review, cameo, easter egg Shazam 2

Shazam! Fury of the Gods aka Shazam 2 was released in Italian cinemas after a series of slams received at home by critics and “fans”, slams that we just can’t justify if not somehow “influenced” by the usual, invasive and often misleading social media that now seem lay down the law; so much so as to push the protagonist Zachary Levi to vent with a video posted on Twitter that reveals a burning and understandable frustration in the face of gratuitous slating.

I really wish the public vote (on Rotten Tomatoes) would go up, to make people realize that this is nonsense. Because it doesn’t make sense. It makes no sense that we were panned like this. You haters attacking the movie saying it sucks, it doesn’t! Seriously it’s not like that. If only any of you had seen the movie – which I know you haven’t – you’d understand that it doesn’t suck. It’s fun, it entertains.

We “Shazam! Fury of the Gods” we have seen it and we can only understand Levi’s frustration, the film is a fun fantasy with an intriguing dark connotation, in the service of a franchise that seeks to grow, as does the titular superhero in the face of danger never so powerful and never so frightening, and also compared to a super-family that can’t find a balance and recognize a leader, who still remains a teenager under his costume and cloak of ordinance.

The first Shazam! introduced the characters and created the first film in the DC Extended Universe with a strong comedy, director David F. Sandberg had a couple of well-crafted horror films behind him at the time, Lights Out – Terror in the dark And Annabelle 2: Creation, and as he grappled with his first superhero film included a pleasant horror digression into the Seven Deadly Sins focusing primarily on Billy Batson (Asher Angel) and Freddy Freeman (Jack Dylan Grazier) who discover, test and rule out the range of superpowers of Shazam, and they will do it with amusing tests that often have undesirable effects. At the end of the film, Billy gives the other boys hosted in his family home the magic he had from the wizard Shazam, thus a team of superheroes was born capable of defeating the evil Dr. Mark Strong’s Sivana and his seven demons.

Sandberg for the sequel accentuates the dark digression by inserting monstrous creatures and a trio of Gods seeking revenge for the magic stolen from Olympus. On screen we find Academy Award winner Helen Mirren as Hespera, Luci Lyu as Calypso and Steven Spielberg’s recently discovered Rachel Zegler as West Side Story

as Anthea. In reality, only one of these divinities, Liu’s Kalypso, is evil and rancorous to the core, while the sweet Anthea falls in love with Freddy and Hespera refuses to follow Calypso’s desire to destroy the Earth and mankind to make a new nightmarish Olympus populated by monstrous mythical creatures. Billy/Shazam! he will be the only one able to stand in the way of Kalypso’s aims and will prove to himself and his family that he is the hero on whom the inhabitants of Philadelphia and the entire planet can count on in times of need.

As for the weak points of a film that as a whole works very well and entertains effectively, we point out an effective imbalance between serious and facetious, better managed in the first film and a scene after the end credits that could displace the fans, but in this regard Zachary Levi intervened to explain to us that it was not the scene after the end credits that we saw in the cinema that Sandberg had in mind, but the result of the intervention of James Gunn who at this point after Henry Cavill’s Superman, seems also kicked off Dwayne Johnson’s Black Adam.

People attack James Gunn because there is Jennifer Holland, his wife who is an actress and is in Peacemaker and Suicide Squad. We involved Jennifer and Steve in that Shazam scene but that wasn’t the original intent. The original intent was for Hawkman and the Cyclone to come and invite me into the Justice Society. Walter Hamada, Peter Safran, David Sandberg… We had this great scene and we were thwarted… I’m just standing up for freedom. The truth is a good thing. We should all live for the truth.

Shazam! Fury of the Gods – Easter Egg and Cameo

• The film opens with an enthusiastic museum tour guide who might be familiar to DC fans. This is because the guide is played by Rizwan Manji who also played Jamil the caretaker in the tv series Peacemakers of HBO Max. Director David F. Sandberg has said that they could be the same character, while James Gunn has suggested that he could be Jamil’s more successful brother.
• If you look at the alphabet chart in the pediatrician’s office, you notice that Starro the Conqueror is used to illustrate the letter S. Also in the background between the games is Annabelle doll. Sandberg has a long history with the Annabelle franchise, both as a producer and director.

• During the bridge rescue scene, Freddy introduces himself as Capitan Tuttipoteri and says that Billy is his sidekick Capitan Tuttipoteri Jr. This is a reference to how the superhero characters of Billy and Freddy were named in the comics. Billy was Captain Marvel, while Freddy was Captain Marvel Jr.
• The TV in the Rock of Eternity is tuned to Galaxy Broadcasting. This American media giant has been a part of the DC universe since its debut in the book Superman’s Pal, Jimmy Olsen No. 133.
• The Rock of Eternity has an arcade cabinet of Mortal Kombat II! In the first movie the superhero form of Eugene quoted the game during the final battle. Since the gamer aficionado of the “Shazamiglia”, I bet he was the one who added the cabinet. By the way, Shazam appears as a playable character in the 2008 game Mortal Kombat vs. DC Universeanother fun connection between the two franchises.
• Eugene tried to catalog the different magical doors and labeled one the Fairy Kingdom. This magical realm is exactly what it sounds like, a dimension filled with fantastical creatures. Batman and Superman have spent some time in this realm in the book World’s Finest No. 265
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• Darla named her cat Tawny, a reference to Tawky Tawny is a giant talking tiger, and is one of the biggest characters in the Shazam! comics.

