Sons Of A Gunn: Shazam! Fury Of The Gods Review

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The sequel to the hit movie Shazam! is here, but how does Fury of the Gods stack up to the original? We’re offering up our spoiler filled review of the new movie, breaking down those end credits scenes and Easter eggs, and discussing how this will impact James Gunn’s upcoming DC Universe.

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Episode Transcript

Alexander Zalben
Welcome to Sons of a Gunn, a podcast about the DC Universe. I’m Alex Gunn.

Justin Tyler
I’m Justin Gunn.

Pete LePage
I’m Pete.

Alexander Zalben
Also at last name Gunn

Justin Tyler
Also a Gunn

Alexander Zalben
We’re all three last name Gunn we have a celebrity father. We don’t like to talk about on this podcast.

Justin Tyler
We don’t want to say who it is kiss ups to Dad though. Shoutouts to the DC universe

Alexander Zalben
I like we always say kiss ups to dad. Exactly.

Justin Tyler
And he’s alive. It’s not like that he’s dead. He’s alive.

Alexander Zalben
Yeah, he’s just further north than we are right now. Again, we don’t want to say where give any hints but we’re gonna be talking about Shazam Fury of the Gods aka Shazam 2 today. So full spoiler warning here at the top because we’re gonna get into it. We’re gonna talk about it. The Easter eggs the cameos and of course the big thing apropos of this podcast is the what this means for the future of the James Gunn DC Cinematic Universe or not as the case may be. No, we’re not Well, the reason I bring this up we’ll get into impressions that a second but to get out of the way right off. This tanked the box office over the weekend.

Pete LePage
Really?

Alexander Zalben
Yes. Yeah. Yeah, well, Pete, I know you saw it 20 million times which provided a lot of the chunk of change domestically made just over $30 million, which is about $5 billion less than they were even expecting it to do much better internationally. So things are looking grim.

Pete LePage
But once it gets online though, I’m sure it’ll

Justin Tyler
you mean illegally streamed talking about

Pete LePage
like you know, when you can do the rentals and that kind of stuff?

Alexander Zalben
Ah, yeah, like a Blockbuster and whatever it is, or

Justin Tyler
when it gets into Blockbuster.

Alexander Zalben
Yeah, exactly. We’ll see. We’ll see what happens obviously, there’s a lot more a lot of potential life. It’s just not doing very well right now, which certainly, I just

Pete LePage
wanted to could normally when I go see a movie, I have the theater and myself. But for Shazam 2 was packed. So I thought I was like, oh, man, it must be doing well.

Alexander Zalben
You know, if we want to get into it, I had the exact opposite experience. I went Friday night here in Brooklyn, and I was like, okay, you know, it’ll be fun. Even if I’m like, 50/50 of this movie. It’ll be fun to see with an opening night crowd. literally nobody in the theater like completely empty theater. Finally, a couple of dudes came in towards the end and we’re shouting Shazam at inappropriate times when

Justin Tyler
they get it? Well, Pete, you saw Zachary Levi’s private screening room, right?

Pete LePage
Yeah. When you say paccked it was– Who’s you? Yeah. Two seats. two seater.

Yes, all seats were taken. So yes.

Alexander Zalben
so very different viewing experience is there Justin? Did you see it a pack show? A empty show or whatever? Yeah, just right.

Justin Tyler
I guess it was more on the just right. capacity was like, sort of fine, but I was by no means packed. I would throw out that.

Alexander Zalben
Okay. All right. Did you know I got the shazam porridge in the Zachary Levi had mine was a little hot. Pete How was yours?

Pete LePage
It was just right.

Justin Tyler
I gotta say leading into porridge over popcorn was a mistake marketing. I agree 100% that but you know, I got the seven bucket deal or you get a bucket for every member of this family. Including the Wiz and I didn’t eat much. Let me be honest.

Pete LePage
I’m glad you included the Wiz man because it was one of my favorite parts of the movie.

Alexander Zalben
Well, let’s get into this and talk about general impressions of the movie. First, I gotta get to you first Pete because it sounds like you probably I’m guessing. I feel like this is a podcast. You liked it the most out of the three of us. So take it away. What did you like about this? Movie? Or not I don’t surprise me.

Pete LePage
I had low expectations. I wasn’t like, oh man. I’m really I can’t wait for this. I was like, Oh, this is out. I’ll go check it out. Maybe it’ll be fun, you know? And I was pleasantly surprised. I felt like it had a you know from the DC flip opening had a fun, kind of like tone really was setting setting the mood right. I felt like and yeah, I just felt like it was kind of a fun movie. There was a lot of like ridiculous moments, but overall I just felt like it was a popcorn kind of family fun movie.

Alexander Zalben
Justin, what about you? It sounds I’m guessing you are a little bit more negative about it. Or surprise me.

Justin Tyler
Yeah, no, I won’t surprise you. I think that we recently reviewed, watched and reviewed the first exam and my review there was I was pleasantly surprised. I thought the movie looked different and better than a lot of other superhero movies. I thought they found some fun and surprising ways to sort of move through the characters. And while the script and the dialogue was a little hokey at times, I think in general I had a more favorable look at the movie. And this movie, I feel like regressed on almost all fronts. It felt like the classic superhero movie intro where it’s like random villains doing a random thing being vaguely scary, but they have something that we don’t know what they’re after, and then just moves through that the a lot of the dialogue I felt was aiming at comedy and missed a lot of the times confusing story a little bit more of a messy look for the whole movie. There were a couple scenes Much, much fewer moments where I was like, that’s an iconic look. They just didn’t it looked worse. And in general just felt like more of a mess. Wow.

Alexander Zalben
I’m definitely more on that. And however, I will say in the positive end to the spectrum. I mentioned this with the first exam I went with my kids when they were littler, you know because that movie came out four years ago, and if they were no joke, traumatized by seeing it, I didn’t go with my kids this time. So that wasn’t a concern. So that’s a big up I think like for Shazam 2, versus Shazam is it didn’t traumatize my kids this time

Justin Tyler
Because they weren’t there

Alexander Zalben
They were not there yeah.

Justin Tyler
great movie, because let me say another movie that is like, ah,

Pete LePage
that’s the only positive thing you got to say about the movie is your kids weren’t there. That’s

Alexander Zalben
My kids are–

Justin Tyler
made my

Alexander Zalben
by number one and number two I don’t want to say which is definitely an order my head I’m thinking.

Pete LePage
Alright, so you’re telling me

Alexander Zalben
My number one or number two

Pete LePage
when Darla yells Taste the rainbow motherfuckers. You guys weren’t losing your mind. I was laughing so hard.

Justin Tyler
Lemme throw this out. Alex and I were talking earlier today and we were like, Oh, we have Shazam. We’re gonna talk about Shazam Fury that Gods later. All Pete’s got to talk about is the taste of the rainbow. Well, the first thing he says and look you did it.

Pete LePage
It was glorious. It was hysterical. It was really fun. I mean, she set it up with

Alexander Zalben
absolutely one of the longest Skittles commercials I’ve ever seen in my life. Usually their like thirty seconds, or sixty seconds. This one two hours and 10 minutes they were really put the effort into making a really good Skittles commercial.

Justin Tyler
I tasted the rainbow and for those of you whose

Pete LePage
the greatest Skittles commercial ever made

Justin Tyler
that Pet’s name is Pete LePage Skittles. He’s the heir to the Skittles family fortune so of course he loves Skittles hit

Alexander Zalben
he did it affect your enjoyment and all that Skittles suck.

