James Gunn, alongside producing partner and co-CEO of DC Studios Peter Safran, is now the man with the plan over at Marvel’s greatest rival. The Guardians of the Galaxy director has his fingers in all the pies, officially beginning with DCU Chapter One: Gods and Monsters, which kicks off in 2025 with Superman: Legacy. However, we know he’ll have a hand in anything else that DC releases in the run-up to that time. Except, it seems, Shazam! Fury of the Gods, which has managed to escape Gunn-free.
Director David F. Sandberg assured fans during a recent eye-opening Reddit chat that his incoming Shazam! sequel was not impacted in any way by the Gunn/Safran takeover. The filmmaker revealed that the movie has been completed and in the can since before the pair stepped into their new all-powerful roles last fall, and neither of them have tampered with it or ordered changes to be made in the time since.
After Marvel’s Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania had its ending changed just weeks prior to its release (and definitely not for the better) it’s definitely encouraging to hear that Shazam! 2 is not the work of a similarly frantic production process and is 100 percent the story Sandberg intended to tell. On the other, those eager to witness the start of Gunn’s dominion over DC might be disappointed to know they will have to wait a little bit longer, probably until this summer’s The Flash.
Shazam! Fury of the Gods is out in theaters this March 17.