Shazam! It ain’t happening.
Before the holidays, I promised a post-mortem on Shazam!, the big-screen adaptation of the DC comic I’ve been working on since early 2007. In case you’re not familiar with the character, here’s what I wrote when I first announced the project:
Captain Marvel is a superhero roughly as powerful as Superman, minus the heat-vision and cold breath. What’s unique about the character is that in ordinary life, he’s teenager Billy Batson. Speaking the name of the wizard who gave him his powers (Shazam) calls down a magic thunderbolt, transforming him into the studly superhero. But he’s still a teenager in there.
If this to you sounds, “Like Big, but with superpowers,” then congratulations! You now understand Hollywood.
So that you may further understand Hollywood, let me briefly fill you in on what’s happened in the meantime.
I wrote a draft for New Line. Around the time I turned it in, there was a lot of speculation about whether New Line would continue to remain in business, but there was enough enthusiasm that the mini-studio ran the numbers and considered going into production before a potential actors’ strike. (The WGA strike hadn’t yet happened, but it looked inevitable.) Director Pete Segal was busy on Get Smart, costarring Dwayne Johnson, and rumors began building that The Rock would play Black Adam. A lot of people liked that idea, me included.
I would describe this draft as a comedy with a lot of action. It mostly centers on Billy Batson getting and learning how to use his powers, and discovering what happened to his parents that left him an orphan. One of the appeals of the project is that Billy is a comic book hero who actually reads comic books. Black Adam ultimately becomes the adversary, but he works much like Voldemort in the Harry Potter movies — a dark force to battle at the end, not a constant presence throughout. I wrote the draft I had pitched, and was very happy with how it turned out.
I got notes from New Line and the producers — mostly about set pieces, and keeping Black Adam from becoming too sympathetic — but before I could get started, the WGA went on strike. I couldn’t write, nor did I talk to anyone involved for 100 days.
When the strike was over, Shazam! was suddenly a Warner Bros. movie.1 The new executive at Warners said he agreed with the New Line notes, and told the producers I should go ahead with my rewrite. We weren’t on the official production schedule, but there were discussions about budgets and timelines. We were definitely Pete Segal’s next movie, and many of the stories coming out of the press junkets for Get Smart were about Shazam.
When we turned the new draft in to the studio, we got a reaction that made me wonder if anyone at Warners had actually read previous drafts or the associated notes. The studio felt the movie played too young. They wanted edgier. They wanted Billy to be older. They wanted Black Adam to appear much earlier.
(I pointed out that Black Adam appears on page one, but never got a response.)
I expressed my frustration that I’d wasted months of my time and a considerable amount of the studio’s money on things that should have been discussed at the outset. I asked for a meeting with the executive in charge. He and I had one phone call, then I got a new set of notes that didn’t gibe with what we had discussed. (The written studio notes, I will say, were well-considered. I disagreed with the direction they were taking the movie, but they were thorough and self-consistent.)
In retrospect, I can point to two summer Warner Bros. movies that I believe defined the real issue at hand: Speed Racer and The Dark Knight. The first flopped; the second triumphed. Given only those two examples, one can understand why a studio might wish for their movies to be more like the latter. But to do so ignores the success of Iron Man, which spent most of its running time as a comedic origin story, and the even more pertinent example of WB’s own Harry Potter series. I tried to make this case, to no avail.
I was under contract to deliver one more draft. So I took them at their (written) word and delivered what they said they wanted: a much harder movie, with a lot more Black Adam. This wasn’t “Big, with super powers” anymore. It was Black Adam versus Captain Marvel, with a considerable push into dark territory and liminal badlands like Nanda Parbat. It wasn’t the action-comedy I’d signed on to write, but it was a movie I could envision getting made. The producer and director liked it, and turned it in to the studio while I was in France.
By the time I got back, the project was dead.