Pete LePage
For– I disagree with that hard disagree. It’s–

Alexander Zalben
least favorite candy

Justin Tyler
do you feel like they’re m&ms in horrible disguise?

Pete LePage
I enjoy m&ms So much better than skills. But still Skittles are enjoyable. So I like a Spree you don’t I mean it come on me. I’m not gonna get mad at

Justin Tyler
You’ll over the place., dog. You’re almost you’re about to say like I love actual fruit. I love

Pete LePage
I love any kind of sugar sweet combination. I mean,

Alexander Zalben
here’s what I’ll actually say about how much in agreement you if you just did there were things that I liked in spots about it that I’m sure we’ll talk about over the course of the podcast. But overall, even though I didn’t love the first Shazam, I was disappointed in this one. I was disappointed in the script. I was disappointed. In the convoluted ation of the plot. There were things that just made no sense whatsoever, which felt like and this is one of my least favorite things. But when you’re watching movies you’re like, that was an earlier version of the script. Like that clearly was an earlier version of the script. You didn’t change that and that you just continued or something happened with you’re adding it together. What were you gonna say Justin?

Justin Tyler
Well, I just I feel like you’re hitting on a lot of things I was thinking as well and I think to be charitable about it like it’s hard to make a big movie like this. And there are multiple versions of the script that we’ll talk about later in relation to the post credit sequences. So like they are juggling a lot but of my big takeaway while I was watching this movie was like when they were making it, what were they thinking about? And I don’t mean that in a mean way. I mean it like, did it all make sense to them when they were literally making this movie? Because it’s complicated in so many ways.

Pete LePage
What are you talking about? It’s a very simple idea. This kid is turning 18 He’s aging out. He’s freaking out about it. There’s a whole thing about him. Being rejected over and over again. And that’s kind of him but now he’s also Shazam. And how does he deal with this all

Justin Tyler
and I get that

Alexander Zalben
now that I want to interrupt because I think Pete You hit the nail on the head there is you’re absolutely right. The idea of him of Billy Batson being 18 years old worried about aging out of his group home in the first place that really feels like he has a family has home dramatically awesome. Really follows up really well on the first movie has this huge emotional thread to it pays off with I think probably the most emotional scene of the movie. Yes, mom hugs him towards the end and just like your mobility your mind boy that’s

Justin Tyler
in that moment was worried right and worse than I thought that moment really worried.

Alexander Zalben
But the thing that I think you hit the nail on the head is you started after you’re describing that that to go into like and also is what you added there and that’s the problem is that that’s a strong emotional thread. But it was like, also he was like, I can’t get through the trauma of my team. It’s all or nine and then ultimately at the end he needs to fight this dragon by himself and lock them out and not work with them and then also the he wants to date Wonder Woman and also all of these other things. And in the process. All of these other characters got completely lost with the exception of Freddie, who I’m sure we’ll talk about but like I think the worst example of it is Mary Marvel who if you think about whose great mind you like the actress is great, does a great job with what she’s given but at the first movie Her arc was like, oh, man, I really want to get into college. Then she doesn’t edit this movie. She’s like, Well, I kind of like still living at home. What a bummer. I’d really like to have other friends and the lessons she learned together is like

Justin Tyler
no, he briefly has a hangover.

Alexander Zalben
Hangover like nobody else gets any time to do anything. Well.

Pete LePage
First off your 20s are sloppy. I mean let’s not even pretend you mean like there’s a lot going on. There’s a lot of ups and downs.

Alexander Zalben
sloppy and so is Shazam 2

Justin Tyler
maybe it was written and produced by a series of 20 year olds because that’s honestly what it felt like it felt like this movie features kids, being adults about looking superheroes and I feel like this movie feels like it was written by kids and is like this is a grown up movie we made because I appreciate your point Pete about the emotional chord that you identify it I agree with you, to me about what the point what was going on with the Daughters of Atlas. Tell me anything about the three of them and how they relate to each other.

Alexander Zalben
Actually before you even get to that explain to me why Ann, Rachel Zegler’s character was going to high school.

Justin Tyler
Yeah.

Pete LePage
It was for the age she was portraying it was age appropriate.

Justin Tyler
Yeah. Because like I wish we talk a lot about comic book movies and about villains but are sort of almost the organizing principle of comic book movies, movies. That work have great villains. You got your thinos you got your king even though admin wasn’t great. I think we all I think kings a good future villain here. And in this movie, we have villains that we don’t understand. We don’t understand what they’re doing. why they’re there. We get a reveal. But it doesn’t. This is what a huge question for the movie. What was Anne’s power set? How to her powers where her power set was

Alexander Zalben
totally shaped. You

Pete LePage
see Inception dudes.

Alexander Zalben
I mean, Dr. Strange mirror dimension was her power. She’s the first Doctor Strange world like a Rubik’s cube that you’ve ever said.

Pete LePage
Yeah, exactly. Rubik’s Cube powers, but with the world.

Justin Tyler
So many questions here. Was she turning the world because when she turned the world that didn’t affect the world, it only affected the person and she could occasionally teleport a person and the world would

Alexander Zalben
move around. Her powers look cool yet

Justin Tyler
exactly. And I think that was a huge problem. That was a cool visual, a time consuming visual. Where at the end, I was like, what when she lost her powers. I was like, thank you because I’m dizzy.

Alexander Zalben
Well, she lost her powers and also be

Pete LePage
mad at her because you’re old and you get dizzy. Because things move fast sir. I not about your dizzy because they changed the worlds around a little bit and you were like, oh, slow down. I want to get off this movie ride this roller coasters.

Alexander Zalben
Going too fast for me. I’ll also throw out at that moment where she lost her powers. I believe that was the first time in the entire movie with it. At that point. It was like an hour and a half head where they’re like, now we’re going into super slow mo to really emphasize this moment. And I was like what you have not used this effect at any point to this movie before. And then they used it again like 10 minutes later and that never used it again. So to me that points to just a general visual sloppiness in the movie in terms of how they’re putting together the pacing and out. But here’s what I’ll say about theaters about this that I was thinking about while I was watching the movie is it actually has a very similar problem to what we were talking about with Savannah in the first movie, where it’s generously 70% of the way there in terms of tying into the theme, whether these three sisters and they are family and they want to bring their world back and hold on to their old world. Right. They wanted to keep it that way. But then the way that it actually executes is Lucy Liu’s character is like, No, I’m going to take this apple and put it here and Helen Mirren suddenly as a turd is like Billy Batson, whatever help you need, I’m happy to help you. And Rachel Zegler’s character and the entire time like we’re talking about she’s like, I’m a regular high school kid for no particular reason. Oh, no, my sister’s here. Now I talk in a different accent and have a different character. It’s not entirely clear why I was doing this thing. So none of those thoughts really connect to each other when it feels like they could have pushed it the 20 to 30% more to be like Billy is trying to hold on to his family and his old life as much as possible. They are trying to hold on to their family. Their old life as much as possible. And we have these two warring forces, but that never comes together in a way.

Pete LePage
First off when it comes to the Daughters, I thought it was very family representational where it was like, if you walk, walk up to anybody in a family and ask them what’s going on. They’re gonna tell you a completely

Alexander Zalben
different thing than what’s actually happening

Justin Tyler
shouts to that

Pete LePage
using their own baggage to give you a view of the world, and I thought that was very hilariously accurate.

