Shazam! Director Reveals If He's Talked to Zack Snyder
David F. Sandberg, the director of Shazam!, has apparently never spoken with Zack Snyder about his [...]
David F. Sandberg, the director of Shazam!, has apparently never spoken with Zack Snyder about his take on the DC Films universe. That's a revelation he made on social media today, as fans wondered what kind of relationship Sandberg has with the man who originated the verisons of Superman, Batman, and other heroes that Shazam! alluded to and featured. Sandberg's film, tonally different from Snyder's in a dramatic way and featuring characters who had not debuted (as almost every other DC Films character did) in Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice, has always felt slightly at a remove from the rest of the movies.
That, it seems, is a pretty fair interpretation. There isn't any antipathy toward Snyder personally, though; Sandberg admitted that even the planned Black Adam movie, which stars Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson as Shazam's arch-nemesis, is not something he has been kept apprised of.
You can see Sandberg's comments below.
No, I’ve never met or spoken to him. I don’t even know what’s happening with the Black Adam movie, and that’s a Shazam character, so I’m not really in the loop on these things. I’ve just seen Snyder’s movies and made Shazam as if those events where real but also DC toys exist. https://t.co/HcF2URdksK
— David F. Sandberg (@ponysmasher) February 9, 2021
Don't expect, then, Zachary Levi to be one of the DC characters getting an unexpected appearance in Justice League next month.
Snyder had completed an "assembly cut" of Justice League -- a rough cut of the film that's barely edited, but mostly just all the footage shot so far, strung together into an outrageously long version of the movie -- when his daughter passed away. Shortly after that, the film was taken over by Marvel's The Avengers director Joss Whedon, who slashed much of Snyder's content and replaced it with reshoots that clashed wildly with Snyder's footage in tone and look.
The resulting movie was a mess, and moviegoers and critics punished it for a lack of direction. While Snyder's grounded, violent approach to superhero movies had drawn criticism from some fans and underperformed relative to the massive expectations set by movies like The Dark Knight and The Avengers, they turned a modest profit and managed to get the next movie, and then the next, greenlit. The franchise effectively stopped dead with Justice League, which didn't make remotely close to its money back, and felt like a case of trying to please everyone, but compromising and instead pleasing no one.
The movie will get another shot with Zack Snyder's Justice League, which is expected to debut on HBO Max in March.