Shazam! Fury of the Gods arrived in theaters this past weekend, and it appears Warner Bros. is already giving up on the movie. After it debuted at the worldwide box office with $65 million (which was well below early $85 million estimates), the sequel already seems to have a Digital release date.
According to a listing on Amazon Prime, we'll be able to watch the Shazam! sequel from home starting April 18. That's a mere 32 days after its theatrical debut and we're guessing it will arrive on HBO Max shortly after too.
It's important to note that this release date hasn't been confirmed by Warner Bros., but it suggests the studio isn't overly confident in the movie's long-term chances of success at the box office.
Beyond the negative reviews and seemingly poor word of mouth, not helping matters much are some recent comments on social media. Director David F. Sandberg has vented some of his frustrations about Shazam! Fury of the Gods' marketing campaign and the way some fans have responded to his work, while star Rachel Zegler has also expressed frustrations over the reviews.
Now, Shazam himself, Zachary Levi, has taken aim at some of DC's toxic fans.
Talking on the Happy Sad Confused podcast with Josh Horowitz, Levi started by taking aim at the "negative to be negative" people he believes have found fault with some of his past critiques of other superhero franchises.
"There's a whole contingent of comic book fans that it's really unfortunate that there's this one particular group of people that think I...well, they don't like me, because I don't agree with them on other comic book movies."
The actor continued, "You know who I'm talking about. But instead of there being a conversation, they take up so many of my words, or things completely out of context, and then they go stir up all the other people that they know online, and they all just want to attack, and attack, and attack, and attack."
"And it's really sad, because this is just one example of so many examples of the amount of just venom, and toxicity, and bullying that goes on in these cyber dimensions."
We're not 100% sure what Levi is referring to here, especially when most of the backlash he's faced on social media has actually been related to his stance on the still-divisive COVID vaccine. While there's some truth to what both the Shazam actor and Sandberg have said, this does somewhat come across like blaming "fans" for Shazam! Fury of the Gods' failings...