Justin Tyler
I and I agree with you. I wish they had sort of front porch to that and made that the movie where it was like, we had the Shazamily doing their thing. And then the daughters where they were, at first very austere and very serious gods but behind the scenes, they were messy, just as messy as well. And also, we almost got there with the movie, but instead it felt forced in fake when their family the daughter’s family fell apart because it just wasn’t I think they needed to let us behind the scenes there. Give us a little vision. I

Pete LePage
mean, it was clear Lucy Liu liked riding the dragon and other people were like, Yo, I want to turn and she was like, I’ll murder all of you I mean, we’ve all been there with family members

Alexander Zalben
Yes. I think just to keep following this train of thought that we’re going down. I felt for sure when Lucy Liu made that turn which was kind of setup but not really set up exactly. But just following from there on where you’re like okay, we’re heading into the final battle, we have to have an antagonist. We haven’t already monsters, etc, etc. If you follow the idea of she’s saying the opposite of what Billy Batson has been saying the entire movie all or none. And she’s like, No, just me. I’m the one who’s going to do it. If you get a battle of the shazam movie, finally coming together, and being like, Yes, Billy, you’re our leader. We stand behind you. Let’s do this. Let’s take her down together. We are a family. She has abandoned her family that shows the opposite between the hero and the villain. But again, I know but it ends with a one on one thing where he sacrifices himself by just shooting you know, busting out of a dome.

Pete LePage
No, because it was like Lucy Liu was like– She held the stick for a little bit the talking stick and she got really excited. And then Helen Mirren was like no, I you don’t you can’t get to talk. And it was like the you know, it’s that thing with a family is like if you take that stick where we one more time I swear to God, and that was it. That was the last time and then she was going to turn on her family. You know, I mean,

Alexander Zalben
There’s– So let’s talk about the production schedule a little bit because I think this points at least a little bit. I don’t know I think this is kind of points to the fact that like, why this at least a part why this happened the way it did, where the first movie came out. It was a big success. The opening weekend or like a surprise success did better than people expected. Yeah. And they almost immediately started working on a second movie and ostensibly part of the reason was, hey, these kids are getting older. Let’s do this very quickly. Let’s get this movie out there. Let’s strike while the iron is hot while people are still excited about it. And that was back in 2019. By the time they started to get things together COVID hit and they weren’t able to shoot it anymore. And the shoot kept getting delayed and delayed and delayed. And things kept changing in the background in terms of the DC Universe in terms of Warner Brothers in terms of these kids getting much older not all to stranger things right. But certainly some of them were like, Hey, you’re a little too old at this point to actually be bachik up to this. And by the time they finally got it and shot the thing. Then, WB and DC were again going through all these changes that we’ve talked about a lot here on the podcast that eventually led to James Gunn and Peter Safran, who, by the way, was a producer on this movie and the previous movie, taking over DC studios. And they ended up delaying it even more, almost not I don’t think it was totally a year but like a very long time. So this is slightly out of forces out of its control, but also in some forces it is control like they took some extra time to work on the VFX which still did not look great across the board. But that kind of is what it is. This movie came out at least two years later than it should have is my point.

Justin Tyler
Yes, a

Pete LePage
That was a long winded point. I think that–

Justin Tyler
I think the movie was also that way.

Pete LePage
The visual effects weren’t there weren’t like horrible moments that completely pulled you out

Alexander Zalben
The flying was pretty bad. Like across the board. The flying was pretty bad. Also, this is not exactly a VFX problem. But why were there two entirely different bridge attack scenes? That was weird,

Pete LePage
dude, people love bridge attacks.

Alexander Zalben
They do love bridges.

Justin Tyler
But let me say this like because like I agree, it wasn’t the VFX people get a lot of blame and the superhero movies for like it wasn’t perfect. I think it’s more of a writing problem because I think the writing in this movie was messy like the bridge attack was in the beginning of the movie was messy, because it was like what’s the point of this like they are sort of saving the day but they’re also sort of not doing good job and it’s sort of just like their bad day.

Pete LePage
I mean, it’s the kind of show that they’re like, a good team but they also are kids and don’t can exactly save the whole day they can save part of people’s lives, but overall they’re still trying to figure things out.

Justin Tyler
But I walked out of that scene thinking like, unclear that that was the point

Pete LePage
You shouldn’t have walked out you’re locked out of the movie. For the old thing, you don’t want dies, you’re over notes and stuff. That’s not how it works.

Justin Tyler
Now here’s how when I sit in the movie, I’m like, if I don’t like this, I’m going to slowly walk out and then it has to pull me back in pull me back out. That’s how it works. And same with my relationships. And that’s why I’m just slowly backing away from the microphone right now.

Pete LePage
Wow. The working with you.

Alexander Zalben
If you want to talk about the bridge thing in particular, like you’re saying other than sloppy facts there were two things that jumped out at me about that scene one they had a David F. Sanberg’s wife who died in the first movie was back as Lady driving a car. She was like going off the bridge playing Yeah, hold it out for a hero. And I love a great setup for a big, big like oh you’re playing that song. That’s awesome. That scene was not paste to that song at all. Like I wish I could have forgiven if it was something they added in later. But it was a major feature of the scene. And it was just not edited into that. And then beyond that, just talking about texturally like you’re saying that getting blamed for that. The bridge was breaking beforehand for no explicable reason that didn’t really tie to the plot. Like I thought it was gonna be a doc aka doorway home thing where the Daughters of Atlas were attacking the bridge or something to draw them out. But no, it was just bad infrastructure on Philadelphia’s.

Pete LePage
I mean, think about that. Yeah, that’s what they’re really talking about.

Justin Tyler
Philadelphia, it’s the Ben Franklin Bridge, which connects to Jersey. I think Philadelphia was like, fuck that state that’s cut this bridge off. And this example is like coming in there and trying to fix I

Alexander Zalben
Pete, you used to live in Philly, right like, a couple of months. They blow all the bridges?

Pete LePage
Well, it’s one of those things where if you have to leave to go to Jersey, wacko it’s five bucks, man.

Justin Tyler
Well let me say this to you if the Phillies lose, they blow up the bridge. Yeah.

Pete LePage
I mean, I would like to talk about the fact that like they did use some cool Philly landmarks in a row, which was nice. I know it was also peppered in with some places that clearly weren’t fully. But I also enjoyed the fact that he set up some nice cheese steaks for Helen Mirren to be like, Hey, let’s talk this out.

Alexander Zalben
I gotta ask you by heart, a heart that– Wait, I gotta ask you about that, Pete. Because first of all, I should have checked this, I guess was that a real cheesesteak place?

Pete LePage
I don’t think so.

Alexander Zalben
No I don’t think so either. How do you set there’s no Philly. At like Philly, that famous.

Pete LePage
They didn’t pick a team. That’s it. And so say Max’s are sort of going with like

Alexander Zalben
Philly, famous for fighting about who has the best cheesesteaks that they’re like, here’s what clearly is like a fast food cheesesteak place. Terrible.

Justin Tyler
Also, there’s the way they sat that down that was like a hot dog joint in Vancouver. Something like this clearly was not a Philly-

Alexander Zalben
And then that was followed up by those people shooting the movie, where Zachary Levi proceeded to repeatedly body slam Helen Mirren on the floor. I got so uncomfortable watching that when that happened, like I understand she’s a super being, but hit being like lifting over his head and being like–

Justin Tyler
shout out to Helen Mirren for doing this role because like she was in it, she wouldn’t do this role. But she she had to do the most like high octane melodramatic acting and then she had to get beat up the most. And then she

Pete LePage
heard her tables argued over which one would took what they were like no no, you take this part. No, no,

Justin Tyler
that’s definitely not how casting works. But Lucy Liu got to hover above it all and be like, I’m just sort of bad the whole time. Well, Helen Mirren had to be like, Yeah, I’ll get rich. And that’d be a good guy for a second like he was just, I can’t imagine

Pete LePage
If you get shot, and you could get saved you could have maybe you know, have a change of heart.

