DC resets Shazam courtesy of Wonder Woman’s mom

I love the DC Comics superhero who is a little boy who shouts “Shazam!” and turns into an adult-size superhero in a red suit. Genuinely, he’s a great classic character who’s had some really sensible tweaks to transform him into a really smart modern found family superhero story for all ages.

I hate that he doesn’t have a name.

It used to be that we called him Captain Marvel. I understand now, however, that it is not an option anymore (even though Captain Marvel had the idea first). But it’s simply not feasible that we call him Shazam. For one, he can’t have a name that forces him to transform every time he says it out loud. Shazam, on the other hand, is the name of his wizard. But most frustratingly for me, a person who writes about comics — if his name is Shazam, what do I call his sister?

She used to be Mary Marvel, but it isn’t any more, for obvious reasons. If I call her Mary Bromfield nobody knows who I’m talking about. Am I supposed to call her Billy Batson’s sister Mary? Gross!

And so, every time DC Comics writers prep for a new take on Billy Batson, his family, and Shazam — as they did in this week’s Lazarus Planet #4 — I wait with bated breath. Are they going to end my suffering? Will they finally rename Billy Batson’s superhero identity? Only time, and DC’s new Shazam!Series will tell.

But in the meantime I really like the way they redid Billy and Mary’s powers in Lazarus Planet.

What other things are happening in our favorite comics pages? We’ll tell you. Welcome to Monday Funnies, Polygon’s weekly list of the books that our comics editor enjoyed this past week. It’s part society pages of superhero lives, part reading recommendations, part “look at this cool art.” There may be some spoilers. It may be that there is not enough context. There will still be some great comics. You can read it if you’ve missed out on the last issue.

The wizard Shazam re-endows Billy with the powers of Solomon, Hercules, Atlas, Zeus, Achilles, and Mercury; as the goddess Hippolyta of the Amazons endows his sister Mary with the powers of Selene, Hippolyta, Artemis, Zephyrus, Auroro, and Minerva. Each of the kids crackles with yellow lightning energy in Lazarus Planet #4: Revenge of the Gods (2023).

It’s recap time. A while back, Billy was unable to share his power with his family. Then the Wizard teamed up with some Greek gods to take over humanity and took Billy’s powers away to do it. Also, in somewhat unrelated events, Wonder Woman’s mom Queen Hippolyta died and ascended to divinity as the goddess of the Amazons.

As the year draws to a conclusion, the Lazarus PlanetAfter the event that saw divinity and magic go wild on Earth, Hippolyta and Billy gain a similar affection. Billy still can’t share his powers with her, but he doesn’t need to. Mary has her own sextet of goddesses — Hippolyta included — in her corner. It’s a throwback to the original origins of Mary Marvel, and a great use of Hippolyta, a character who doesn’t otherwise get much play outside of Wonder Woman stories.

Deadpool and his sweetie, Valentine Vuong, visit a sculpture park, a bookstore, a diner, and an ice skating rink as a big monster secretly hunts people behind them. Deadpool’s narration muses about how this time he’s finally gotten love right, in Deadpool #6 (2023).

Deadpool has fallen in love with a nonbinary mutant scientist with syringes for fingers, and they’re going on cute all-day dates while Deadpool’s new pet — an offspring of the Carnage symbiote that was incubated in his stomach — eats all the assassins trying to kill them. I’m proudly shedding a tear as I say: This is the future liberals want.

A series of cross sections of rooms in Doom Patrol headquarters, characters from all eras of Doom Patrol relax and catch up with each other in Unstoppable Doom Patrol #1 (2023).

It’s true that I wasn’t sure about a Doom Patrol comic series that would focus more on uniforms and super-heroics. But Dennis Culver, and Chris Burnham, have wowed me in their debut issue. I especially appreciate their inclusion of earlier versions of the Doom Patrol team. And OK, OK, maybe I’m just a sucker for Gerard Way’s run, but it’s just nice to see Lotion the anthropomorphic cat in a motorcycle jacket.

Rasputin, a chimera mutant from the future who looks like if Colossus was a girl, steps out of a portal and is greeted by present day Kate Pryde. “Okay, I don’t know who you are,” Kate says, “but I have to say, I’m loving this whole look,” in Sins of Sinister Dominion (2023).

Speaking of futures the liberals want: The mutant chimera who looks like Colossus (Kate Pryde’s ex-fiance) and Illyana Rasputin (Kate Pryde’s long-time queer coded “best friend”) combined has, as many other characters from averted future timelines have, taken up residence in present X-Men continuity. And the first thing that happens is a finally canonically bisexual Kate Pryde walks up to her to say “How It is a good idea to use doin’?”

#resets #Shazam #courtesy #Womans #mom