Some thoughts about Shazam #1

What's happening to the world of Shazam?

Billy Batson is trying to handle the responsibility of being the Earth's Mightiest Mortal and it all seems to be fine despite of not having the help of his family anymore. However, magic is working differently now and it will turn out to be more problematic than ever.

Yeah, Shazam hasn't been the best since Geoff Johns left has it?

We had to endure the terrible Teen Titans Academy spinoff miniseries that Tim Sheridan created where he handled serious matters very poorly and the not so bad but still lacking New Champion of Shazam miniseries by Josie Campbell. It seemed like DC didn't really know what to with the franchise since they kept changing directions without a clear plan in mind which was baffling since they already had the franchise working on films (despite that the last movie wasn't as successful).

Fortunately, DC seems to have the right idea now by giving the title to Mark Waid who has gotten good acclaim in titles like World's Finest... and not so much acclaim in stuff like Batman Vs. Robin or Lazarus Planet so Waid can be a bit of a hit and miss. That being said, Waid has a history of taking classic superhero ideas and giving them an interesting twist and based on this chapter alone, he's apparently implementing that technique pretty well.

You can tell that right away when Billy is helping a group of space dinosaurs find their son, is just pure and classic comic fun which also connects to the old Captain Marvel themes and speaking of which, Waid finds a way to include the "Captain" name into the story to pay respect to the past, is not the most clever way to use it mind you but it gets the job done. What follows is just showing the typical Billy Batson/Shazam status quo in which the boy tries to balance his normal life with being a superhero.

Now where is the "new"? Well, Waid introduces a reason why Billy would want to go back to be Billy that involves the Wisdom of Solomon's powers and is simple and makes sense. I have a few problems about Billy being so clumsy in real life considering that Johns' version showed him more physically capable due to being an orphan (like throwing a few punches to protect his family) but I guess it works to create that conflict in the duality of the protagonist. Also, what happens at the end with the Captain reacting in not so classic way reminds me a lot of what Johns tried to do at the beginning of his work with Billy and we will see what Waid is planning with it in the future.

Dan Mora handles the art and again, he was a fitting choice for the series since he's inspired by the very beginning of Captain Marvel by making the hero look like his early appearances in many scenes and follows the story very clearly with a lot of polish.

Solid beginning. Hopefully the rest of the series will follow suit.