Zachary Levi Responds to Criticisms About His Performance in SHAZAM 2 by Explaining His Choices

Zachary Levi's overly silly performance as Shazam in DC’s Shazam! Fury of the Gods was widely criticized by critics and fans. The actor has now addressed those criticisms and made an attempt to explain his creative choices.

When I watched the movies, I understood what Levi was trying to do as he was an adult trying to play a teenager in different stages of a teenager’s life. The problem was his energy wasn’t consistent with the energy of the young actor Asher Angel. In fact, when Shazam was in his teenage form, there was more of a maturity to him than when he was Shazam. It was weird.

Levi is now explaining what he was trying to go for when playing this character. Specifically with how he played the character in the sequel, Shazam! Fury of the Gods, which was a box office bomb. During an interview with Screen Rant the actor said:

"From the first movie to the second, I tried to age him as Billy ages, you know, in his actual younger teen form. Inside, he’s aging too.Obviously, in the first film, he was like 15, and in the second he’s 17ish, almost 18. So I tried to address that and bring that into the character, which ironically, in some ways, kind of made him feel almost a little more immature.

"But that’s because when he’s 15, he’s not trying to be cool guy, when he’s 17, he’s trying to be cool guy, he’s trying to be the leader, and he’s trying to kind of put on that bravado more."

On top of that, I always felt that Warner Bros. cast an actor who was too old to play the young version of Billy Baston, and by the time the sequel was released the actor was much older-looking. It didn’t quite work. Regardless of all this, Levi still wants to play Shazam again in a third film, and he said:

"I think with the third iteration, obviously, he'd be a little bit older than that, and so kind of incorporating whatever that extra bit of growth and maturation and wisdom would be and, hopefully, just go on some really cool adventures with some other cool DC characters.

"Nathan Fillion and I have been buddies for a really long time, and I think a Green Lantern/Shazam buddy-comedy would be so much fun. So, I don't know, something like that."

Yeah, while that might be fun, after Shazam! Fury of the Gods crashed and burned at the box office, I seriously doubt that we’ll ever see Levi as Shazam again. What do you think?