and saw Shazam! Fury of the Gods on opening weekend.

It’s not as strong or satisfying as the first, and there are all sorts of things I could pick apart, but dammit, I had a good time watching it. It put a smile on my face, and the last new superhero movie to do that was Spider-Man: No Way Home. For a movie about kids who say a magic word and become adult superheroes, isn’t that the main goal?

A nice aspect of the Shazam! movies is that you don’t need to watch any other DC movies to follow them. They exist in the same universe, but they’re doing their own thing. And that’s important, because unlike most other recent DC films, pretty much the whole family can get together to watch Shazam! and its sequel (parts of the first movie might scare younger children, though).

Too many other modern DC movies have skewed older—even Superman movies—and that’s a shame. While adult-oriented superhero fare has its place and I enjoy some of it myself, kids need superheroes more than we do. DC superheroes, when done right, are especially great for kids. I can stand to be disappointed by a Superman movie so long as they get the character right and kids enjoy it, but Man of Steel and Batman v. Superman disappointed me, got the character wrong, and were inaccessible to children. That’s just a waste all around.

Thankfully, the Shazam! movies have flown in to fill this gap. They show flawed kids who try to do the right thing, foster parents and siblings who genuinely care about each other, and plenty of straightforward, unpretentious superhero action. Even though the kids can be rather juvenile at times—they are kids, after all—there’s still so much decency on display in these movies. It’s refreshing.

And there are bad people, too, ranging from overly selfish to outright evil, but that only makes the bonds of this loving foster family all the more meaningful. It’s a nice antidote to cynicism.

If Fury of the Gods existed when I was ten, I would have loved it.

So, sure, some of the siblings got shortchanged on screentime and characterization, the villains needed more development too (though Helen Mirren and Lucy Liu do bring a lot of menace to the table), there should be some sort of cost to the kids’ power-sharing (e.g., splitting Billy’s power evenly among the group rather than giving all of them full power every time), Billy’s character arc could have been more focused, and one aspect of the resolution seemed a bit too convenient.

All of these shortcomings stem from the same fundamental issue I noted in my recent Ant-Man review: Movies seldom allow enough time to properly develop everything that needs to be developed in a superhero series.

But in the case of Shazam! Fury of the Gods, this bothered me a lot less because the movie does succeed in the most important area—creating a fun, wholesome, family superhero movie. Just because there’s room for improvement doesn’t mean there isn’t plenty to enjoy. And sometimes it’s nice to simply enjoy an entertaining movie without overthinking it.

Really, my main complaint is that we can’t call him Captain Marvel anymore. (No offense to the other Captain Marvels.)