Zachary Levi blames Shazam sequel flop on 'insanely unkind' haters and social media 'toxicity'
Zachary Levi is serving a ferocious ka-pow to Shazam! Fury of the Gods haters.
Four months after the big-budget DC superhero film flopped with critics (49 percent on Rotten Tomatoes) and at the box office ($57 million domestically), the star hit back at the film's detractors on Tuesday's episode of The FilmUp Podcast.
"As an experience, I really enjoyed making that movie and I really enjoyed playing that part. I don't know what the future holds for it all, because, unfortunately, the second movie was not as well-received. The audience score is still quite good, but the critics score was, I don't know, very oddly and perplexingly low, and people were insanely unkind," he said when asked about the prospect of another Shazam! film. "Listen, I've been a part of things and as much as I wish that they were good, I know that they're okay, I know they missed a lot. I'm not saying Shazam! Fury of the Gods is some perfect Orson Welles masterpiece, but it's a good darn movie."
The 42-year-old said he thinks director David F. Sandberg "made a really fun movie" in the sequel, but that "the world has shifted so much" in the four-year gap between the first hit movie (which grossed $367 million globally, versus the sequel's $134 million).
"Social media has shifted so much, online hate and haters and trolls and factions and all of that has just gotten more galvanized in its toxicity, and I think that there are people that genuinely, unfortunately, want to destroy certain projects because they don't like them or they don't like me or other people involved in them or whatever," he said, later adding: "I just hope or believe that history will show. It will be one of those things that people will go back, people will watch Fury of the Gods on home streaming or on a plane or wherever, and it'll be this movie they heard so much s--- about, and they'll be like, Well, wait a minute. It is what it is."
Sandberg previously tweeted that the reaction to the film soured him on making superhero movies for a while.
"I wasn't expecting a repeat of the first movie critically but I was still a little surprised because I think it's a good film. Oh well," he tweeted in March. "As I've been saying for a while now I'm very eager to go back to horror (as well as trying some new things)," he continued. "After six years of Shazam I'm definitely done with superheroes for now."
During a fan Q&A that same month, Levi cited the film's "marketing" as the "biggest issue" contributing to its underperformance.
Shazam! Fury of the Gods — also starring Rachel Zegler, Lucy Liu, Helen Mirren, and Djimon Hounsou — is now streaming on Max.
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