Henry Cavill won’t appear as Superman in Shazam: Fury of the Gods

Last Updated on August 5, 2021

In the closing moments of Shazam!, Billy Batson (Angel Asher) made good on his promise to Freddy Freeman (Jack Dylan Grazer) and showed up at Fawcett High School as Shazam (Zachary Levi), but that wasn't all as he also brought a certain Man of Steel along with him. Although we never saw his face in the scene, the actor playing Superman was wearing Henry Cavill's Justice League suit.

Shazam! producer Peter Safran said in 2019 that the original intention was for Henry Cavill to make a proper cameo in this scene. "At one point, we'd hoped it was going to be Cavill doing it, but unfortunately his schedule didn't allow him to do it," Safran said. "We still wanted to do it anyway, and it turned out to be better, because it let us do a hard cut on Freddy's reaction, because if we had Cavill there, we'd actually written lines, they had a dialogue, but then it's a little bit of a hat on hat, because really what it's about is Freddy's reaction, so we got to get out on that." With Cavill seemingly making a deal to return to the DCEU as Superman, many have assumed that he might just appear in the upcoming Shazam! sequel, and there have been multiple rumours pointing to just that. Well, it seems as though those rumours are just rumours as Variety has heard from "two sources with direct knowledge of the production and Cavill’s schedule" that the actor will not appear in the sequel. Shazam! director David F. Sandberg also took to Twitter to address the rumours, but he doesn't outright refute them.

With the release of Shazam! Fury of the Gods still over two years away, that's a lot of time for things to change, so Sandberg is wise not to reveal his hand one way or another. During a fan Q&A at DC FanDome last year, Sandberg says that the Shazam family will "definitely" be more involved in the upcoming sequel. "Now they’re all superheroes, they’re all a family with superpowers," Sandberg said. "And now we finally get to see that. We only got a glimpse of that in the first movie, so that’s something to look forward to." Sandberg was also asked about who will be facing off against the Shazam family in the sequel, but obviously couldn't say much. "I can't really talk about villains or villain," said Sandberg. "But I think a lot of people will be surprised. It's gonna be a little unexpected."

Shazam! Fury of the Gods is currently slated for a June 2, 2023 release.