In an interview with The Hollywood Reporter, director David F. Sandberg was asked when the film’s surprise appearance by Wonder Woman (Gal Gadot) was written into the story. “From the beginning and the first script,” Sandberg said. “He was always supposed to be there, but I didn’t think it was going to happen because of what happened in the first movie, where we had to do a headless Superman cameo. I thought that was going to happen here, too.” Sandberg’s “headless Superman” remark refers to the end of the first Shazam! in 2019, when Superman is briefly shown from the neck down. This was due to actor Henry Cavill being unavailable for filming at the time.
Shazam! Get creative with the DC Universe
Sandberg went on to say that if Gadot wasn’t available, she could bring back Hespera (Helen Mirren) to retrieve the wizard’s wand after it was destroyed in the film’s climax. “So I started thinking, ‘Okay, when he can’t do it or when it falls apart, how do we bring Shazam back to life? Do we need to bring back Helen Mirren’s character Hespera? What are we going to do?’ But then it actually happened, which was great because then we could have fun with the headless cameo from the first movie, the Wizard dream sequence and stuff like that. But we could never have done that if we didn’t have it. Gal at the end because people would have been furious.”
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Wonder Woman wasn’t the only DC comic originally planned for film. Although Black Adam (Dwayne Johnson) himself never appears to fight his nemesis, the Justice Society Black Adam almost appeared in a scene after the film’s releases. According to Sandberg’s previous comments, the Justice Society was supposed to speak to Shazam (Zachary Levi) in person at the end, but Sandberg learned that the cast couldn’t show up just three days before filming the scene. Last minute calls were made to the producers, and Emilia Harcourt (Jennifer Holland) and John Economos (Steve Agee) Suicide Squad and Peacemaker was written into the scene instead.
Shazam! Wrath of the Gods continues the adventures of teenager Billy Batson and his foster siblings, all of whom received powers from mythological gods thanks to an ancient wizard (Djimon Honsou) in the first film. In the sequel, Shazam encounters the daughters of Atlas, who hope to claim the wizard’s power for themselves and avenge their father’s death. When Shazam’s friends lose their powers, he must stop his daughter Kalypso (Lucy Liu) from conquering Earth with an army of monsters.
Shazam! Wrath of the Gods is now showing in theaters.
Source: The Hollywood Reporter