Shazam!‘s second season is just seven episodes long, and I fully intended on covering the entire season today. But, as we’ll discuss in a little bit, the final episode sets up something that seems like it deserves a little more time, so we’ll tackle that next time.
Plus, there is more than enough to discuss in these first six episodes. Let’s dig in.
So, the most obvious place to start is that, in four of these six episodes, we have a new Captain Marvel. Jackson Bostwick, who played Cap for the first season, didn’t show on set one day, and was abruptly fired by the producers. It turns out that he wasn’t holding out for more money, as the producers claimed, but was rather getting medical help because a stunt was not set up properly while shooting. Bostwick sued, and was paid for the entire season, despite just appearing in two episodes.
The new Captain Marvel was former boxer John Davey, and the change is jarring. While Bostwick had a sweet, almost simple disposition, Davey comes across as surly and unpleasant initially. The change is also jarring because Bostwick is in episode 1, then Davey in episode 2, Bostwick in 3, and then Davey from 4 on. I could see people discussing whether there was a new Cap after episode 2, and then watched the next week, thought they were crazy, and finally justified after episode 4. Why wouldn’t they just air Bostwick’s two episodes back to back?
This is especially weird as the fourth episode, the second time people have seen Davey as Cap, the episode begins with Cap robbing a store. Of course, it turns out it is a crook in the most realistic mask ever created, but it adds to the thorough confusion of a new actor portraying the character.
As the season rolls on, Davey comes into his own a little bit, and loses some of the edge that marks his first two appearances. It’s a pretty thankless job, as he has to both establish his own take on the character, but not stray too far from Bostwick’s performance. Davey is also physically quite different from Bostwick, and does not fill out the Cap costume in the same way. When Davey is flying, his gut is pretty clearly hanging out and, how can I put this delicately, the pants of the costume seem a little snugger for Davey.
One major difference, aesthetically, in this season is that, probably due to the actor change, Billy does all the morals at the end of the episodes. The messages don’t have the same weight coming from Billy, who winds up sounding holier than thou more than inspiration, like Cap sounded. We’ll see what happens in season 3.
Much of the show remains unchanged despite the new co-lead. Still set in the dirtbaggiest of Californian towns, the series’ tone somehow gets even NARC-ier than usual. Half the episodes share the moral of “the law is always right,” which is obviously understandable for a kids show, but also comes off as pretty authoritarian. Mentor at once point says that the crooks are too smart to come back to their old hideout, “That is if any criminal can be called smart.” Shit, Mentor, that’s cold.
The obsession with aviation devices continues, where in “Goodbye, Packy” a little girl and her pet wolf (!) accidentally take off in a hot air balloon. I was afraid that the title was going to be a misspelling of a common British slur for a person from Pakistan, but thankfully it was just the name of a wolf. The episode’s main thrust is about how a little girl doesn’t want to give up her pet wolf. You feel for the girl, but mostly because she’s unlucky enough to have parents who would allow her to have a wolf for a pet in the first place. What the fuck, people?
In “Speak No Evil,” Danny Bonaduce (!) shows up in a guest-star capacity in an episode that features a lot of time focused on a jigsaw puzzle of the Mona Lisa that seems about at a 2nd grade level, but Mentor and Billy struggle with mightily. Not only that, but a Sheriff comes over and goes “Woah, a jigsaw puzzle!” when he sees it. Is this a town that banned them, like dancing in Footloose? If not why is he so excited to see one?
This mini season also features an old prospector, the worst ADR of the series, and maybe the saddest kid yet from “On Winning.” The kid basically has a crippling inferiority complex, which his family never noticed until it is pointed out by Mentor and Billy. It’s a trip of a mini season.
But the reason I’m not reviewing all of it today is that the final episode is a crossover with The Secrets of Isis. This series was paired with Shazam in a block called The Shazam/Isis Hour, and featured a new character which would eventually find its way into DC Comics. Next week, I’ll cover the final seven episodes of Shazam, along with the four episodes of Isis that Captain Marvel appeared in. See ya then!