Justin Tyler
I can’t imagine just dropping that language on mirror and like, Okay, here’s what you’re gonna do. You’re gonna have to say all this stuff, get beat up and then eventually be like, I love you Shazam or whatever. Like, that’s how she’s a hardcore actor.

Pete LePage
Close to the end. Maybe you gotta change your heart, man.

Alexander Zalben
Jesus, dark.

Justin Tyler
she’s old. End of our life. So

Pete LePage
I’m saying after you get shot, maybe you’re like, Hey, I’m making bad choices.

Justin Tyler
They didn’t actually shoot her for the movie though. No, they

Alexander Zalben
shot the body slamming seeds. Last because she died after that. Oh. I do have one more question not to stay on this cheesesteak scene. But in the scene they have a joke where Shazam is like, if there’s one thing I’ve learned from the Fast and the Furious movies is you can always count on family. Now. Helen Mirren was in The Fast and the Furious movie she’s better at a couple of them is Helen Mirren the actress in faster the furious in the DC extended universe, and there just happens to be a goddess who looks like her, or is the Fast and Furious series entirely different somehow in the universe that Shazam exists in.

Yeah. It’s her character and fast and F8 Hespera, the goddess of the Daughter of Atlas.

Pete LePage
I mean, she was also in Hobbes & Shaw, and she wasn’t wearing that sweet visor. So I mean, I think the answer is yes. And then sometimes no.

Justin Tyler
That’s honestly that’s probably the right answer. Thank you for keeping us honest.

Alexander Zalben
Here’s one thing that I did like about the movie, which is the other thing that I really liked about the first movie is oh la. Do you want to talk about darlin peed onto my point, if you’re bursting at the seams?

Pete LePage
It seemed like you were gonna say something positive. So yeah.

Alexander Zalben
I was I was gonna talk about Jack Dylan Grazer as Freddie, who I think is great. Like he is as very funny. He has good comedic timing. He had of all of the kids at either include Billy Batson, probably the most complete emotional arc over the course of it. Got to be a hero. His chemistry with Rachel Zegler was

Pete LePage
that whole hero tap was really fun and sweet.

Alexander Zalben
And so he came out of the movie blameless. I think

Justin Tyler
what a what a compliment. It’s just as good as an Oscar. The blameless awards I do think the scene when he is fighting down the fear Dragon, and they do a good job of setting up the dragon as like capitalize on fear, right? Freddie being someone who’s conquered his fears because he has been bullied relentlessly his whole life. And while the earlier scenes between he and n are like, so schlocky teen stuff, it still worked emotionally for me when he does face down that sort of fear fire and comes to Anne’s aid. And it like the even that emotion, their relationship, when they were sitting together and held hands at the end of the movie. I was like, I’m here for it. And that is not easy given the material that they were starting with. So shouts

Alexander Zalben
Wait, can I mention one thing

Pete LePage
It was a transcendent hookup that you know, I think a lot of people are shipping and right now

Justin Tyler
he’s into older women. I don’t know about a lot of people but that was

Pete LePage
a fun moment. Mom was like What’s with our kids and older ladies.

Alexander Zalben
I do want to throw out one thing just before I forget and then I’ll get back to positive things that I was gonna say. But the that seed when they’re holding hands, they’re like everywhere you go to her now and she’s like, Well, I think maybe I’m going to Explore your world. And then five minutes later with a wizard comes out. They’re like, what are you going to do now? And he’s like, Well, I think I’m going to Explore your world. And I was like, You didn’t write another lot like you just said that live life.

Justin Tyler
I have a lot of questions about the wizards look when he comes in like, was he on Project Runway briefly. Did he like what’s he coming into it?

Pete LePage
Think about if you’re trapped in a cave, where are you gonna go first Project Runway. Well

Justin Tyler
let me throw this out across the board. The wizard ended up having sort of a larger role in this movie. Yeah, I wish they gave him some character. Instead, he was this weirdo of all time who just said random stuff. And I think they come up with

Pete LePage
his head. I’d Wonder Woman’s body was hysterical. I

Justin Tyler
mean, let’s talk about that. And

Pete LePage
how long are we gonna go without talking about how much fun let’s

Justin Tyler
talk about that in a second. But like if they had given the wizard, some sort of child like, because that we’ve set up this idea that like this is Shazam and the rest of his family our kids in superhero bodies, the wizard, millennia old, if he also acts like a child, then everything sort of rhymes and they were almost there with the way he was behaving.

Pete LePage
And he gets mock voice that was hysterical.

Justin Tyler
But for him to be out of touch and childlike in the way that is out of his element, I thought would have been such a funny choice would have added so much comedically to a movie for a character who didn’t

Pete LePage
spend much in jail. What do you would

Justin Tyler
give it give him something because he ended up just being there and occasionally being like Jada get that staff and say, Yeah, we know

Alexander Zalben
there wasn’t. There wasn’t a consistency to his character. Djimon Honsou great actor, does great job again,

Pete LePage
everything he does,

Alexander Zalben
but the fact that like, and maybe this is I don’t know if this is exactly what you’re talking about Justin, but that they start off at a place where he is the very deathly serious wizard from the first movie first movie. Yeah, asterisk. How did he come back? Did they explain that at any point? I don’t think so. I don’t think

Pete LePage
they really if you’re a wizard, and then you die, you go to jail.

Alexander Zalben
They really skipped over that part. They were they were like we wanted him back. So he was back. But he’s very, very serious up until he encounters Freddie and then suddenly he’s a sarcastic quick machine, which mind you they had good chemistry together and they played off of each other well, but I was thrown by the fact that he went from shouting at Billy Batson to then later on being like Billy based on nothing. You are the greatest hero of our age, and I chose you wisely despite the fact that I’m on everything at this point. You’re doing really great giving up this like pump up speech. We’re in the middle part of the movies. Oh, like joke joke. Joke. Joke. Joke. Joke joke joke joke. It didn’t connect at all.

Justin Tyler
Yeah, great. They could have made them funny throughout with no loss to the rest of the story.

Pete LePage
I disagree. I thought that the part where you know, he kind of like pumped up Billy because of the fact that he believed in what he was and what

Justin Tyler
he really believed he

Pete LePage
believed in.

Alexander Zalben
Well, let’s talk about Billy–

Pete LePage
He went back for the son that he never had.

Alexander Zalben
We have now taken half an hour of the podcast and not talked about the main character the movie too much. We’ve been talking about all the other characters.

Pete LePage
Darla.

Alexander Zalben
Go ahead talk about Darla Pete.

Pete LePage
No, you’re gonna

Alexander Zalben
Oh, okay. All right. It was gonna talk about Billy I was going to talk about the two Billy’s we get a lot more Zachary Levi in this movie, which sucks. I think we can all agree on that. Asher Angel gets a much more downsized role, and I gotta say he’s very strong as an actor, Zachary Levi’s performance at Asher Angel’s performance. No connection. None. Yeah, no, I could not make any connection whatsoever between those characters. Like I could sort of mentally stretch it a little bit in the first movie, by him being like, I’m excited about being a superhero. Isn’t this cool? Oh, my God, I got all these powers. But here it was Zachary Levi doing Zachary Levi thing and Asher Angel being like, kind of playing Billy Batson for the comics a little more. I felt just in terms of being a little more earnest, a little more straightforward. Have a little more emotion to him, but we didn’t get to see him at all.

