Poor Captain Marvel, one of the oldest superheroes of all time nearly forgotten if not for DC. At one point Captain Marvel rivaled Superman in terms of popularity. Now he can't even be called Captain Marvel outside of the pages of his comics. Regardless a movie is in the works and in October, Captain Marvel, err Shazam! was transferred from New Line to Warner Bros. Screenwriter John August stated that they were not interested in his action/comedy direction for the character, which to many fans seemed like they were more interested in going a serious route.



Then it looked like that version of the project, which at one time had Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson attached to play Black Adam, looked to be dead. Now Warner Bros. has hired Bill Birch and Geoff Johns to write the new script for Shazam!. Peter Segal who directed films such as Get Smart, The Longest Yard and Naked Gun 33 1/3 is set to direct, and he will produce as well. Supposedly they are going to get deep into the original source material from Fawcett Comics for inspiration.

It seems as if they're still hoping to go for a more comedic approach with the film. I can only imagine that would make the final product a bit like "The Mask" which I'm not certain I love. Although Captain Marvel has always had a bit of a humorous slant, I do love the more serious take the character has had in various comics through the years. I guess we'll see what the "Big Red Cheese" ends up looking like on the silver screen... Assuming of course it ever even makes it there, DC has a nasty habit of wasting money on projects that never happen.

Speaking of Captain Marvel, put me in the camp that would like to see Patrick Warburton as the Shazam man himself! He's got the perfect look and has the comedic ability as well.





The story of Captain Marvel is pretty strange. Fawcett Comics was forced to stop producing the comics after DC cracked down on them basically saying Marvel was a ripoff of Superman. During that time away, Marvel Comics created their own Captain Marvel, who is similar in name only and trademarked the term. Low and behold a few years later DC Comics would get the rights to Captain Marvel from Fawcett Comics and begin printing new Captain Marvel stuff... Only for Marvel Comics to step in and say that they owned the name, forcing all current Captain Marvel stuff to fall under the name of "Shazam!" his battle cry. Now more people know the character as Shazam than Captain Marvel.

Moral of this story? You reap what you sow, but you can't stop Billy Batson!

If you want to see the awesomeness of Captain Marvel, check out this clip from JLU.