These days, leaks will happen. Marvel Studios and Warner Bros. both know this, and as a result, actors are often hustled to-and-from set while wearing black robes over their costumes, and sometimes even over their heads if their very presence in a project would enter spoiler territory. Well, David Sandberg — director of Shazam!, #7 in our list of Best Comic Book Movies Of The 2010s — has decided to dispense with this stressor while filming the sequel, Shazam! Fury of the Gods. After revealing a slight tease of Zachary Levi’s upgraded costume as the title hero, Sandberg went and dropped the whole shebang, along with costumes for the rest of Billy Batson’s foster family.
“Don’t know how long we can keep the new suits from leaking,” Sandberg wrote on Twitter. “[S]o here’s a pic I took the other day.”
Don’t know how long we can keep the new suits from leaking so here’s a pic I took the other day pic.twitter.com/41wStJ6oe2
— David F. Sandberg (@ponysmasher) June 21, 2021
That’s one way (and certainly the most effective way) to get ahead of the leak machine, and interestingly enough, Sandberg’s doing this almost two full years before the sequel’s 2023 release date. Levi is obviously returning as Billy Batson, and the rest of his foster family are now adult versions of their still-teenage characters. Adam Brody picks up the grown-up-bod of Freddy Freeman, Grace Fulton is Mary Bromfield, Ross Butler is Eugene Choi, Meagan Good is Darla Dudley, D.J. Cotrona is Pedro Peña.
Viewers will note that Grace is now playing both versions of Mary, whereas Michelle Borth previously portrayed the adult version of the character. As Sandberg explained on Twitter, “Yes, Grace now plays both parts. But her hair and makeup is slightly different when she’s super so nobody will ever recognize her. Hey, it works for Wonder Woman!”
If one looks back at the old adult costumes that appeared in the first film, there are definite upgrades here. The chest plate shapes have changed, and a couple of the male characters now bear darker colors. Also, Darla’s costume is decidedly more revealing for the sequel, which is not surprising, but thank goodness this doesn’t veer into “Harley Quinn in David Ayer’s Suicide Squad” territory.
The gang looks ready to (eventually) start battling Black Adam, whenever that happens. The Rock, of course, is filming his long-gestating swing of that character in the Shazam! spinoff movie, Black Adam, although all signs point to zero interfacing so far in both that movie and Shazam! Fury of the Gods. “He has his own movie,” Sandberg previously clarified (via Comic Book) regarding questions of The Rock dancing between franchise installments in the near future. However, we should probably expect a larger reveal of The Rock’s full anti-hero costume soon, after some slight teasing.
Shazam! Fury of the Gods will arrive on June 2, 2023. Black Adam is due out first on July 29, 2022.