Billy Batson

It isn’t easy, in these jaded comic book times, for a superhero relaunch to make fans sit up and take notice. But Marvel’s announcement last month that writer Al Ewing, alongside artist Martin Cóccolo, would be spearheading a fresh start for the publisher’s God of Thunder as The Immortal Thor this August was that rarest of exceptions: a new superhero series that feels like a genuine event.Spoilers of the Week Feb 21-25Since arriving at Marvel in 2013 (after making his bones on British titles including the venerable 2000…

The latest DC film, Shazam: Fury of the Gods, is now in theaters, and like its most recent predecessor, Black Adam, it does its best to firmly establish itself in the larger mythology of the overarching franchise.But surprises and cameos aren’t all that make Shazam: Fury of the Gods stand out. The film’s director David F. Sandberg talks with io9 about the film’s emotional ending (and why that was the ending)—and yes, that massive cameo, as well as if he thinks Black Adam is hovering around somewhere off-screen.After…

Image: Warner Bros./DC ComicsIt may not fully seem like it, but Shazam: Fury of the Gods comes out next Friday. Originally scheduled to come out towards the end of 2022 before being punted to 2023, Fury of the Gods has had a somewhat muted marketing cycle compared to more recent DC movie fare, or even its own 2019 predecessor. But in the same way that WB decided at a certain point to give up the game about Henry Cavill’s Superman cameo in Black Adam, the studio is now doing it again with the Shazam Family’s second…

The odds are stacked against Shazam in Fury of the Gods.Image: Warner Bros.The balance of power in the DC Universe is about to change. We’re, of course, talking about new heads of the DC Films division, James Gunn and Peter Safran, the latter of whom produced the long-awaited Shazam sequel, Shazam: Fury of the Gods, which has a new trailer out today. What, did you think we were talking about something else?Shazam 2 has been waiting to come out for what seems like years and, finally, on March 17, it’ll be here. It’ll be…

Superman #1 cover by Jamal Campbell,Image: DC ComicsThey say it’s always darkest before the dawn, and that’s certainly true of DC Comics. Having spent most of 2022 on the tie-in event Dark Crisis on Infinite Earths—which I won’t insult you by trying to summarize, but suffice it to say things were very bleak for all of the publisher’s superheroes—2023 will be the “Dawn of DC,” which isn’t (as far as we know) yet another DC universe reboot but a project that focuses on solo superheroes titles, which honestly sounds kind of…

Screenshot: Warner Bros.Billy Batson is back and this time, he’s got his whole family with him. Shazam: Fury of the Gods is the sequel to 2019's Shazam and once again it’s directed by David F. Sandberg and starring Zachary Levi and Asher Angel. Angel is Billy, a young boy who gets the powers of a superhero (Levi) when he says the word “Shazam.” By the end of the film, that power extended to his family as well and now with a whole family of God-like heroes, well, the Gods are bound to take notice.SHAZAM! FURY OF THE GODS -…

Marvel’s movies and shows may still grab most of the headlines, but the DC Extended Universe is only getting bigger and better. DC’s films and HBO Max series continue to get more robust, with a wide variety of projects far beyond just Batman, Superman, and the Justice League, which promise to include new and interesting takes on DC Comics’ stable of characters in the works.What follows is an up-to-date list of everything DCEU-related that’s on the way: DC movies heading to theaters, as well as DC streaming movies and…