 The internet has been talking. They have things to say. One of which is that Shazam Fury of the Gods is where comic book movies have finally hit fatigue levels. This is the one that makes people yawn and think, you know what, I've seen enough. And to that criticism, I say, you're just getting here now? Let's talk Shazam Fury of the Gods. I recently saw and hated Ant-Man Quantum Shidia. Thought it was a complete waste of time, ugly looking, just all around a complete mess. With Shazam Fury of the Gods, I had way lower expectations. Perhaps that helped. I didn't even go to this movie opening night because it just looked bad from the trailers. And I liked the first Shazam. I'm actually a fan of that one. I think it's one of the stronger DCU movies. The next day I felt bad about not going. I thought to myself, how are people possibly going to sleep at night without a review from Adam about Shazam Fury of the Gods? What does Adam say about this? So I got the kids together. I said, listen, you guys want to go? And they both said, yeah, we like the first one. So we went. And we had a good time. We had a good time at Shazam Fury of the Gods. The criticisms aren't wrong. It is a very formulaic superhero movie with a lot of stuff getting punched and blown up. Not a lot of huge stakes or consequences. You kind of see where everything's going to go and it's there. And yet because of this family dynamic, not that fake bull crap family from Fast and the Furious, this genuine family of these superhero kids coming together with their foster parents in a loving way, taking on all the obstacles in front of them. It was charming. It worked. It's a very serviceable, entertaining movie. Nothing more. Not everything's a zero or a 10. Sometimes a nice solid eight or seven and a half is okay. It depends on how boring your life is for me. It was, it was fine. It was very nice. Let's start with the things that work. For me, it's the storyline. I'm talking about from a broad surface level. I love the God stuff. I like that they play off some of the tropes. I like that the movie ties in the first one's events in a smart way. Obviously when you start to dig into it, it gets muddy. It makes no sense. But from a surface, it's solid. It's a good foundation and I'm okay with that. The humor is on point for me. I'd say it's 80-20 with 80% of the time those jokes landing. 20% of the time I roll my eyes to the back of my head, but we move on fast. We move on very quickly. There is a lot going on in this movie. Most of it can be chalked up to loud explosions and big bang punching. Fine. But again, it works because I have characters I like. If it's just nonsense noise like Black Adam was for two hours, I just don't give a shit. But I like all these people. The actors all do a really good job. They're all very pretty to look at, except for one. Pretty, yeah, yeah, he's fine to look at. I'm not knocking his looks. But Zachary Levy, the lead character here as Shazam, does not work for me. He barely worked for me in the first. It made more sense in the first one, I guess. But here, he's playing an entirely different character than Billy. Billy is quiet. He's thoughtful. He's shy. He's intelligent. But when he says Shazam, he is a completely different character. An idiot, a smart ass, a goofball. And I do understand that he has more confidence when he's in a superhero physique. He is going to like be a little bit more out there. But this guy is not even remotely the same. And that's really off-putting. It really takes you out of the moment. Because when I look at Shazam grown up, I don't see Billy as an adult. What's even more confusing is he's almost 18. The girl, Mary, beautiful actress. She was in the fall. She's really good in this, too. She is herself when she turns into the character, Shazam. She's still her. So it's a one-to-one, whereas some of these other older kids are still completely different people, and it just doesn't work as well anymore. Zachary Levy's the main character. So that is a bit of a bummer that that didn't work for me. But again, there's so many other elements that do. The action's on point, and there's a lot of it. There's some really creative things done. Since these superheroes have the power of speed and strength and, you know, force sight and all that stuff, you get to see some really creative things done there. Like I said, the humor lands far more often than it doesn't. I read that the budget for this one is actually pretty quaint when you compare it to other superhero movies coming out in 2023. I think the budget was around $110 million, something like that. You could have fooled me. This looks better than Ant-Man Quantumania. This looks better than Thor, Love and Thunder. This looks better than a lot of stuff that's come out recently. Yeah, there's still some shoddy stuff happening. But for the most part, there's tons of effects. It feels more believable, too. They're in a real city. They're in locations with actual people and cars around them. They're on sets. They're in lots. It's not just them walking in front of a green screen non-stop. And that takes you out of it. I was actually pulled into this one. There's a lot of people that won't even see this because the DCU's getting rebranded. It's getting rebooted, basically, in 2025 with the new Superman. James Gunn's taking things in a new direction. So they're not even going to go to this film, but that's the point. Well, the point is to watch a good, solid movie with characters that you liked from the last movie. And I think that that's a win. I don't need to have 13 more Shazam movies. I don't even need one more Shazam movie. This was a good beginning, middle and end picture. And I think that's a way healthier way to look at this stuff. We shouldn't be going in, waiting for the end credits to see what's next. You should go in watching a film that entertains you and not thinking so much on where does this fit in the grander scheme of things. That can be a fun aside, but that shouldn't be the primary goal. And speaking of that, there is an end credit scene, at least one. We didn't say pass the way end credits, but there's one about one minute in. It's really bad. It's really bad. And I feel like it was done after James Gunn's stuff took over. Not a first good impression if that is the case. Speaking on Shazam 2, you could do a lot worse than seeing this film. Not too shabby. Had a good time. Check it out if you're interested even remotely. I think you'll be surprised at how well it works. Like this video if you had a good time. Please think about subscribing if you haven't as I post tons of movie and TV show content each and every week. I would love to have you stick around. Hopefully, I see you next time. Take care.