If Fast & Furious Was Made In A Parallel Universe But Also Was Funnier!

Xtreme Vogue London Desk: Judith Benjamin

Shazam! Fury of the Gods Movie Review Rating:

Star Cast: Zachary Levi, Asher Angel, Jack Dylan Grazer, Rachel Zegler, Adam Brody, Ross Butler, Meagan Good, Lucy Liu, Djimon Hounsou and Helen Mirren

Director: David F. Sandberg

Shazam! Fury of the Gods Movie Review Out! ( Photo Credit – Shazam! Fury of the Gods Poster )

What’s Good: Carries forward the same formula from the first part keeping the strengths intact

What’s Bad: Carries forward the same formula from the first part exploiting the weakness even more badly

Loo Break: Only if you want to pee; it’s harmless fun otherwise!

Watch or Not?: There’s no option for those who are following this universe; for those who aren’t, you can watch this on any lazy Sunday without planning

Available On: Theatrical Release

Runtime: 130 Minutes

User Rating:

Shazam’s first scene would immediately make you feel it’s like a David F. Sandberg film when a considerable amount of people are asked to ‘unleash the chaos’ by the daughters of Atlas (Helen Mirren, Lucy Liu), and they do the same by forming a zombie-chain reaction eventually turning themselves into dust. Yes, the intro scene screams David F. Sandberg (Lights Out, Annabelle: Creation), but that’s about it because post that, we see the routine superheroes’ stuff of saving the world & family.

Why are the daughters of Atlas unleashing chaos on the people of Earth? Well, remember Shazam (Zachary Levi) breaking the magic staff in the first movie? Yeah, that belonged to the goddesses, and hence they’re here to unleash their fury upon the gullible laymen (& women) of the planet Earth. Shazam infused superpowers into his foster family as well, and you’ll get no points for guessing who’ll be on his side to fight the fury of the gods. Family!!!

Shazam! Fury of the Gods Movie Review Out! ( Photo Credit – A Still From Shazam! Fury of the Gods )

Script Analysis

Henry Gayden (Shazam!) & Chris Morgan (Fast & Furious) are the two writers inculcating the exact two flavours into the story they know and have mastered. The flavour of a superhero doing routine sh*t is by Henry & why a family is needed to save the superhero is the essence brought in by Chris, who has written six of ten Fast & Furious films (+ Hobbs & Shaw as well). It nails the fun portions but fails to deliver otherwise.

From the lead hero going to a paediatrician for therapy to a ‘Chat GPT’ like pen named Steve helping the team to write letters (delivering one outrightly hilarious letter-reading scene), the interest to watch the film highly elevates when it’s not trying to do the ‘superhero’ stuff. Other than that, it travels on the same boat every other superhero film is nowadays by posing a threat to a country/world and letting the heroes clean the mess to get applause (and a guaranteed sequel with a post-credit scene) by the end.

Star Performance

Zachary Levi continues to be the Deadpool for kids with his imposter syndrome and childlike ability to deal as a superhero with Shazam. The idea of an innocent, harmless & naive full-bodied superhero has just been scratched with the first two parts, and it might get onto something in the future. Adam Brody, Ross Butler and other superheroes from the family don’t contribute much to get noticeable limelight in the film.

Rachel Zegler, as Anne, gets involved in one of the most dragging tracks of the film, not getting much to explore despite having a good amount of screen time. Lucy Liu & Helen Mirren, as Anne’s elder sisters and daughters of Atlas, needed more attention than they got. Djimon Hounsou is hilarious AF & his character of the wizard gets much meat to bring in comical relief whenever the narrative starts to sink.

Direction, Music

While reviewing the first part, in the ‘What’s Bad?’ section, I mentioned “The story is divided into two parts – one that fools around and is funny, another in which it takes itself too seriously than required – the latter one is the dragging part!” and almost four years later that’s the same case. David F. Sandberg plays on the same strengths and weaknesses he did in part one, nailing and failing precisely at the same places.

Jumping in between from Marvel to DC, Christophe Beck is here again after Ant-Man And The Wasp: Quantumania, and it’s clear he’s exposing himself a little too much than required. What felt like a banger of a soundtrack in Ant-Man (as a separate entity) feels every synonym of ‘routine’ here. Playing Bonnie Tyler’s Holding Out For A Hero as Shazam saves a civilian was the kind of decision I expected more from the soundtrack.

Shazam! Fury of the Gods Movie Review: The Last Word

All said and done, Ant-Man And The Wasp: Quantumania made Marvel look more like DC and Shazam! Fury Of The Gods makes DC look more like Marvel. It’d be fascinating to see the next moves of these superhero films churning production houses while we wait for some of the baseless mid/post-credit scenes (this one has 2).

Three stars!