When it was released in 2019, "Shazam" was a pleasant surprise. This superhero had never been on the big screen. He was one that general movie-going audiences didn't know much about, so it was not a guarantee that this movie would be good or make a lot of money. It did both and injected some much-needed fun into the DCEU.

"Shazam: Fury of the Gods" continues the story of Bill Batson (Asher Angel) and his superhero alter-ego Shazam (Zachary Levi).

I am not sure if you noticed, but I rarely write about a movie I didn't like. The truth is, why would you want to read a negative review? It's not as fun to write a review when I don't like a movie. All that being said, I did not like this movie. I thought the villains were boring and checked out whenever they were on the screen. The first movie had a lot of heart in the form of Billy looking for and finding the mother that abandoned him at a fair when he was young. This one could have built on that, but instead, Billy is given so little to do, and he is in his Shazam form for 90 percent of the movie. The movie leans on Shazam's comedy side, and the drama and emotional storytelling is sorely missed.

One of the biggest problems with this movie has nothing to do with what is on screen. Warner Brothers, who release the DC movies, recently had a lot of shakeups within the company. Most notably, James Gunn and Peter Saftin have taken over the DC movie wing of the company. They are starting fresh, and everything not under their creative umbrella is not considered an Elseworlds story. This is the first movie to come out after this shakeup, leaving it in a weird spot. It's probably not going to figure into the new DCEU (DC Extended Universe), so that begs the question: does anything in the movie matter?

Who knows? With a movie this boring and devoid of fun, I don't even care.

4/10

Rated PG-13 for sequences of action and violence and language

2hrs. 10mins.