Justin Tyler
Well, I think they used him differently. Like in the first movie he was he was the person that we moved through to get to Shazam. And this movie Shazam was the person and we touch on Billy for the emotional moments and and but I think that’s a waste. of Billy a little bit because to put all of the like big emotional, heartfelt moments on a kid to just react in the moment is unfair. Especially because it felt like Zachary Levi in the Shazam role, couldn’t carry those moments and was basically doing his like, I’m sort of telling jokes. The whole time of the movie,

Pete LePage
but it does make sense for the character because if you’re Billy Batson, you’re not going to be yourself. You’re going to be used to jam as much as possible because he’s the invincible one. He is the strong one. So I thought it kind of worked in that aspect. Did I want more of the younger kid actor versus Zachary Levi? Sure, maybe but I understood the impetus behind it. I understood the choices that kind of got us what we got. And even if it was less, it was still more because the kid delivered on some really beautiful moments. And it was when the mom asked for him. You know, I clutching my pearls I was like, oh God.

Justin Tyler
And again, that moment was fantastic.

Alexander Zalben
I do wonder though, and this is a very typical thing for second superhero movie. So I wonder if they were resisting this at all. I feel like it would have tied into the overall theme of the movie that they were making gestures towards at least if he was the one who lost his powers, not everybody else because everybody else might do it affects Freddie because Freddie they sort of like played that out with his art a bit in terms of him not getting to be captured every power anymore. At least for a good chunk of the movie. But if Billy had to face down being like, Wait, everybody else has their powers and they’re going to do stuff. I’m a regular human. I don’t have it. What do I do here? How do I leave them? That’s how you find that true power inside. That’s how you become that hero inside and then you get that moment where the Wizard is like no, Billy, you ever you were the right hero I chose right say the word say by name and that he changed his exam and that he saved the day you know, there’s I don’t know it felt missing.

Justin Tyler
And I think that’s that’s such an interesting point. Because it’s like, what if you what if you give Billy, Freddie’s arc for the movie where Billy meets and and they have a connection. And it’s about him doing that and I get why it’s Friday, maybe from an actor’s point of view and just to make sure Freddie, who was a major character in the first movie has that arc. But just from a pure Shazam, storytelling point of view. It sort of makes more sense if Billy’s that character, and he learns how to be a hero in relation to an and faces down his fears and then he gets to rise up at the end and save the day, while his family is also doing the other work that they do in the current cut of the movie.

Alexander Zalben
I wonder if this is complete speculation, but I wonder if it is like you’re saying an actor thing behind the scenes where they were like, gotta have more Zachary Levi, everybody loves Zachary Levi Shazam gotta put him on screen more. And Jack Dylan Grazer, great actor, we got to have more of him as well. So how do we do that? And that’s the reason they split it up.

Pete LePage
I mean, I wonder if because DC made this big announcement that like, we’re gonna have strips and we’re gonna do stuff. I wonder if they shot this with like, everybody got arcs and chunks and then they added it in kind of like they cut everything down, you know?

Justin Tyler
Well, I mean, it does seem like there was us over jam script, and they’re given the stuff we’re going to talk about a little bit about Mr. Mind. It felt like there was a whole nother script that was about Mr. Mind and Savana, being the villains, and the main villains, and we have this other script. So I think there’s a lot of iterations of this movie potentially either on the page or on the screen that they ended up cutting down. But imagine if we had that sort of Billy Batson focus story, and we flip it, and we have Adam Brody playing, the sort of has to jump up into this Shazam role and be the sort of head of the family when he’s not ready for it. That’s a dichotomy that I feel like could have been the rallying point of the movie and instead they flip it and that leaves Shazam, Zachary, Levi, Shazam, without a lot to do sort of hovering there and waiting for stuff to happen to him for the movie. While the emotional arc was on Freddie the whole

Pete LePage
What did you guys think about the kind of like continuation of these, you know, Snyderverse where it was like, are we gonna have a weird dream moment? Where

Alexander Zalben
Alright, do we want to jump into that? Because like I said at the beginning, that’s sort of the whole point of this podcast is to talk about kicking off the Gunn stuff. And James Gunn when he was introducing a slate he was like, Oh, she sounds kind of off to the side doing its own thing. We’re not even worried about that. And then later on Peter Safran came out and said, yeah, we’ll see how Shazam does, and maybe we’ll continue Zachary Levi, if it does really well on the responses good as Shazam. This is straight up a DC EU movie, like I know that’s not exactly what you were talking about Pete, but to the point that Wonder Woman incongruously only shows up at the end of the movie to bring Shazam back to life. They’re talking about Batman and Superman all the time. There’s a end credit scene that, by the way was supposed to tie into Justice Society. They were supposed to have the Justice Society for Black Adam show up, but they were not available. So instead of the last second, they got two folks from Peacemaker, but again, it’s like very heavily entrenched in the DCU. There’s also that thing at the beginning where he’s at the pediatricians and he’s talking about Aquaman and The Flash and all of these characters. So that’s kind of why I said at the beginning, it’s a lame duck like I don’t see a way they can continue this in any fashion

Justin Tyler
Lame Duck is a great way of describing this movie because I think– and, and I say that I in the political term where it’s like it’s not to say this movie doesn’t have quality.

Pete LePage
And also animals are all the ducks out there. You’re not lame, you know, just yeah,

Justin Tyler
Shouts to our duck fans

Alexander Zalben
Lame ducks can still be delicious. They can still be delicious. You put a little orange sauce on them. Doesn’t matter whether or not you don’t get that

Justin Tyler
orange duck confit shit going, but what I think lame duck is it’s something that was has lost its power. Without too with without being blamed for it because the DC Universe is moving past this movie, the Justice Society stuff I think is going to go away. Even Wonder Woman appearing here is sort of like oh, she’s not part of the future by desease own admission, so it makes sense that she does show up in the end as a big feel. It felt like that was shot with the idea like, Look, she’s here. That must mean this is important. But now it’s like, oh, no, she’s not important anymore. So that’s bad for the future of this movie. And the even the Justice Society post credit thing is sort of like, I don’t I don’t think

Pete LePage
I do love that bit though. It’s like she says Justice is like I’m in and then it’s not Justice League.

Alexander Zalben
So there’s a bunch of like, behind the scenes things that I mentioned that I thought were kind of interesting about this in terms of how they had to like, pivot and change, which is very surprising. I mean, you’d expect Hey, it’s all wonderful these productions. It’s all one big family. You could just make these things happen, but you can. For example, that post credit scene, they were expecting, so basically, they had the spot in the woods where they could shoot, they’re like, this is stupid. It just looks like it’s part of the woods. Let’s build something there. So they built an entire gas station. And they were supposed to have the members of the Justice Society from Black Adam show up and then the schedule didn’t work out and they were like shoot, we have this built we only have like a day or two and this was mind you years ago. Apparently they did this when they shot this like this was not a last second thing. They’re like, okay, we can get these two guys from Peacemaker. Let’s quickly write a seed for them and shoot a seed for them and let’s go. Does it make sense that they’re asking him to be at the Justice Society probably not. But let’s do it anyway. So they did that. The other thing that was mentioned in terms of the Wonder Woman thing, there was a little bit of a scuff up online to put it lightly about this this past weekend, but Gal Gadot was not actually there on set when he shot that the way that

Justin Tyler
the obvious in the movie if I may say from I mean, I have a little bit more of an eye from working in production. I was like yo, she’s that shoulder that Shazam shoulder in her shot. I was like no way she was on set