By “dead,” I mean that it won’t be happening. I don’t think it’s on the studio’s radar at all. It may come back in another incarnation, with another writer, but I can say with considerable certainty that it won’t be the version I developed.2
Yes, that sucks. And obviously, I can only share my interpretation of what transpired. There were dozens of meetings and phone calls in which I had no participation. As a reader, you should certainly consider the possibility that I wrote shitty scripts they simply didn’t want to make. Because Warners controls copyright on them, I can’t put them in the Library for you to read yourself. So you have to decide whether to take my word on it.
The larger point of this retelling is to help readers understand that at every level in a screenwriter’s career, there are projects that simply don’t happen, mostly for reasons you couldn’t anticipate at the outset. I’ve had good experiences at Warner Bros. (Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, Corpse Bride) and bad experiences (Tarzan, Barbarella). My next movie is at that studio, so while I’m frustrated by the way they handled this project, I have no axe to grind. When they have a movie they want and support, they’re top-notch.
I got paid well to write Shazam, and I get to keep that money. The real cost is an opportunity cost — the other projects I could have written that might be in production now. More than anything, that’s one of the reasons production rewrites are so appealing to established writers: you know those movies are going to get made.
Also softening the blow is that I’m already writing a new project, one I might have had to pass up if Shazam had dragged on any further. The first half of 2009 is going to be very busy. So while I’ll miss Shazam, and the movie it could have been, I won’t feel too bad if this is the last post I ever write about it.
- Warners has a relationship with DC Comics that goes beyond the corporate kinship with New Line, so they apparently could have gotten involved even if New Line had remained separate. ↩
- Keep in mind that press releases often have little relationship to reality. The same week I found out that Shazam! was dead, Variety and several online news outlets ran stories about Pete Segal’s new overall deal with Warners, which highlighted Shazam! as his next project. I got several “Congratulations!” emails. ↩
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January 5th, 2009 at 2:28 pm
the truly sad part is that wb has a goldmine and doesn’t understand it. comics are one-dimensional for them. DARK KNIGHT isn’t successful because it’s dark and edgy… it’s successful because it’s good (hell, great). IRON MAN isn’t edgy, it’s fun.
WANTED on the other hand is just stupid and i have yet to meet anyone over thirteen that likes that movie. granted, it made money so congrats.
and i’d like to come to the defense of SPEED RACER. that movie tanked not because of the movie (seriously, how many people have actually watched it?) but because of a horrible ad campaign. they tried to sell, literally, a liveaction cartoon to teenagers with “from the creators of THE MATRIX.” nobody sold BABE PIG IN THE CITY as “from the director of ROAD WARRIOR and THE WITCHES OF EASTWICK.” SPEED RACER was a kid’s movie and a damn fine one. my fiance and i walked out and both wished we had kids to take to it because had i been ten, it would have been the most fun i’d ever had.
January 5th, 2009 at 3:38 pm
Hey John,
It’s George (of Ixtlan and comicbookresources.com, where we did that interview about you and the Shazam script). It stinks that everything fell apart, especially since I feel that you and Segal had the right take initially.
Personally, I’m worried about the next DC movie – especially in light of an article in the WALL STREET JOURNAL (http://online.wsj.com/article/SB121936107614461929.html?mod=googlenews_wsj) about Warner Bros. films which stated:
“Creatively, (Warner Bros. Pictures Group President Jeff Robinov) sees exploring the evil side to characters as the key to unlocking some of Warner Bros.’ DC properties. ‘We’re going to try to go dark to the extent that the characters allow it,’ he says. That goes for the company’s Superman franchise as well.”
Ugh. While I enjoyed DARK KNIGHT, I’d really like a movie I can take my 6 year old boy to, you know?
Anyhow, best of luck on your next project!
January 5th, 2009 at 3:46 pm
It always confused me that DC published a comic about Captain Marvel.
Thanks for sharing. What was it like to go back and deliver that last draft? Was it hard to leave behind the “Big, but with superpowers” ideas? Could you maintain your enthusiasm for the project?
January 5th, 2009 at 4:20 pm
You should pull a John Rogers and write Shazam! for DC… Though Jeff Smith did just do a retelling that was pretty durn good.
