New Shazam photo leaks have us excited and confused

DC’s Shazam! movie is filming on location in Toronto right now, and despite DC and Warner Bros. best efforts, a few pics are leaking out here and there. Shazam! is one of the few movies on the DCEU timeline that has a release date and is currently in production, so we’re watching this one pretty closely for details to get an idea of where it’s going.

Here are the photos:

The photos tell us quite a bit about the costume, even at a glance. The suit is clearly has the enhanced muscles seen in so many other superhero suits (except for Deadpool, apparently), and it looks like it’s using that same textured material we’ve been seeing on suits like Man of Steel‘s Superman. The suit takes cues from the New 52 version of the character, with the braces, boots, and belt all resembling that modernized take.

Meanwhile, the cape – despite being bolted on like the modern version of the character – has the shorter, layered look we see in older versions of the costume, like legendary artist Alex Ross’ reimagining of the outfit:

The bright yellow lightning emblem, meanwhile, looks like something straight off the outfit of the original Shazam (then called Captain Marvel).

My first instinct is to say that the costume looks kind of goofy, but there’s a few things worth remembering.

First, there’s a lot you can do with visual effects after the fact. Some of our favorite characters, like Groot and Rocket Raccoon, are entirely CG despite interacting with live human actors.

Second, Shazam! is the story of a young boy given the power to turn into a grown-adult superhero by calling out a magic word that is both the name of the wizard who gave him the powers and an acronym for the six mythological beings from whom his powers are derived (Solomon, Hercules, Atlas, Zeus, Achilles, Mercury). The whole concept is goofy. And if you asked Tom Hanks’ character from BIG to dream up a superhero costume, it definitely would’ve been different from the ones dreamed up by his actually-adult colleagues at the toy company. Kids, ask your parents about BIG.

With that in mind, I’m trying to be patient. After how gritty four of the last five DCEU movies were, I’m thrilled to see a DC hero movie that doesn’t look like its main character is going to talk through his teeth about his dead parents for the entirety of the film.

Shazam! is set to hit theaters on April 5, 2019 – barely 13 months away.