The New Champion of Shazam!
by Josie Campbell
art by Doc Shaner
DC Comics
DC Comics
2023
The New Champion of Shazam! collects a 4-issue miniseries of comics that reintroduces the character of Mary Marvel as (briefly) the sole wielder of the power of Shazam. This might've made a good start to a new ongoing series, but instead, the 5th comic in here, a single issue from another DC crossover event (Planet Lazarus) undoes the premise by bringing back Billy Batson as the original and primary Shazam.
For awhile, I tried keeping up with DC Comics' main continuity, but I've stopped checking in as much, and basically lost track over the past couple years. In some ways that makes New Champion ideal for someone like me, since it's a fresh start for a character who apparently has been out of circulation for awhile. On the other hand, the set-up to get the series started presumes events I had no knowledge of. Billy Batson is vanished and missing, his foster siblings are no longer able to transform into superheroes, and this state of affairs has prevailed for long enough that they've all moved on creating new civilian lives.
Mary has gotten into Vassar, and wants to figure out who she is now - not as a superhero or sister, but as an independent young woman. She gets very little time to find out, unfortunately, since on move-in day, her roommate's pet rabbit reveals that he's a messenger from the absent Billy, and he bestows her with the magic of Shazam. (In fact, since no one else is sharing it, she's many times more powerful than usual, although since I'm not really clear on her previous strength, that's not a particularly useful distinction!)
Mary defeats the Disaster Master, then returns to her dorm to find police waiting. Her foster parents never made it home from dropping her off at the bus station, so as the only adult foster sibling, she has to leave Vassar, return to Philadelphia, and take over as de facto parent. Understandably, she's both worried and resentful. She enrolls at the local community college, meets a sympathetic teacher, gets in a bunch of arguments with her siblings, then fights a giant flying crocodile and three mysterious jet black figures.
She also slightly embarrasses herself when she's approached by a news crew right after barely surviving the crocodile, getting stagefright, and flying away. Jokes and memes about her blow up on social media, setting up the best fight of the series, with another magic villain named Babel who psychically assaults her with her own negative self-messages, which at the moment are mostly made up of all the hurtful online comments.
The whole online infamy angle is one of the two really good bits of social commentary in here. The other is the fun the comic pokes at the ridiculously self-aggrandizing community college president, who keeps trying to oversell the quality of the school.
Anyway, eventually Mary figures out who's been creating the magical monsters, and kidnapping people (including her foster parents!,) and she's able to save the day all around. Mary embraces being Shazam, her family is reunited and no longer all arguing with each other, the press begins stops making fun of her, presumably she can restart college next semester on better footing, etc.
I sort of wish the volume stopped there, because the miniseries tells a complete story, and you could imagine Mary going off to have other adventures, in the style of Ms Marvel or Squirrel Girl, who also balance superheroics, attending school, and managing relationships. My favorite version of Mary Marvel is the one from DC Bombshells, where she's reimagined as a pious Jewish girl who draws strength from famous biblical women (still spelling out Shazam in acrostic, of course,) and stands alone without a male counterpart. As I mentioned at the beginning, the last issue collected here is from a crossover event, and brings back Billy Batson as the primary hero, thus replacing Mary and undermining what the miniseries had tried to build up.
For awhile, I tried keeping up with DC Comics' main continuity, but I've stopped checking in as much, and basically lost track over the past couple years. In some ways that makes New Champion ideal for someone like me, since it's a fresh start for a character who apparently has been out of circulation for awhile. On the other hand, the set-up to get the series started presumes events I had no knowledge of. Billy Batson is vanished and missing, his foster siblings are no longer able to transform into superheroes, and this state of affairs has prevailed for long enough that they've all moved on creating new civilian lives.
Mary has gotten into Vassar, and wants to figure out who she is now - not as a superhero or sister, but as an independent young woman. She gets very little time to find out, unfortunately, since on move-in day, her roommate's pet rabbit reveals that he's a messenger from the absent Billy, and he bestows her with the magic of Shazam. (In fact, since no one else is sharing it, she's many times more powerful than usual, although since I'm not really clear on her previous strength, that's not a particularly useful distinction!)
Mary defeats the Disaster Master, then returns to her dorm to find police waiting. Her foster parents never made it home from dropping her off at the bus station, so as the only adult foster sibling, she has to leave Vassar, return to Philadelphia, and take over as de facto parent. Understandably, she's both worried and resentful. She enrolls at the local community college, meets a sympathetic teacher, gets in a bunch of arguments with her siblings, then fights a giant flying crocodile and three mysterious jet black figures.
She also slightly embarrasses herself when she's approached by a news crew right after barely surviving the crocodile, getting stagefright, and flying away. Jokes and memes about her blow up on social media, setting up the best fight of the series, with another magic villain named Babel who psychically assaults her with her own negative self-messages, which at the moment are mostly made up of all the hurtful online comments.
The whole online infamy angle is one of the two really good bits of social commentary in here. The other is the fun the comic pokes at the ridiculously self-aggrandizing community college president, who keeps trying to oversell the quality of the school.
Anyway, eventually Mary figures out who's been creating the magical monsters, and kidnapping people (including her foster parents!,) and she's able to save the day all around. Mary embraces being Shazam, her family is reunited and no longer all arguing with each other, the press begins stops making fun of her, presumably she can restart college next semester on better footing, etc.
I sort of wish the volume stopped there, because the miniseries tells a complete story, and you could imagine Mary going off to have other adventures, in the style of Ms Marvel or Squirrel Girl, who also balance superheroics, attending school, and managing relationships. My favorite version of Mary Marvel is the one from DC Bombshells, where she's reimagined as a pious Jewish girl who draws strength from famous biblical women (still spelling out Shazam in acrostic, of course,) and stands alone without a male counterpart. As I mentioned at the beginning, the last issue collected here is from a crossover event, and brings back Billy Batson as the primary hero, thus replacing Mary and undermining what the miniseries had tried to build up.
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