January 5th, 2009 at 5:32 pm
The sad part is that when we’re talking about a comic book adaptation and Warner Bros., it was kinda written in the cards that the movie wouldn’t happen. Back in the olden days when I represented talent, my actor was attached to play Namor which was at Warner Bros. He wasn’t that excited about the project but the movie came at a time when his career was really waning (fast forward 6 years later. It waned). I told him not to even think about it because the movie was definitely not happening. As a comic book geek, we all know the red tape that is Warner Bros.
Too bad DC can’t pull a Marvel and fund their own movies. Anyone notice how when the actual comic book company took over its own movies they all of a sudden got really good?
January 5th, 2009 at 5:48 pm
RATS. I was so totally excited about that. So sorry. And I was hoping they’d do an Isis afterwards. Bummer. Thanks for working on it. Maybe some lackey at Warners will leak the script “accidentally” to the internet? :D Sigh. Incidentally: I met you at the Austin Film Festival and told you about my Sundance script and you were totally right- it didn’t get in. Thanks for saying it was the supernatural element. Whether that was the case or not, it was encouraging to hear that.
January 5th, 2009 at 6:01 pm
So the only hope of hearing SHA-ZAM on the big screen is if they decide to do a theatrical version of Gomer Pile USMC…
January 5th, 2009 at 6:12 pm
When you say that they wanted Billy to be older, should I just assume they wanted Shia LaBeouf?
January 5th, 2009 at 8:19 pm
So when are you going to make your directorial follow-up to the nines?
January 5th, 2009 at 10:45 pm
I think your post highlights a couple traits that Hollywood writers should aspire to: responsiveness and fluidity.
1) You were pragmatic enough to rewrite your script according to the notes, in spite of your initial disagreements with the exec-people. You wanted Spider-Man, they wanted Batman. You sucked it up, gave it your best, and rewrote–the goal, after all, is to get the picture made.
2) When the project got lost somewhere in the Hollywood machine, you chose to forget it (sort of) and move on. There’re more movies to write! Also, you ignored the emotional pratfalls (”Those jerks wouldn’t greenlight my picture!”) and focused on the good stuff (”I got paid!”) that’ll keep you moving forward career-wise.
You’re writing a career textbook for us!
January 5th, 2009 at 10:48 pm
Um… I meant to put “pragmatism” instead of “responsiveness” in that first sentence.
sigh
January 6th, 2009 at 5:10 am
Sorry, John… I guess Warner Bros. hasn’t bothered to read any of the comics published in the last 70 years where the character was mostly handled in a comedic (and a not even remotely dark) way. I personally can’t see Peter directing something that doesn’t have any comedy in it, so I expect that we’ll hear that someone else is directing it if a movie ever gets off the ground. (I’m sure the reaction to the recent The Spirit movie couldn’t help matters.)
January 6th, 2009 at 7:20 am
Hello again John. Hoppy here (remember me from your first SHAZAM update…? “This makes it sound as though you’re giving us a big-screen version of the consistently unpopular “Captain Man-child” version of the character.”). Anyway, I have to say, while I’m delighted to hear that “Big with superpowers” will never be made (I maintain that version would have bombed exactly as all the comic series based on that premise have bombed for decades), I’m very disappointed to hear that your harder edged version is also being passed over… it sounded far more like what I’ve always hoped for in SHAZAM movie.
I mean, Captain Marvel shouldn’t be Dark Knight level dark… but as a character that was absent form the silver age of comic books Cap was never given the chance to mature from his kiddish origins (a chance almost every other major golden age character got). DC, for some reason, seems intent on not letting Cap mature in the comics… it would have been nice to see a movie that would have helped Cap catch up to the Batmans and the Supermans all the others who grew up a little during the silver age.
Sorry your project is totally dead and thanks so much for keeping us informed.
January 6th, 2009 at 7:43 am
Kevin, weren’t movies like Spidey 2 and Xmen 2 funded by the studios? I’d say those were pretty darn good. And marvel funded the second attempt at the Hulk, which wasn’t particularly well received.
