Shazam! Fury of the Gods
If you’re expecting more of the same from Shazam 2, you’re not going to be disappointed.
★★★1/2
Directed by David F. Sandberg
Written by Henry Gayden, Chris Morgan and Bill Parker
Events from the first Shazam movie caused the barrier between two worlds to crumble, and the Daughters of Atlas, goddesses Hespera (Helen Mirren) and Kalypso (Lucy Liu) traverse to the world of Men to exact vengeance on the race that imprisoned them. Standing in their way are Billy Batson (Asher Angel/ Zachary Levi), Freddy Freeman (Jack Dylan Grazer/ Adam Brody) and the Shazam family.
Here we have yet another one of those with the same stupid plot about otherworldly villains who want to destroy the world through yet another one of those conveniently available magical artifacts. Their finale would always be set in a city on the verge of destruction, with the heroes saving it just in the nick of time. If you’re expecting more of the same from Shazam 2, you’re not going to be disappointed.
I was not a huge fan of the first, even though I liked some things about it, so expectations were low going into the sequel. I thought the characters in the first film were interesting, especially Freddy and some of the dramatic moments were really strong, like when Batson reunites with his mother. There are some good albeit brief familial drama here, but the actors sold it really well. I also enjoyed the humour, with quite a number of pop culture-related ones, as well as some self-referential stuff. I appreciated all of that since I found the superhero stuff to be very rote.
It’s also weird that there seems to be two protagonists given almost equal importance, but I felt that Freddy’s character was way more compelling that Batson’s to the point of overshadowing the main star. This time round, Freddy’s pining for new girl in school Annie (Rachel Zegler of West Side Story fame). Although Zegler’s character didn’t have much depth, but Zegler and Grazer had such great chemistry together that I was rooting for them despite how predictable their teen romance got. Batson’s character got really underserved here with yet another routine discover-the-hero-in-you arc that was repetitive, unfocused, and not very interesting.
I was also quite surprised by the action in this one, which looked very well planned and polished, and much larger in scale. I will admit it was a lot of fun watching the six caped superheroes going about saving people. The VFX looked really good. Normally, you could see the transition from a live-action shot to a rubbery CG double, but I think the tech has gotten so impeccable that I can’t really tell anymore. The VFX shots of citywide destruction looked solid, and there were a lot of them. This is an expensive looking show.
It was fun to see Helen Mirren and Lucy Liu play baddies in a comic book flick. Mirren came off a bit better as she was the only one who got the funnier moments, but I thought they both played it a bit too straight. Would have loved to see them ham it up instead as that would have better suited the lighthearted tone of the movie.
Usually, I would have ended the review here by saying that this is an enjoyable but imperfect movie, go watch it and all that, but there’s more. The movie has one unexpected cameo (at least for me; I heard they revealed it in recent trailers - I don’t watch trailers), and two end credits scenes that was surprisingly puzzling to me, since James Gunn announced earlier in February that he was going to set a new trajectory for DC, and that the Snyderverse is no more. I get that they’re putting out the last few Snyderverse films that were already in production or completed before the upheaval, but since you’re not continuing with the Snyderverse, why still leave these scenes in, especially when you could have easily excised them with no impact to the film? There’s even one end credits scene that connects the film directly to one of Gunn’s own DC projects. Does that mean some remnants of the Snyderverse would remain while others are jettisoned? Why even tease these stuff if you’re not going to do anything with them anyway? It’d be real funny to see the WB suits scramble to do an about-turn if Shazam 2 unexpectedly makes massive B.O. money. (It flopped. - Wei from the future.)
The Batman (2022)
A huge lesson I learned from my theatrical experience of The Batman is not to watch a movie when you’re tired. I came out of the show not too enamoured by the film, even though I did acknowledge that it had many good scenes and performances. Somehow, they didn’t coalesce into a good movie in my fatigued eyes. Many weeks later, I managed to re-watch it on a 4K Blu-Ray, and I finally realized I couldn’t be more wrong.
★★★★★
Mild spoilers
A huge lesson I learned from my theatrical experience of “The Batman” is not to watch a movie when you’re tired. I came out of the show not too enamored by the film, even though I did acknowledge that it had many good scenes and performances. Somehow, they didn’t coalesce into a good movie in my fatigued eyes. Many weeks later, I managed to re-watch it on a 4K Blu-Ray, and I finally realized I couldn’t be more wrong. It went from “meh” to one of my top films of the year!
