Shazam!!!

DC is officially changing the original Captain Marvel's name to Shazam. Kinda depressed me at first, until I remembered that DC doesn't deserve the character in the first place. They sued him out of existence before buying him outright (or owning him via the lawsuit?). Then Marvel performed the cock-block to end all cock-blocks, by trademarking Captain Marvel and attaching that trademark to an alien military officer of their own creation.

I used to read old reprints of the Captain's Fawcett adventures and maybe some newer stories drawn in that style back in the seventies. There was also a TV version that had a Hispanic looking Billy Batson travelling around the country in a mobile meth lab RV with his former science teacher some old dude solving problems like Caine in Kung Fu. Due to the trademark issue, both the comics and the TV shows were called Shazam instead of Captain Marvel.



Once I found out why that was, I kinda held it against Marvel, though I'm a fan of their Captain Marvel primarily because of Jim Starlin's run on the character (which I didn't get around to til the late 70s/early '80s). Now I think it might be better if Marvel actually owned the original Captain Marvel themselves. Actually no. Probably not, but it would make their recent acquisition of Marvelman just a little more complete.

Speaking of Alan Moore (kinda), he once suggested (I think) that the wizard Shazam, the old man who gave Batson the original captain's abilities was a future version of Batson/Marvel in his golden/silver age homage, Supreme. And that, actually based on something he read by C.C. Beck. The latter bit I may be mis-remembering.

I still think a Shazam/Captain Marvel film should cast The Rock as the lead.