While I like the idea of Marvel funding and making decisions, it still seems way to early to declare that the result is consistently better movies.
January 6th, 2009 at 8:09 am
Hey John,
That really sucks about Shazam I think WB is making a big mistake as usual. Please post your script (not the rewritten ones) in the Library I would love to read it!
January 6th, 2009 at 8:49 am
Mike:
While the Hulk, didn’t do the numbers that it could have, it was well received and fans loved it (including the cameo by Robert Downey Jr. which would’ve been impossible if the movie wasn’t funded by Marvel–competing studios). And the Marvel summer of 2011 would also be impossible.
And while X-Men 2 and Spiderman 2 (and the first one!!) were great, there’s just no way in the world Marvel would’ve allowed that terrible, terrible story that was Spiderman 3 (Haha, that sounded incredibly naive). So that last statement wasn’t exactly fact…but that’s what I believe!!
January 6th, 2009 at 9:08 am
Sorry about how it went down, but I’m glad you don’t sound bitter or angry and are, in fact, looking forward to new projects this year. Can’t wait to hear how THOSE go! :)
January 6th, 2009 at 9:09 am
Two things to point out here:
Let’s face it: even with the greatest talents in the world, Shazam never could have risen to the commercial and artistic zeniths reached by Kazaam. The bar was simply set too high.
In five or so years, when the studios have screwed up enough superhero movies to decide that audiences don’t want to see them anymore, perhaps you’ll be able to swoop in and write and direct your own take on this film with about a $20 million budget and low interference.
January 6th, 2009 at 10:57 am
I think you can still jump on board again, perhaps if you persuade them to give you another chance at it and make it dark like the dark knight. These day’s no one watches cartoon like stuff as speed racer.
It will do the comic book’s justice if you make Shazam serious and watchable to adult’s and not only children.
How can i read the script you wrote since it is “dead” as you say.
Your sincerely Michael.
January 6th, 2009 at 11:59 am
Incredibly depressing.
January 6th, 2009 at 12:11 pm
Sorry to hear this, but it sounds like you’ve got a good grip on the reality of moving on from what is otherwise a much transformed and rather unfocused project, so instead of troublesome you’ve taken it as experience.
And let me agree with James Ford re: SPEED RACER. I don’t have kids, but I certainly felt like one while watching it. It was quite possibly the most fun I had at a cinema all year; no other movie displayed even a fraction of filmmaking joy that SPEED RACER did, and it rekindled my faith in The Wachowksis after the lackluster Matrix sequels.
January 6th, 2009 at 12:13 pm
Typo alert: Wachowskis.
January 6th, 2009 at 12:44 pm
Hey cool website, John. I’m very sorry that happened with your project. WB needs to get their act together and release their projects right. Close to the source material, and without all the “DARK AND EDGY” nonsense. Hopefully Green Lantern is able to come out soon.
January 6th, 2009 at 1:24 pm
@JamesFord: I am a 30something and I thoroughly enjoyed Wanted…so there.
John- Sorry to hear about the wasted creative juices…question- do you think writing this gives you a better chance of being on the short list for other hero flics (especially DC)?
January 6th, 2009 at 1:42 pm
What a shame. If Warner is pinning future efforts on “darker” characters, that means we probably won’t get to see Jim Carrey don the Plasticman goggles. Unless of course Seth Rogen’s Green Hornet makes bundles of loot. In which case they’ll do an about face and begin combing the DC archives for comedic superhero properties. I think there’s potential there, as witnessed by Hancock (and Iron Man to a certain degree) but it requires a very skilled writer to pull it off. Wish we could peep the script. Cheers John. Thanks for sharing.
January 6th, 2009 at 1:47 pm
Will any of your drafts ever be posted or is that some Warners legal stuff you’d rather not fuddle with? I think this movie should be performance capture anyway. It’s a medium that’s being wasted on making stuff that we could’ve just shot with real actors.
