The marketing push for “Shazam! Fury of the Gods” has been an odd one, no doubt. The questions about the film’s future amid the soft reboot from new DC Studios co-CEOs, James Gunn and Peter Safran, dominated the discourse. The only thing people seemed to care about is whether or not a “Shazam 3” was in the cards. The answer from filmmaker David F. Sandberg was different forms of “I don’t know” followed by the idea that if people don’t support the sequel, there’s zero chance a third will get made. Well, the two post-credits scenes in ‘Fury of the Gods’ sure do set up plenty of threequel speculation, even as the box office results seem to put the final nail in the coffin.
But before we get to the box office, let’s talk about the two post-credits scenes. The first one, coming mid-credits, as they do in superhero movies nowadays, focuses on Emilia Harcourt and John Economos, played by Jennifer Holland and Steve Agee, respectively, recruiting Shazam for the Justice Society. This is an odd choice, considering those two characters are best known for their work in “Peacemaker” and not necessarily the folks you might assume would be recruiting for a superteam. Alas, that’s what is given, and according to Sandberg’s recent interview with THR, they weren’t the first choices to show up.
“There were supposed to be characters from [‘Black Adam’s’] Justice Society, but that fell apart three days before we were going to roll cameras,” Sandberg said. “So, Peter Safran, who produced this movie and ‘Peacemaker,’ made some calls, and thankfully, Jen Holland and Steve Agee were able to come by on very short notice.”
It obviously would have been much more interesting to see members of the Justice Society show up to recruit Shazam, but oh well.
The next scene is a continuation of the scene that was at the very end of the first “Shazam” film. This shows Dr. Sivana and Mister Mind, once again, planning some sort of next move. Since this team-up was teased at the end of the first film, many believed those two would be the villains again for ‘Fury of the Gods.’ But that isn’t what Sandberg & Co. wanted to do. And the filmmaker did explain why these villains were put on the bench for the sequel.
“At first, we thought we’d continue Mister Mind and Sivana, so they would be the ones bringing the gods to this world, since Mister Mind has this big plan,” Sandberg said to DC.com. “But that wound up just being too much story to tell. Even without Mind and Sivana, the movie is still, like, two hours and ten minutes long so we had [to make some choices].”
Both of these scenes do seem to set up future adventures with Shazam. However, given the film opened to a dismal $30.5 million domestically, the idea of another film seems completely out of the question. Gunn has already said that Shazam doesn’t figure into the plans for the new DCU, and considering ‘Fury of the Gods’ is likely going to lose money for WB theatrically, it would be silly to assume that the studio will be pushing for another “Shazam” film anytime soon.
Of course, Zachary Levi could show up as Shazam in a future project and fans would be excited. The character is well-liked. So, as part of an ensemble, it would make sense and might work well. But, as of now, it’s hard to imagine either of the post-credits teases paying off in any meaningful way.
