Shazam! Fury of the Gods Director Has Perfect Response to Film's Earlier Release Date

03/09/2022 05:49 pm EST

The upcoming crop of DC movies got some major updates on Wednesday, when Warner Bros. announced shifting release dates for a slew of its upcoming movies. This included delaying the theatrical release dates of Black Adam, The Flash, and Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom — and moving the release of Shazam! Fury of the Gods up six months earlier. The blockbuster will now be opening on December 16, 2022 as opposed to June 2, 2023, and director David F. Sandberg took to social media to acknowledge the new date in a pretty delightful way. In a series of tweets, which you can check out below, Sandberg confirmed the earlier date, joked that its competing date against Avatar 2 will have director James Cameron "shaking in his boots", and acknowledged how the sequel will now be a Christmas movie, despite not being set in Christmas.

The cast of Shazam! Fury of the Gods includes Zachary Levi as Shazam!, Asher Angel as Billy Batson, Grace Fulton as Mary Bromfield, Jack Dylan Grazer as Freddy Freeman, Adam Brody as Super Hero Freddy, Faithe Herman as Darla Dudley, Meagan Good as Super Hero Darla, Ian Chen as Eugene Choi, Ross Butler as Super Hero Eugene, Jovan Armand as Pedro Pena, D.J. Cotrona as Super Hero Pedro, Marta Milans as Rosa Vasquez, and Cooper Andrews as Victor Vasquez. New cast members also include Helen Mirren as Hespera, Lucy Liu as Kalypso.

"I loved the first Shazam movie," producer Peter Safran explained in an interview with Collider earlier this year. "I thought it was beautifully done. I thought that David Sandberg nailed that tone so incredibly well. The eye of the needle was so small to get it right, but he really did nail it. I feel like this second one has more emotion, more humor, but it also has bigger action, bigger set pieces, some great villains. I just feel like it's everything that we loved in the first movie but really turned up to 11. So I love it."

"I think the addition of some of these new characters with Rachel Zegler and Helen Mirren and Lucy Liu are fantastic editions," Safran continued. "I love that the kids are all a little bit older now so we get to have a little bit more fun in kind of an edgier fashion with them. Zach inhabits that character in such a beautiful fashion. So to have been able to make a second one of those, it's a thrill."

Are you excited for Shazam! Fury of the Gods? Share your thoughts with us in the comments below!

Shazam! Fury of the Gods is set to be released on December 16th.

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