January 6th, 2009 at 1:48 pm
Dear John: I’m really sorry about the end of this proyect.I love Captain Marvel and I want to see him in the big screen. I really don’t understand why Dc wants a “dark” character if Captain Marvel (and Superman) are kind and big boy scouts. Billy is a young boy (a child) and his imagination is so pure that a teenager or a young man: that’s the explanation about why a child comes in to a powerful man: He has a kindly soul. I hope the things change and we have your wonderful script back to Warner and make this movie. Regards from Mexico.
January 6th, 2009 at 2:02 pm
Sorry to hear this.
…and I didn’t hate Speed Racer – just thought it needed about 25-35 minutes cut out…
January 6th, 2009 at 2:17 pm
John,
Sorry to hear that the Shazam! movie is dead in the water now.
I don’t know if you can answer generic questions about the script without WB being upset, but, out of curiosity, would Sivana also have appeared in the story alongside Black Adam?
January 6th, 2009 at 3:03 pm
Hmm. One should remind WB that the reason they had such a successful reboot with Batman is because they had to reboot it after completely screwing it up in the 90’s. I seem to remember them almost handing it back to Tim Burton before scrapping it, starting over later.
Sounds like they aren’t taking the character seriously at all, they just care about the end result of the box office take of a single movie, that dictating their future character decisions. Sounds like they just want to duplicate “The Dark Knight”, discounting the fact that is simply one of a kind. DC unfortunately has an incestuous relationship, it seems with WB, Marvel Studios can take bids and listen to other ideas. WB should also take a look at Sam Raimi getting another shot at Spider – Man, despite nearly making another “Batman & Robin” – style crapfest. However, that will continue in its current direction, and it is worth a billion. From what I see in all of Marvel’s upcoming productions, more filmmakers that are fit to do the project itself (Johnston on Captain America, Branagh on Thor), whereas WB is going to act as Supreme Dictators, and only get people that suit their greed. I realize this is a business, but their refusal to take chances will lead to their own superhero franchise’s demise. This is the kind of crap I would expect from Fox, but I thought, honestly, WB was going to shape up. Ah, well. Hopefully Nolan returns…
January 6th, 2009 at 3:34 pm
Dude… this is myopic reactiveness at its worst!
Dark Knight made money- let’s make a lot of Superhero Movies and make em all dark!
There were 5 successful Superhero movies this summer: Iron Man, Hulk, Wanted, Hellboy 2, and Dark Knight. They are all very different in tone and source. AND THATS WHY THEY WORKED WB! Because they had different tones. They were not all the same! And there was money all around for 5 “comic book movies” to be successful in a single summer. And because the people at the helm of those projects GOT the tone, And were TRUE to the tone, they invented or sustained unique, and viable franchises. The short-sighted, gut reaction to immediate returns on a perceived cultural trend is what will inhibit your careers. You do not, see the big picture, and you will suffer financially.
John, I have no doubts that you and Pete would have made the definitive Shazam film.
January 6th, 2009 at 4:36 pm
Hi John,
Sorry to hear about SHAZAM. I was really looking forward to it. BUT, you might have dodged a different bullet. Some of the producers you were scheduled to work with are not people I would ever work with again. I made the mistake of investing my life savings in a film of theirs, and even though I know many films do not make their money back, these ‘producers’ “lost the books and accounting paperwork” and have changed their numbers and addresses. Best not to be in business with people like this anyway. Lesson learned.
January 6th, 2009 at 4:38 pm
Things work in Cycles – as soon as the last HARRY POTTER film comes out Warner’s will be looking for something similar…
SHAZAM! fits the bill :)
January 6th, 2009 at 6:38 pm
Given what Jeff Robinov said to the Wall Street Journal, the road that SHAZAM! took can’t come as a surprise, neither can the turn that finds it in a dead end. SHAZAM! is for kids, an empowerment fantasy that’s as transparent can be, with absolutely no pretense. SHAZAM! is pure fantasy and as lighthearted as superheroes get. Trying to make a post modern Captain Marvel movie is antithetical. Maybe if you’ve never read one than you can be excused to think that all comic books are simple and their heroes interchangable. The real world has no place in the story of a boy named ‘Billy Batson’, who gets spirited away by an unseen wizard who gives him the power to turn into a flying He-Man whenever he says “Shazam!”. It sounds like deciding not to make the movie after all is the best thing for everyone.
