The graphic novel tells how archaeologists C.C. Instead, Ordway got artist Peter Krause to handle the pencils on the ongoing. Wieringo didn’t stick around, he had been part of a pitch with Mark Waid to do a different take on Captain Marvel. Mike Wieringo was initially attached to do art, which I remember from a Wizard Magazine special detailing the changes at DC Comics after their 1995 event Zero Hour. He began with a painted one-shot graphic novel that would retell the character’s origin and set up the ongoing series’s main arcs. In 1991, writer Jerry Ordway was given the assignment to make Captain Marvel part of the DC big hitters. By the 2000s, DC was tired of the name confusion, so with the New 52 reboot, he was renamed Shazam.Īfter a revival in the 1970s and an attempt to reboot the character post-Crisis, DC didn’t have much luck getting such an iconic figure in a regularly published title. DC’s version legally could not use his name in the title of books, so Shazam became the commonly used moniker. Fawcett went out of business, DC bought Captain Marvel, but by the time they wanted to use him in the 1960s, Marvel Comics was around with their own Captain Marvel.

The first thing to get out of the way, yes, this character was called Captain Marvel, he was the original created in 1939 at Fawcett Comics. I cannot explain what drew me to the Captain Marvel character since I was a kid, but I just was. Of the collections I’ve read and reviewed on this site, I believe this is the first where I bought each individual issue as it was published. Reprints The Power of Shazam! graphic novel, The Power of Shazam! #1-12, a story from Superman/Batman Magazine #4Īrt by Jerry Ordway, Peter Krause, and Mike Parobeck The Power of Shazam! Book 1: In the Beginning… (2020)

The Power of Shazam! by Jerry Ordway