Pete LePage
no but it was also kind of like an inside joke because they already did that with the Wizard where they put somebody’s head on somebody else’s body. So it was almost like, you know, they were

Alexander Zalben
Totally to be clear, like in terms that that playing off against the headless Henry Cavill from the first movie. Yeah, people like that, where she goes on a dream date with Wonder Woman. You don’t get to see your head. You’re like, Oh, they’re doing this again. That is the Wizard’s head fun. At the very end. Yes. And fun with the Wonder Woman thing where they zoom up, they go to her neck and you’re like, god dammit, they’re gonna do it again. And then they come up but it was Gal gadot and I’ll tell you the five guys at the theater who kept shouting Shazam very excited about it. They were way–

Justin Tyler
and that was that’s a good setup punchline situation that they played out. Well, I thought

Pete LePage
that was too

Alexander Zalben
but the way that they shot it, which I don’t blame them. I just think this is interesting. They shot it with a stunt double on stage wearing the Wonder Woman costume and then later on the director directed Gal Godot over Zoom on a stage to essentially reproduce those movements. So I think they did a good job. But if you watch the seed over again, it is interesting to see how like, yeah, you can see how nobody’s actually interacted with her. The only time you see her in a shot with them. It’s either like you’re saying over the shoulder, or the thing where she plants the staff is right over her head and you can’t actually see the face. So yeah.

Justin Tyler
Interesting. Oh, that’s just just production background. But I mean, the fact that I think they worked that well into the story, if we weren’t in a different world where justice society was going forward, and they’re going to be more Wonder Woman movies, I think this would play a lot better. And it would be like, Oh, this is being woven in. But we’re in a world where the entire creative team is changed. Black Adam was a failure at the box office. So this whole universe is a little bit burned in general.

Pete LePage
Well, regardless of that, I do you want to say that like having the bit where Wonder Woman doesn’t show up when you want her to show up and then shows up at the end was just such a like, great, kind of like, hey, we mess with you, but we’re gonna give it to kind of moment.

Alexander Zalben
I agree except for the fact and this is maybe more on me than it is on the movie though. I got to put it out of the movie. When she was like, there is one God left. I had to wrakc my brains like who what which is God? Yeah, there’s got to be really what’s going on here. It’s been a couple of years since I’ve seen — and she is at half Zeus that was established in Wonder Woman. So we do get that but it it literally feels like a Deus ex Machina showing up there

Justin Tyler
where it’s literally a definition of Deus ex Machina.

Alexander Zalben
And also the fact that like, the Daughters of Atlas the entire time, we’re like, we gotta get this apple we got to plant here in our realm and bring our realm back to life. And the Shazam family is trying to stop them the entire time, but the end Wonder Woman is like I planted this seed now the realm has come back to life is that nicely like yeah, that is that’s That sounds good. is weird. It is weird.

Pete LePage
I know that you shouldn’t have planted the seed because it was not meant for this world. So that’s why we got all those monsters and shit. But then Wonder Woman stopped all that was like, all right.

Alexander Zalben
No, no, they were in the God Realm. That’s where they were burying Billy.

Justin Tyler
They buried Billy and like, in a weird dusty grave?

Pete LePage
Yeah. Yeah, like old cowboy grave. Yeah, it was fun.

Justin Tyler
Yeah, it was like they buried in one inch.

Pete LePage
Sand. Yeah, they couldn’t bury him so they just piled dirt on top and then

Alexander Zalben
I did like the zombie bit. I thought the zombie bit was good. It was fun. It was.

Justin Tyler
It was fun here for it.

Pete LePage
If you’re going to do that, you got to do a zombie bit. Again.

Alexander Zalben
Can I mention though my favorite part of the movie, which I think based on our discussions that already sounds like at least one person absolutely hated this. My absolute favorite part of the movie the part of the movie that I unequivocally liked, was the end credit scene with Mr. Mind and Sivana.

Justin Tyler
because why, because it was a joke because it was weird.

Alexander Zalben
It is. So for those who haven’t seen it, although I’m assuming most of you have. It. The first movie we get Sivana is in jail scribbling things on the wall. He’s trying to get back to the Rock of Eternity. And he just can’t do it anywhere. It doesn’t have the magic and then Mr. Mind this worm creature who escaped from Rock of Eternity comes in his like, we’re gonna team up we’re gonna take down Shazam, Oh, the things that we’re going to do together they both start laughing. So like Justin was saying the assumption was that the next movie was going to be Sivana and Mr. Mind and in fact, they wrote an entire script. That’s what it was supposed to be, but that they felt like we just wrote the first movie but bigger. That’s all we did. Why don’t we change it and took them out of the script. I think they were also supposed to be like a secondary plotline at some point. So they pulled that out.

Justin Tyler
I think the idea was it Mr. Mind is the one that opened the door for the Daughters of Atlas to come. That was the original idea

Alexander Zalben
So that they don’t have that obviously and that we get this end credit scene we’re Sivana two years later in the timeline. Now has a very beautiful beard. And Mr. Mind comes back, he’s very angry. And I was like, Where where are you? And he’s like, Oh, you don’t understand. I’m worm and it takes me a while to get places. But whatever. I have these incredible plans and we’re gonna get to them and you’re gonna love what I’m going to tell you and Sivana’s like, yes, yes, tell me everything and he’s like, but first I have one thing to do and leaves just the whole bit of like, never getting to it I thought is so funny, and they’re never going to do this, but my main impression was like, I didn’t like this movie. I want them to make 31 more Shazam movies where they have this the end of every credits and they never get to it.

Justin Tyler
Well, but that’s sketch writer shit right there where you’re like keep playing this game?

Pete LePage
Very specific. They didn’t like it but I cannot believe that.

Alexander Zalben
Every– they got to put this at the end of The Flash. They got to cut back to it at the end Aquaman. Mark Strong back every two years. Getting bored and more annoyed at this worm.

Justin Tyler
Yeah, I thought it was my time.

Pete LePage
The only time we see him is in post-credits that’d be amazing. I love it. So good. It’d be so great.

Justin Tyler
Agreed. That was fun.

Alexander Zalben
Yes, yeah. Yeah, I get it. Like I get it textually. So talk about Justin your problems with that existing

Justin Tyler
With that Mr. Mind stuff. Well, I mean, it’s just, I mean, I think it just points to what I was saying earlier, where it’s like, this movie’s messy and like, we spent so much time on the Daughters of Atlas. We have the Mr. Mind thing at the end. It’s like, I would have been happier with a more focused movie if Mr. Mind was the villain. That was about this family, sort of being trying to be a family while also trying to do their superhero business, or getting into all the doors that we had a little bit of gesturing to the possibility of the doors and the rock of eternity. I love the way they tricked out the layer for this movie. I thought that was really cool. And they use the doors a little bit. It could have been an easy sort of fantastical story. of them going into a door making a mistake and having that intercede into their world. And then having to fix it as a family versus one

Pete LePage
is a Monsters Inc. Movie is what you said.