January 6th, 2009 at 6:46 pm
I do not understand the obsession Hollywood has specifically Warner has with making every property they own “dark” that is based off of a comic book. I keep hearing Dark Knight as a example for the reasoning. Films like Twilight and Sex in the City make huge profits for studios and yet the studio heads continue to chase the 18-34 male demo. Are they attempting to pursue films that will make them money? Is it about money for them or executives justifying their jobs and existence by getting by things they think they understand and shy away from people that are confident in what they do. You can’t slap the Dark Knight label on everything. Superman is identifiable as Mickey Mouse and the American flag yet Warner greenlit a feature that portrayed the title character as morose and basically an ex girlfriend stalker. How do you make a Superman movie PG-13? Why?
Captain Marvel has been one of my all time favorite characters. The idea of having fun with it sounded great. The title Billy Batson and the Power of Shazam had me there opening weekend. Future incarnations of classic DC characters don’t need to be dark. Ask Paul Dini or Bruce Timm the level of sucess and imprint you can have on the medium by sticking to the source material.
Truly a sad thing to read that such men and women in power are in control of such beloved characters.
January 6th, 2009 at 10:35 pm
I’m very saddened, disappointed, and a little angry that Shazam will not likely be made at this point. Warner Bros has their bottom line to obsess about. Sam Raimi proved that a series of movies about a superhero could be made that were extremely good and well received. Warner Bros. only has “Dark Knight” on their mind, and wants superhero movies made in that image apparently. Capt. Marvel is my favorite character, and now we won’t see what John August and Peter Segal were able to do with such an iconic character.
January 7th, 2009 at 2:30 am
I’ll be honest with you, sir. When I read your description of where you seemed to want to take this movie, I went “Ugh, not more kiddie fare.” Even kiddies don’t like kiddie fare these days. If I’d been involved in any way, I definitely would have wanted the project to be darker and edgier.
You should consult the Alan Moore project Miracleman, which deals with a superhero who is virtually identical to Captain Marvel, right down to the kid/adult and calling-out-for-the-transformation business. Moore’s work will show you just how much depth you can give a project like this, without sacrificing action, etc.
Based on what I’ve read here, the studio was right to take it out of your hands, if you were going to go into the juvenile direction.
January 7th, 2009 at 3:06 am
From what I recall Batman was not exactly a boy scout. In fact, Bob Kane’s character was a vengeance seeking loner who prowled the shadows and even used a gun to mete out justice. Warner is just turning back the clock to pre-1950s and the Adam West days. I never had a great love for Shazam/Captain Marvel. Perhaps this is due to the 1940s serial and the 1970s TV Series. By the way, although the wizard used the name Shazam he told Billy it was really an acronym for Solomon, Hercules, Atlas, Zeus, Achilles and Mercury – a very important part of the story as Billy gets his powers from those characters.
January 7th, 2009 at 5:05 am
That’s really lame how WB made you change your vision for this project,but I guess that’s just show biz,I greatly admire screenwriters and hope to be one myself someday,so keep plugging away John!
January 7th, 2009 at 6:58 am
Sorry to hear about how the original draft got scrapped. I just finished reading an article about how a lot of classic movies almost never got made because of studios trying to change everything. If they keep pushing to appease the demographics, we’ll never get any more classic movies, and I would’ve preferred an action-comedy to a dark Shazam.
January 7th, 2009 at 7:48 am
Sorry to hear about it. If it makes you feel any better, their next “dark and edgy” superhero film will probably fail in spectacular fashion, since every tonal copycat tends to bomb (Titanic and Pearl Harbor, Lord of the Rings and Narnia, etc.). Execs just assume that this whole creative process is some formula you can apply to any property…lather, rinse repeat.
