I finally saw the film tonight. I know little about the character except a few memories from the live-action show in the 1970s. Some thoughts:

• I highly enjoyed Zachary Levi’s man-child performance. I don’t know any of his other work, but his behavior seemed very reasonable for that character in those circumstances. Granted, the comic book version is more mature, but they can always do that in the next movie, after Billy is more accustomed to heroics. It will make a natural progression from this film.

• Sivanna was terrible, and I was always glad when his scenes ended. Not the actor; he was alright, though I was distracted by how much he looked like Steve Carrell playing Baron Von Strucker. But if you want to do a “Captain Sparklefingers vs his equal and opposite,” obviously Black Adam is the villain you want. Sivanna is supposed to be a mad genius, but he didn’t do one smart thing the whole movie.

• The Djimon Honsou wizard scenes… were they supposed to recall Morgan Freeman satirizing that same basic character in The Lego Movie?

• Overall tone was jarring. The Captain Sparklefingers scenes were lighthearted fun. The Sivanna scenes were boring PG-13 dark. Pick a lane! Hint: The correct lane should have been “lighthearted fun” throughout. This ain’t Constantine. Speaking of which:

• Sivanna shouldn’t even have been in this film, at least not as the direct heavy. They made a movie where “Seven Deadly Sins” demons were featured heavily, and they missed an obvious opportunity to build the movie around that theme. Right off the bat I thought of two ways that could be handled.

-----One would be for the Seven Sins to get loose and cause themed problems around the world. Lust causes everyone in Philadelphia to start kissing on each other. Greed generates a spree of citizen robberies. Sloth turns all the air traffic controllers in to listless slackers. Envy and Jealousy tag-team an AARP convention or something. Whatever. That gives the film structure as Billy has to run around putting out all these different crises, plus one final confrontation against the demons’ combined might. They could have even included Sivanna as a scientist trying to help Billy, and it all goes badly wrong, and he loses his hair and, oh wait, that’s Luthor, but still something in that department rather than Sivanna just being boringly nasty from the get-go because his dad yelled at him in the car one time. It would have given Billy and Sivanna a badly needed connection beyond "I need to kill you so I can say I'm strongest, except I forgot Superman exists in this world so I still have a problem."

-----The other way would be smaller: The seven deadly sins infect seven members of Billy’s household, probably with himself being one of them. Lots of opportunities for lighthearted action there.

• Billy's mom. That non-revelation made zero sense. The cops couldn't track her down? Really? Did she change her name and move houses right after she abandoned her son? And her parents never looked for their grandchild? He should have been a real orphan.

• They should have saved the Marvel Family for the next film, to get some replay value out of the “learning my powers” trope instead of showing them all as instantly competent, even the seven year old girl who doesn’t know what a “lair” is.

• Little goofy plot things, like everybody running back to the amusement park just as the super-fight was winding down. I don’t think so! Why were the two bullies the only ones on the ferris wheel? Sparklefingers having enough lightning control to charge people’s cell phones as he strolled past.

Bottom line: It’s not as needlessly joyless as DC’s other recent offerings, but neither was it the optimistic romp it could have been. “Selfish kid learns to overcome his darkness and embrace heroism” was done much better in Disney/Marvel’s “Big Hero 6.”

I hate Johns' take on the material; but, I didn't hate the first film. Didn't think it was great; but, it was okay enough to be entertaining. They really need to do more to flesh out Mary and Pedro in the sequel, as they barely had personalities in the first film, which is one of the things I didn't like. Need to get Black Adam into things quickly, though they are still holding out for a Black Adam solo film that has been in development since 2008, with Dwayne Johnson involved (Shazam dates back to the beginning of the Millennium, from the William Goldman script). I say it's time to put up or shut up for that or move things forward without Johnson. If you can't get a script together in that amount of time you never will.

I do think these need to be lighter and stay that way, as the uneven tone in Shazam hurt it. The lighter stuff worked well, the darker Sivana (White Adam, really) did not.

They need to solve the problem with the name. Calling him Shazam, when he can't say the name, is the dumbest idea yet with the character. Calling him Captain Thunder was a better solution; heck, give him a promotion and call him Major Marvel. Marvel doesn't have a trademark on that (and can't just arbitrarily trademark the word Marvel, other than as a brand name for their comics).

If he cuts a promo about what the Adam is cooking, I'm outta there!

Not so much joint use as specific use.  DC could still call the character Captain Marvel, but not in a title; so, they just tapped out.  Still, calling the guy Shazam doesn't work, just by the basic convention of the whole thing.  Yeah, I know, civilians thought that was the name; but, nyah....

Obviously, no one had any confidence in Sivana as a mad genius, because 90% of Hollywood can't write that without being over-the-top campy, which could still work for Captain Marvel.  Hell, 98.99% of DC and/or Marvel can't write that, since they all have chips on their shoulders about being called nerds by the jocks.  Comics have to be SERIOUS and so do comic-based movies!  I'll show everyone who ever laughed at me............

See, you'd think it would be easy for nerds-turned-pro; but, not enough therapy to embrace the lunacy.  Or too much....I don't know.

If you ask me, embrace bat-s@#$ insane for Captain Marvel, because serious superhero doesn't really work, so why not?  They can't do whimsy: so, swing for stands with lunacy, I say.

Of course, that would mean someone would actually have to take a chance.  Can't have that in a corporate environment.

Anyway, if it can at least be as watchable as the first, they will be doing all right (so long as they characters get a bit more development and they don't just repeat scenes).

I can't understand why Hollywood is so afraid of going with actual cloth for the costumes, rather than molded latex and such.  It photographs better and you can get more vibrant colors, without it going off kilter.  The costume they came up for Stallone, in the first Judge Dredd worked pretty well and that would be great, for the Marvel Family.  Worked for Tom Tyler and Jackson Bostwick looked okay, though a tunic instead of a t-shirt would have worked better.

Still looks like they cut up a bunch of dodge balls and sealed them together to make the suit.