Justin Tyler
I wanted. I wanted a simple moving

Alexander Zalben
I think, Pete I know you’re joking here but they literally set up a Monsters Inc type situation where they come in. They have that great line where they get to the doors, they need to go through them to look through all the doors and they’re like, Well, this was inevitable. And I’m like great. That’s great. We’re getting to the doors thing at that they didn’t really do it like they backed off of it. They went–

Justin Tyler
They just go to book world and there’s a talking pen that shows Steve the results fun. It’s funny, like the reading the letter when Helen Mirren letter when Helen Mirren is reading the letter. That’s it. Yeah, that was a good bit. That’s a good it was a really fun

Alexander Zalben
one also a very good yes, that also was a great bit. There’s some good bits throughout the movie, but it’s like you’re saying Justin, I didn’t find a conveniently consistent

Justin Tyler
It was messy, like there were a lot of bad jokes that didn’t work and I don’t want to fully be mad at Zachary Levi, but he can’t. He’s good at giving quick response jokes. But if it’s like a joke that is like a setup punch line, or like there’s a more meaningful punch line here. He’s not good. He’s good at just fast responses. And so when you rely on him to really land a lot of comedic material, I think he’s not great at it. But the more scenic jokes are the more premacy jokes like the letter we’re just talking about. I thought landed and there were some fun stuff there. So it again, a simpler movie would have given them more plot wise would have given them more time to focus on the comedy and done something that we’ve been, I think waiting for desperately in the superhero space. A truly funny superhero movie. We haven’t.

Pete LePage
I’m glad you brought up that letter moment because also Megan Good was really funny as being the other version of Darla. Yeah, Darla and

Justin Tyler
Way to sneak up on Darla by the way

Pete LePage
you know, just being excited about the fact that the letter transforms into a bird that then flies to the person to deliver it was such a fun Darla moment.

Alexander Zalben
Meagan Good was great. I thought she was really great in the movie. She also did get much of an arc other than like, be really liking Skittles. Darla unicorns like Skittles, but oh and unicorns. You likes Skittles and unicorns and kittens– stealing the kitten from the bridge. That was a fun bit as well.

Pete LePage
But yeah, then realized that she had to bring it back was

Alexander Zalben
like in terms of the lightness of the arcs, Pedro’s arc of being like, looking at a hot ballplayer and then saying I’m gay and everybody saying I know and be like, okay, just there’s nothing there. That’s all.

Pete LePage
I mean, I felt his relief when he like when he was like, Oh, you guys know and it’s okay. Like that moment was nice, but how they got they just

Alexander Zalben
don’t understand when and I know they have a lot of characters that they’re balancing. They got the adult characters, they’ve got the young characters, they’ve got the villains, they’ve got the parents. They’ve got so many things going on in this movie, but I don’t understand what you’re like you’re mapping it out on the board where you’re like, Okay, here’s what we’re gonna do. Pedro is gay and doesn’t tell anybody. And then our second note for Pedro is he tells everybody’s gay. Exactly like they clap each other on the back and they’re like, let’s take lunch.

Justin Tyler
That’s obviously there were like truly three story points for Pedro, the two you said and the one moment where they cut him and he’s like, I lost my powers. And this fight and you guys aren’t mad about it. And it was just like it feels out of balance when you try to make have him have an arc when you haven’t actually given him the time in the movie, to have an arc. Like, you got to give them the time to do that.

Pete LePage
I mean, it was like kind of this interesting idea of like, trying to be brave when you don’t have the powers and also you’ve kind of like turned to them and they’re like No, no I’m out. Like, I got hit in dodgeball. I suck at dodging. So I’m first one out like it was like, Yeah,

Alexander Zalben
well, and we haven’t even mentioned Eugene, who is one of the other characters who is there and does stuff and I think this points to a problem we were talking about with the first movie specifically, we talked about it with the seven deadly sins that they were all for the most part, monster, you know, and that was it. Like there wasn’t any differentiation. I feel like they brought the same thing to the Shazam family here. They had very sketchy arcs in the first movie, but you felt like now that they’re established you could expand them more. Instead, they all have the same powers and they all have the same specialties. And that stood out to me in particular in the discussion that we’re having about the wisdom of Solomon, where he keeps saying Solomon wrong, which was a dumb bit

Pete LePage
He would go out and go, Oh, man, that was

Alexander Zalben
a lot of what was that Dr. Strange thing from Multiverse of Madness, where he was like, Oh, the Illumi-whaty? Which rang so false because of course, I hated that. Of course, you know that word. It’s the same thing with he would do the word Solmon just by like, playing video games or something. Yeah, so we’re

Justin Tyler
well and there was a lot of like the thing of Shazam not having a name. But also bothered me over the course of the movie and all the like, different every power all that stuff. I was, it was a this is an annoying people

Pete LePage
got to yell. Captain Marvel and different. It was kind of like

Alexander Zalben
dude who played Billy from the old TV show. I’m forgetting the name of it. It’s like the Shazam and Isis hour or something like that? Because you can tell because he was wearing a red t shirt with a yellow neck.

Justin Tyler
and was old was as it was, it was oddly old in this.

Alexander Zalben
What I was going to say about the Wisdom of Solomon thing is like that’s perfect time to be like, Hey, wait out these different things. These separate different things. They split up between us we all are strangely stronger in these things and Mary who seems to be the brains of the operation clearly got the Wisdom of Solomon like she is the one who is strongest at it. Oh, but instead– No, no, I’m saying like, that’s the thing done. Instead, everybody is sitting there doing the same amount of research with the same amount of knowledge and throwing things out. It’s very same-y.

Justin Tyler
Well, let me throw this out. What if you had a movie where the Shazam family are fighting amongst themselves? Then you have factions?

Pete LePage
That’s what kids do for your Daughters. That’s what basically we’ll get with the villain.

Justin Tyler
Yeah, no, but those are all a bunch of extra characters to establish. And then we didn’t get to see them develop. And then they’re gone essentially, except for and who’s just hanging out. You could have had a story where a one character and introduces something breaks this his family apart, which is what was sort of happening in the movie anyway. They fight and they have to get back together to solve something that is, you know, is is the story. Instead, the movie was just, I mean, this is my general takeaway, overly complex, overstuffed and we end up not enjoying so many of these elements that I think are there so many of the actors I think we like so much of the like, the we like the superhero characters. We like a lot of the things that are happening, we like to drag and showing up, but it ends up being just messy and we can’t enjoy it.

Pete LePage
Okay, I mean, sure, maybe, but let’s talk about the real thing. All right. How happy would skinny Yeah, if you reach into your pocket and someone puts Skittles in your pocket because you’re having a tough day. I mean, that’s the greatest thing you can do for somebody.

Justin Tyler
I don’t know. I’m gonna note that for I’m going to note that for my future interactions with you. Okay, great.

Alexander Zalben
Any other note notes about the movie any other scenes you want to call out Pete anything else you’d like to in particular?

Pete LePage
Yeah, I just thought the the whole kind of setting up the Darla arc and I’m glad the whole thing to Skittles. Were kind of set up to pay off.

Justin Tyler
That’s a Skittles arc, not a Darla arc.

Pete LePage
No, the fact that Darla loves animals and was all about kittens, and then of course was like unicorns out the answer. So I thought that was a very fun kid thing, a way to kind of get out of this because those unicorns look scary, but not to Darla man and I mean she sees hearts. She doesn’t see you know, shaped. So it was just, it was beautiful.

Alexander Zalben
Oh, yeah, I forgot to establish she’s shape blind. Yep. Yeah, we’re just called regular blind, I think.

Justin Tyler
Yeah I think that’s vaguely but I mean, I want to shout out to all of the mythological animals

Pete LePage
are Yeah. See the Cyclops?

Justin Tyler
Cyclops you got to see the mantacore. You got to see some harpies shooting around. Yeah, Minotaur like very fun. The fact that they kept that man, I wish we got to see more of that or that was a larger part of the story.

Pete LePage
I think the dad saying the battle wagon was a fun moment. Well, I was gonna say

Justin Tyler
the mom and dad like the mom had just maybe the emotional core of the movie for someone who’s on screen for a total of like six and a half minutes, but she still was able to deliver on that and connect with with the with Billy as the character I thought that was great. The data is fun, was though they were able to really land a lot of the comedy and in a way where it’s like you’re so on the side of the story yet you’re doing so much more work. So I would say shots to them.