As a reboot of the Batman film franchise, “The Batman” had to do something to differentiate itself from past reiterations. Roughly there had been four: goofy (West), Burtonesque, campy (Schumacher), and realistic (Nolan). They decided to give what fans have been clamoring for all these years and made this one a detective story. More precisely, a horror-tinged, serial killer detective story. It references Seven a lot; from the glisteningly grimy, rotting aesthetics of its rain-soaked world, to its crime-fighting pairing of an angsty white young man and a cool-headed older black detective with a divine voice. Said older detective even has a scene where he reads a disturbing passage from a serial killer’s journal. There’s even a scene with a head in a box. The pair are in pursuit of a serial killer known only as The Riddler, who leaves cryptic clues in each crime scene that allude to a grander purpose. Yep, it’s practically a remake of Seven!
The cast ranges from interesting to great. Colin Farrell’s Penguin was the biggest worry for me because he had to perform under a lot of latex and fat suit, but he turned out the best, most charismatic performance in the entire movie, and is easily the best onscreen Penguin by far. Zoë Kravitz had the enormous pressure of several preceding iconic Catwoman performances, but she successfully made the role her own. I also liked Jeffrey Wright’s pre-Commish Lieutenant Gordon reacting to everything like a blue-collar cop would. I didn’t think Andy Serkis’ Alfred worked on first viewing, but on subsequent re-watches I finally appreciated his nuanced take, which felt jarring because I got too used to the larger-than-life roles he usually does. And then we have Robert Pattinson. I thought his Batman/Bruce Wayne worked and I kind of liked it. Amusingly, no one seemed to notice that he was still doing his Edward Sullen man-of-few-slow-spoken-words thing. He was almost as pale-looking, and there’s even a moment where he cringes away from sunlight. Batman as an almost literal vampire is actually rather clever, but forgive me if this was already done a hundred times in the comic books. I thought John Turturro’s Carmine Falcone was an unusual casting choice but he was effectively creepy. Peter Sarsgaard was great but he has a pretty small role. Paul Dano as The Riddler was reliably great to a point, but I’ll get back to this later.
Great direction and creative choices from Matt Reeves, who I shouldn’t have doubted after really liking his Cloverfield and the “of the Apes” films. I think he only managed an ok mystery-detective story here, but as serial killer thrillers go, it’s pretty good. His visual sense? Even better! Handling of the actor’s performances? Exquisite. I was shocked at how short his filmography was when I Googled for all of his films. Hope he gets a lot more work moving forward.
My apologies to Michael Giacchino too, whom I once chastised in the comments sections for ripping off Star Wars’ The Imperial March for Batman’s theme (which funnily the IMDb trivia section for The Batman actually acknowledges) but there were other wonderful themes throughout the film too. The wailing violins gave them a pretty obvious horror vibe. They also reminded me of the brilliant Bram Stoker’s Dracula score by Wojciech Kilar. My favorite is definitely Catwoman’s theme, which first appears in the “Don’t be Voyeur With Me” track.
Now, the quibbles. Let’s come back to Dano, who always puts out fine work, until he went a little too Jim Carrey. I know the character has been telegraphed very early on as an unabashed exhibitionist, but what he did in one pivotal scene was borderline comical, and he was supposed to be frightening. Another one: “savior” Batman is a nice idea, because he certainly needed to do more than just beat up criminals, but the Gotham Reeves and his team created was so utterly nihilistic that this optimistic development in Batman’s character felt a little out of place. Lastly, I need to mention that special cameo at the end. Though tastefully done, it still reeked of interference by studio heads too eager to mimic Marvel’s M.O. of planting sequel baits, which wasn’t needed here at all. Why make a superhero movie entirely in your own style, then throw in stuff to remind your audiences about your biggest competitor?
Overall, for one of the most oft-rebooted superhero franchises, I’m glad to say that they managed to pull it off yet again. It’s a visual feast with great performances that I have been enjoyably re-watching with no signs of fatigue yet. For that, I think it’s only right that I give it a 5-star rating, even though it’s not a perfect film. I acknowledge that I was incorrect with my negative assessments in past comments, but one that I’m more than happy to be very wrong about.