Showcase Presents SHAZAM! #1

The Big Red Cheese! That’s what Dr. Silvan called SHAZAM! (Captain Marvel) in Fawcett Publication’s Captain Marvel series introduced not long after DC Comics Superman premiered.

DC Comics now owns the rights to SHAZAM! and the character has become a important part of the DC Universe.

Back nearly 80 years ago DC Comics (then known as National Periodicals) owned the rights to Superman.

When Fawcett Publications created Captain Marvel (SHAZAM!) with similar powers and abilities National sued Fawcett.

The legal tit for tat lasted for months eventually forcing Fawcett to concede and stop publishing Captain Marvel.

Years later DC Comics would purchase the Fawcett library of comic book characters that also included Captain Marvel.

In the 1970s when Marvel Comics created its own Captain Marvel DC changed their character’s name to SHAZAM! named after the phrase young Billy Batson spoke when he changed into Captain Marvel.

In the 1970s SHAZAM! got his own DC Comics series and enjoyed a respectable run.

He also appear semi-frequently in other DC titles.

Since that time SHAZAM! has resurfaced as a key player in the DC Universe spawning two movies and numerous mini-series and guest appearances.

Showcase Presents SHAZAM! #1, from DC Comics, contains the numbers 1 through 33 of the SHAZAM! comic book series reprinted in black and white.

Psalm 84:10 (NIV) “Better is one day in your courts than a thousand elsewhere; I would rather be a doorkeeper in the house of my God than dwell in the tents of the wicked.”