‘Shazam’ star Zachary Levi calls out “garbage” Hollywood films

Zachary Levi has urged audiences to “actively not choose” to see “garbage” Hollywood films.

The actor, who recently bemoaned the poor reception to his DC film Shazam! Fury Of The Gods, expressed his frustration over Hollywood’s output at Chicago Fan Expo on Saturday (August 12).

• READ MORE: ‘Shazam! Fury Of The Gods’ review: a body-swapping superhero sequel with no soul

“I personally feel like the amount of content that comes out of Hollywood that is garbage – they don’t care enough to actually make it great for you guys. They don’t,” Levi said (via Entertainment Weekly).

“How many times do you watch a trailer and go, ‘Oh my god, this looks so cool!’ Then you go to the movie and it’s like, ‘This was what I get?’ They know that once you’ve already bought the ticket and you’re in the seat, they’ve got your money. And the only way for us to change any of it is to not go to the garbage. We have to actively not choose the garbage. It’ll help. It’ll help a lot.”

Last month, the Shazam actor defended the sequel after it performed poorly at the box office, blaming “insanely unkind” reviews and “online hate”.

“The audience score is still quite good, but the critics score was, I don’t know, very oddly and perplexingly low, and people were insanely unkind,” Levi told The FilmUp Podcast.

“Listen, I’ve been a part of things and as much as I wish that they were good, I know that they’re OK, I know they missed a lot. I’m not saying Shazam! Fury Of The Gods is some perfect Orson Welles masterpiece, but it’s a good darn movie.”

Shazam! Fury Of The Gods grossed $134million (£105.5million), at the global box office, a significant drop compared to the 2019 original’s $367million (£289million). The sequel holds a 49 per cent critical rating on Rotten Tomatoes, compared to an 86 per cent audience score.

In a two-star review, NME wrote: “Swapping comedy for quips and action for messiness, the overstuffed, under-lit sequel only ever seems accidentally enjoyable.”

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