As a fledgling writer, I’m happy you at least got paid for your work, even if it won’t come to fruition. Captain Marvel is certainly one of the harder properties to adapt into the contemporary mainstream, though you were definitely on the money in playing the teenage angle. Frankly, I felt the Raimi team made a gross misstep in denying the Spider-Man franchise the teenage angle that initially made the character such a huge success in comics. I mean, it’s the teenage male contingent that admire such properties, and your idea involving playing off Cap’s teenage roots would have done a fine job in tapping into that demographic. Alas, we can look forward instead to more copycat “dark heroes” that will undoubtedly fail. No, this is not sour grapes; rather, it is more faith in the Dark Knight’s success benefiting greatly from a perfect storm of circumstances, hype, and general talent. If this sort of success were easy to replicate on a consistent basis, we’d still be knee deep Titanic rip-offs.
So kudos for trying to do something inherently faithful to the core material, and apologies for the rant. Glad to know the studios are still supporting you, as bothersome as they can be sometimes.
January 7th, 2009 at 8:04 am
Brandon Finch:
Warner Bros. greenlit a script that made Superman a deadbeat dad and then towards the end, Lex Luthor literally shanks Superman in the back with a piece of kryptonite.
Um…
January 7th, 2009 at 8:44 am
Apparently the studio forgot that the lighter side of comics, even kid oriented comics can be wildly successful. Maybe if they sat down and watched The Incredibles again.
Sorry to hear about Shazam. While I was not a huge fan, I was excited by the casting of Dwayne Johnson as Black Adam. It was an excellent choice and that alone gave me hopes the film might be good.
January 7th, 2009 at 8:57 am
I like his idea of making Shazam more of a comedy and lighthearted than the other superheroe movies that have come out. But I would NOT make it a live action movie though, I would do it animated in the same style as The Incredibles. Hell, I’d try to get Brad Bird to direct it if possible. It would be awesome and fun and a monster hit! Trust me, it would make a lot more money in that style than if it was live action. The only kink, or the major kink in the idea is that there are only two studios right now that really have the potential, know how, and skill to produce that kind of movie, Pixar and Dreamworks Animation and neither of them have the rights to it.
January 7th, 2009 at 9:02 am
rock please come back 2 wwe never mind doing movies
January 7th, 2009 at 9:27 am
Dang it! I was seriously looking forward to this film…..
January 7th, 2009 at 10:10 am
For Shazam to play well I believe the movie should be a 1940’s period piece. I’ve felt for a long time that Captain Marvel doesn’t translate well to modern audiences, not because of his “golly-gee shucks” persona, but because he’s a character of another time, much like Captain America, of which the movie is to be set during WW2. These heroes may lack a modern sense of cynicism and irony, but that doesn’t mean they can’t be very dark. Harry Potter set in modern day Boston is a bad movie. It’s all about the setting. Get the tone right, mix with great story, and you’ve got a killer movie. The Rocketeer is the perfect example. Brilliant movie, fun, exciting story. The Rocketeer in 2009? That would never work. I feel the same thing applies to Captain Marvel. He needs to be in his world, not ours. “Golly-gee shucks” can also be dark, exciting, and even at times frightening. I hope this movie gets made and made well.
January 7th, 2009 at 11:45 am
John,
Thank you for this post.
I recently had a script optioned by a producer who was very excited about the project. I started rewriting the script based on his notes. Since this was my first option I enjoyed the experience and did quite well. Suddenly, things stalled and the producer and his partner cooled on my script because they no longer felt that it had any heat and due to circumstances that were beyond my control.
So, I was left with an expired option, no cash (I went into debt since I was unemployed), and a half-rewritten script. However, I had a blast. Hopefully next time I’ll see a check for my efforts.
It means a lot to me to read how a pro like yourself deals with projects that fall apart.
Thanks again for your time and this website.
January 7th, 2009 at 12:57 pm
I’m closing comments a bit early so it doesn’t become a Warners-bashing pulpit.
I don’t think there will be any new developments with my incarnation of Shazam!, but if there are, I’ll let readers know when I can.