Alexander Zalben
I’ll give a shout out to something that I didn’t think actually panned out completely well in the movie, but I like anyway, Gail Simone, who is pretty famous comic book writer had this great thread on Twitter, where she was talking about how she was emotionally affected by the movie and how she was connecting with it. But one of the things she talked about is that this is one of the few superhero movies where it’s not characters who are billionaires, they’re struggling with Buddy, their, you know, battle to lower class. That’s something that affects them in certain ways. And I really liked that idea and I really liked how she was putting it out there. I thought that was very smart comment. It’s something that I wish had played in a little bit more because like, I love the idea that we find out the parents have finally bought their house and only to have

Pete LePage
that but that it was a tough moment. It’s totally hit you older people because I was like, you just bought a house like oh,

Alexander Zalben
yeah, and it doesn’t really seem to affect them negatively too much because they have the house and the rebuild. And there’s so many other things happening. There are so many other things happening but I think there’s like I get like we’re talking about there’s the bones of things that are there that are really good about this franchise and about this movie, but I just don’t think it gelled together.

Justin Tyler
Well, and I think on that if they had folk really focused in that on that and superheroics as their sort of family business, and what that would mean for them, where they’re like, they don’t have a lot of money. How do we make money? We’re all superheroes that we tell our parents do. How do we deal with this? Like I thought could have been fantastic as a driving story for the whole movie. I wanted to say one other thing, Alex, I think it’s so funny. You talk about how the first movie scared your kids so much when he showed when you watched it with them, and you didn’t bring them to this movie. And then this movie watching it. They it was like this movie for kids. It’s fun. It’s funny, and then they have that moment where that teacher is walked off of that

Alexander Zalben
Deidrich Bader

Justin Tyler
an actor we know Yeah, I love and know

Pete LePage
Yeah, that was a

Alexander Zalben
cold. Yeah, there’s that like that. And it’s kind of a funny moment, but like the unicorn completely impaling the Cyclops as it’s running. Yeah, there’s things that go like a little too far with the violence and the reality of it, which is weird.

Justin Tyler
When we saw Diedrich Bader is like, Oh, he’s a fun teacher who likes Freddie because he identifies with him and then truly six minutes later, he walks up the

Alexander Zalben
joke about his body exploding as he lands It’s

Justin Tyler
horrifying.

Pete LePage
I just think maybe if you lower expectations for the movie, and maybe aren’t so dead inside, you can have some fun.

Justin Tyler
me throw out there they were

Alexander Zalben
They were already at rock bottom. Yeah.

Justin Tyler
I was going like this movie is a lame duck. It’s a little bit of a burnt situation for going forward into the DC Universe. Is this the last DC movie of this style? This feels very much in the style of Ant-Man Quantumania, where it’s like oh, an overly

Pete LePage
DC style. This is the fun DC movie.

Justin Tyler
Well, but let me say this is a movie that’s overly bloated that’s like was messily made was probably shot completely sort of out of order and like let’s pick up this scene. Let’s pick up the scene similar to I think how Ant-Man: Quantumania was made. Is this the last movie like this, we’re going to see

Alexander Zalben
well I do. This is like a little bit of a side answer to this question. But I think given how badly this movie has underperformed and how badly Quantumania has underperformed, there’s a lot of discussion about is the shine off of superhero movies. And I think the answer is yes. People are not automatically going to see it just because it’s a new superhero movie in theaters opening weekend. They don’t feel the necessity. Will there be superhero movies? There’s still drawn people absolutely just like any other sort of movie, like they’re not dead or anything but this in particular talking about the DC stuff. Even though it’s not them and they could say it’s not them. This puts more pressure on James Gunn, Peter Safran to deliver when it finally gets their time. And obviously we don’t know what’s going to happen with The Flash. We don’t know what’s gonna happen the Blue Beetle or Aquaman 2 or anything like that. But even if, let’s say those movies like all of those movies, underperform, that’s only gets them so far in terms of being like No, we weren’t involved in that. That wasn’t us that was in us. Because if you get an entire year of bombs, they have to over deliver with that first movie that they come out with way more than they have to right now. I don’t know that they all will like we talked about this before, but Aquaman is the biggest success I think that DC has had so even if Aquaman 2 is absolutely trash, it’s still made to fine, The Flash there. Seems to be a lot of hype out of Blue Beetle. Maybe they didn’t want to spend a lot of money but I do think like in particular Shazam, to giving a sour taste at the box office and also to critics and also to not all fans but some fans. Definitely makes that job of winning people back harder. Because frankly as deep as we are in that world. Most people are like– just you ask a regular person on the street they’re not gonna be like, well, Shazam 2 you is not part of the new James Gunn DC continuity. So I’m waiting for that. Like they don’t care. It’s a superhero movie.

Justin Tyler
Well but I think it’s a shame for them that this movie came out at this much more dire time. This movie was made in a time where it’s like, yeah, we’re just keep making superhero movies. And it’s coming at a time where the stakes are way higher than they anticipated. And that’s unfortunate for them. However, I think The Flash movie, the state, everyone knows the stakes are high on that. The same way everyone knew the stakes are high for Quantumania, and Quantumania failed. So it’s on Flash. If Flash can deliver. Then I think DC steps up into a place that they may be there’s going to be a ton of articles about how to or in the No seriously,

Pete LePage
we haven’t even gotten there yet. No,

Justin Tyler
I know we’re not there yet. But let me just say I mean obviously Guardians 3 is coming and that’s going to be a hit. I think unequivocally I agree but if Flash hits as well, if Flash hits as well. We’re in a good place where things are operating as opposed to right now where it’s like Oh, another bummer and also

Alexander Zalben
throw out there in a weird way if Guardians 3 hits. That’s also a plus because it’s a James Gunn movie like people see it as a Marvel movie, but it’s written and directed by James Gunn. It’s it is style. So people are going to be much more emboldened to be like, okay, feeling good about his DC slate now?

Justin Tyler
Well, in James Gunn is like I made Guardians and I back Flash to the bone. He’s like, this is the best superhero movie I’ve ever seen. It’s like Yo, you made a bunch of them. What are we doing here? You’re doing the two competing movies at the same time. Okay, dude, we ride with you. And that’s good, but it’s also dangerous. stakes are high.

Alexander Zalben
The stakes are very high.

Justin Tyler
For daddy for for Dad,

Alexander Zalben
For whoever. But we’re gonna be there to ramp you all. Up for the stakes. We’re kicking it off next week. Actually, later on this week with a required reading episode all about Supergirl: Woman of Tomorrow one of the recommended readings and by James Gunn, they’re of course going to be adapting movie on that. So check that out later this week as this is airing also, we’re gonna do a bunch of movie recaps and other things leading up to the Flash movie, things you got to watch before you check that out. So be sure to subscribe to the podcast to do all of that. If you’d like to support us patreon.com/comic book club. Also do a live show every Tuesday night at 7pm to Facebook and YouTube. Come hang out. We’d love to chat with you about the DC Universe, Apple, Spotify, Stitcher or the app of your choice to subscribe listen and follow the show at comic book live on Twitter comic book club live.com for this podcast and many more. Until next time, Dad We’re all counting on you.

Justin Tyler
That I let the dog out

Pete LePage
delicious high steaks

Justin Tyler
but just like you gotta let him out probably before bedtime just real quick. Sorry, is this a bad place to do this dad but sorry.