Review: In “Shazam! Fury of the Gods,” Zachary Levi reprises his role as the superhero and Helen Mirren makes an improbable appearance as a wrathful goddess
Now that it has finally arrived, the sequel brings back the eager-to-please Zachary Levi as the cheerful Philadelphia-reared man-child superhero from 2019’s “Shazam!” who when off-duty is a libidinous 17-year-old named Billy Batson who dreams about dating Wonder Woman. The nerdiest and least cool of superheroes, Shazam embodies the strange transitions of puberty and the embarrassment and lack of control that accompany them. Certainly there is a lot of chagrin to go around in the movie.
Thanks to events depicted in the predecessor film, Billy has shared with his five foster siblings the ability to generate their own superpowers and leap back and forth into adulthood by uttering the titular exclamation. After a prologue establishing how two goddesses from a previous millennium steal an ancient, all-powerful staff from an Athens museum, that duo and a third goddess show up in Philadelphia to go to war with Shazam’s super-family.
The three destruction-bent goddesses are played by two veterans and a newcomer: Helen Mirren, Lucy Liu and Rachel Zegler, the star of 2021’s “West Side Story.” Ms. Zegler is young enough to welcome the opportunity to gain exposure in a movie that will probably make more money in its opening week than “West Side Story” did in its entire run. Ms. Liu at least gets to ride a giant dragon, which for some reason is made of wood. But watching the formidable Ms.
Directed by David F. Sandberg from a script by Henry Gayden and Chris Morgan, “Fury of the Gods” makes no pretense of being anything but a comic free-for-all. A beloved high-school teacher gets thrown off a roof, but the murder is forgotten within 10 seconds. All that really matters to the filmmakers is a make-it-up-as-they-go drive to lunge from one magical spectacle to another.
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