• During the family reunion, Billy hints at the idea that Wonder Woman has a secret identity. He describes her working in an office, wearing her hair in a ponytail and wearing glasses. Billy just described Diana Prince, the disguise Wonder Woman used during the pre-Crisis comic book era.
• Freddy is wearing a de shirt The Iron Giant when he meets Anne.
• The flaming violin is back for a second easter egg after the one in the first movie. The flaming violin was first seen in Captain Marvel Adventures #64, when it was used as a weapon by Oggar, one of the former champions of the wizard Shazam.
• Billy and his brothers discover that the name Shazam is an acronym for the wisdom of Solomon, the strength of Hercules, the endurance of Atlas, the power of Zeus, the courage of Achilles and the speed of Mercury. This fact was established in Billy’s first appearance in the book Whiz Comics no. 2 from the 40s.
• Victor exclaims “holy moley” (translated “porca palette” and in the Italian dub version “santa polenta”) as he sees the destruction caused by the Tree of Life. “Holy moley” was Billy Batson’s slogan throughout the Golden Age, starting from the book Special Edition Comics no.1.
• As Shazam battles the giant dragon, he is cheered by a citizen who says, “You are the best, Captain Marvel!” This spectator is played by Michael Gray, the actor who played Billy Batson in the 1974 television series Shazam. He even wears the same outfit that his version of Billy wore!

• The track “A Little Less Conversation” by JXL and Elvis Presley plays over the end credits. Elvis was a big fan of the Shazam family of comics. In fact, the king of rock and roll even based his hairdo on Shazam’s sidekick, Captain Marvel Jr. A few vintage Captain Marvel comics are also on display at Elvis’ Graceland estate.
• Since this movie started with Peacemaker’s Jamil, it seems fitting that two other characters from the series show up for the mid-credits scene. John Economos and Emilia Harcourt invite Shazam to join the Justice Society. Billy first joined the group in 2002 in JSA List #37.
• The Daughters of Atlas do not appear in the comics, but are original characters created for the film.
• Grace Caroline Currey, who plays Mary Bromfield, also takes on her superhero form, replacing Michelle Borth from the film Shazam! (2019). According to director David F. Sandberg, Fulton now plays both parts, but her hair and makeup are slightly different when she’s super, so no one will ever recognize her.
• The Furies come from Greek mythology and are all daughters of Atlas (one of the gods who gives Shazam his power):
• Hespera takes its name from the Hesperides, the spirits of the sunset, who tended a garden of golden apples. Hespera is also the female form of Hesperus, brother of Atlas and personification god of evening light.
• Kalypso is named after the enchantress who cared for Odysseus on his way home.
• Anthea is the goddess of gardens, marshes, flowers and human love.
• There are two other members of the Hesperides named Calypso and Antheia (another spelling of Anthea’s name).

• Spotted a “Fulci” sign behind Shazam during the final battle? It is a tribute by director Sandberg to Lucio Fulci, the legendary director of horror films.
• The dragon Ladon comes from Greek mythology, where it guarded the gardens of the Hesperides.
• Shazam tells Hespera he will defeat her because he has “seen all the ‘Fast and the Furious’ movies.” Helen Mirren, who plays Hespera, has appeared in a number of Fast and Furious sequels and spin-offs as crime matriarch Magdalene “Queenie” Shaw.
• The golden apple of the Hesperides is well represented in Greek mythology as one of the twelve labors of Hercules.
• Lotta Losten, wife of David F. Sandberg, makes a cameo appearance as the first person Shazam saves on the collapsing bridge.
• Director David F. Sandberg makes a cameo appearance as a Kalypso victim.
• Director David Sandberg recounted how the idea for Gal Gadot’s cameo as Wonder Woman in the film’s final scene came about:

What happened in the first Shazam! was that there had to be Henry Cavill. After a first take with a stunt double, Cavill would have had to attend at a later time to shoot a scene in which he showed his face. But he never showed up that day, so we had to improvise with the footage we had and it all worked out. In this second film Gal Gadot was still in the script, but I was wondering “Are we sure he will come?”. The day we were shooting, (Gal’s people) said she wouldn’t be able to be there, so we’d have to shoot with a stunt double and then work with what we had. That’s when I started thinking, so if we can’t get her to be here, how can we fix this? I thought about bringing Hespera back, because we knew we’d need a deity to revive Billy. But then it finally worked and we were able to insert it. I mean, if she hadn’t shown up at the end, we couldn’t have had the (dream sequence) with the wizard’s head! Can you only have that scene if it comes at the end, or would the fans be like, ‘Another headless cameo? What’s going on?…When we first saw her, I shot her head out of the eye, but then we were like, ‘No, no, she’s here!’ before audiences can get out of the theaters,” she laughs.

Source: DC