Amidst the turmoil of the New 52, one word made sense… SHAZAM!!!
Fans, coming fresh of the Shazam! movie starring Zachary Levi, were quickly excite as writer Geoff Johns and artist Dale Eaglesham followed up the film by quickly announcing the first Shazam! monthly series in years.
And then what?
And then…delay after delay after delay has pushed the seventh issue to September and the eighth won’t arrive until October 8th.
Complicated Continuity of Shazam
Eaglesham was recently at Fan Expo Canada and when asked about the cause of these delays, he had no comment. All he could do was promise the wait will be worth it.
Regardless, the delays in the monthly series has not stopped Billy Batson from appearing as one of the Batman Who Laughs’s “infected” in Batman/Superman #1. Given the ‘World’s Mightiest Mortal’s’ scheduled appearances in one-shots like Black Adam: Year of The Villain and The Infected: King Shazam, Johns needs to resolve these scheduling conflicts.
The seventh issue left things with a cliffhanger, with Billy’s father C.C. Batson returning from the dead to collect Billy, and Mary revealing her dual identity to her foster parents. And this comes right after a wild adventure for the Shazam family exploring the magical realms they are to govern. An adventure that attracted the attention of villains Sivannah, Mr. Mind, and Black Adam in the background. In the case of the latter, he was revealed to have better knowledge on these realms and why they were sealed apart from each other.
Johns and Eaglesham had emphasized the magical aspects of the franchise established by Johns himself in the reboot. This Harry-Potter-Meets-Superhero approach had been successful. The book feels fresh and new again, but the scheduling conflicts risk dwindling interest.
With all these plot holes created by these scheduling conflicts, will Johns and Eaglesham need a magic word of their own to fix this growing mess?
