The Marvel Family in suspended animation 1940s-1970s? No intervention by Shazam?

[Buried Alien]

To explain what had become of the Marvel Family during the decades (1940s-1970s) when legal restrictions prevented Fawcett Comics from publishing any more of their adventures, DC Comics, when it revived the Marvel Family after buying out Fawcett's assets, wrote a backstory that during the 1940s, Dr. Sivana had placed the Marvels in suspended animation in a spaceship orbitting the sun. The Marvels did not revive from suspended animation until the 1970s.

Question: why didn't the old wizard Shazam intervene to free the Marvels during all that time?

Buried Alien (The Fastest Post Alive!)

[Jack Zodiac]

He was dead? Or he secretly doesn't really like the Marvel Family all that much.

[moonlight_night78]

That's a good question! My personal theory is that old Shazam figured that with most of their main enemies either in suspended animation with them or otherwise incapacitated, they weren't really needed.

To me, the bigger question is how did they explain them coming back after 20 years. Wasn't Billy Batson a nationwide celebrity? How do they explain people coming back and they haven't aged a day?

[CYOTI]

Question: why didn't the old wizard Shazam intervene to free the Marvels during all that time? Because he was already dead and really nothing more than a shade.

[Joe Acro]

Perhaps he did intervene because the Marvels were not truly needed.

[glennsim]

That's a good question! My personal theory is that old Shazam figured that with most of their main enemies either in suspended animation with them or otherwise incapacitated, they weren't really needed.

To me, the bigger question is how did they explain them coming back after 20 years. Wasn't Billy Batson a nationwide celebrity? How do they explain people coming back and they haven't aged a day?

It was a large crowd of people (basically all of Cap's friends and family and enemies), so once they were freed, it became public knowledge that Billy etc. had been frozen in the Suspendium. In fact, there were so many people there that even though he was frozen as Cap, nobody questions the possibility that Billy was there "too".

[Dr. Killbydeath]

A wizard did it.

[MAK15]

he was taking naps

[LtMarvel]

Even Shazam had to bow to DC's lawyers.

No, wait, I've got it. The Marvel Family exist to combat Shazam's greatest mistake: Black Adam. With Sivana in the Suspendium with the Marvel Family, the wizard knew that Black Adam would not return until Sivana invented a way to bring him back.

[moonlight_night78]

It was a large crowd of people (basically all of Cap's friends and family and enemies), so once they were freed, it became public knowledge that Billy etc. had been frozen in the Suspendium. In fact, there were so many people there that even though he was frozen as Cap, nobody questions the possibility that Billy was there "too".

Tht's cool, it had been a while since i actually read the 70's Shazam. I kinda thought that's what had happened thouh, being that Billy is Capt. Marvel's contact person through the radio station

[Denny Colt]

The Old Wizard was too busy representing the Marvels in court.:)

[Froggy]

He was dead? Or he secretly doesn't really like the Marvel Family all that much.

BB: Why didnt you save us Shazam?

Shazam: you want the truth? DO YOU!? YOU CANT HANDLE THE TRUTH!

BB: ye........yes i can

Shazam: OK then, I just didnt like you all that much! goody two shoes b*(*(*#

[Karl O'Neill]

what's suspended animation?

is that like hanging from a ceiling from your legs and arms and laughing hysterically?

im just kidding,

Maybe sivanna had the wizard taken care of aswell?

[BoosterBronze]

To explain what had become of the Marvel Family during the decades (1940s-1970s) when legal restrictions prevented Fawcett Comics from publishing any more of their adventures, DC Comics, when it revived the Marvel Family after buying out Fawcett's assets, wrote a backstory that during the 1940s, Dr. Sivana had placed the Marvels in suspended animation in a spaceship orbitting the sun. The Marvels did not revive from suspended animation until the 1970s.



Good Lord DC and their convoluted ass backstories.

[Bored at 3:00AM]

Shazam came down with a decades-long bout of Montazuma's Revenge and was stuck in the bathroom that whole time. It sucked dude. Seriously.

[Slam_Bradley]

The truly mind-boggling thing is that someone at DC thought their "disappearance" needed an explanation.

[glennsim]

Good Lord DC and their convoluted ass backstories.

Well, like most well-done backstories, they spent all of one issue addressing this, and proceeded from there.

They didn't have story after story of a 1940s Cap adjusting to life in the 1970s.

[BoosterBronze]

Well, like most well-done backstories, they spent all of one issue addressing this, and proceeded from there.



Well that's nice.

So when did the Marvel's get relegated to Earth-F... or was it Earth-S?

[Buried Alien]

Well that's nice.

So when did the Marvel's get relegated to Earth-F... or was it Earth-S?

Earth-S, and it happened immediately upon their incorporation into the DC Multiverse back in the 1970s. I don't know if the name "Earth-S" was established in that first issue of SHAZAM! back in the 1970s, or if they waited until a few months later when Earth-S was part of an annual JLA/JSA crossover.

Buried Alien (The Fastest Post Alive!)

[Powerboy]

To explain what had become of the Marvel Family during the decades (1940s-1970s) when legal restrictions prevented Fawcett Comics from publishing any more of their adventures, DC Comics, when it revived the Marvel Family after buying out Fawcett's assets, wrote a backstory that during the 1940s, Dr. Sivana had placed the Marvels in suspended animation in a spaceship orbitting the sun. The Marvels did not revive from suspended animation until the 1970s.

Question: why didn't the old wizard Shazam intervene to free the Marvels during all that time?

Buried Alien (The Fastest Post Alive!)

He was wise beyond his time. He knew the Silver Age would eventually end and he was waiting, waiting...

[blackphoenix]

YEESH....Hadn't even thought of that. The wizard major league effed that one up. Maybe an even more convoluted backstory can be developed that says SHAZAM was away from this dimensional plane during that time and didn't know what was going on with them...?

[The Batman]

He probably left them in suspended animation for the same reason that he never bothered to fix Freddy Freeman's bum leg: because the wizard Shazam is a jerk.

[LtMarvel]

Psst...it was the 1950s that Sivana attacked...

[glennsim]

Somebody correct me if I'm wrong, but I think the wizard at that time was pretty much limited to a) giving advice and b) providing identity-changing lightning. He was dead, that was all he could do.

On the other hand, he was several hundred years old, so he probably wouldn't have considered a couple of decades to be an issue.

[Sijo]

Shazam was indeed dead in the original version, having committed suicide in the very first Captain Marvel story (with a huge stone block, to boot!) saying something along the lines that "it was written that I must depart." :eek: Billy could contact him only by lighting up a magical brazier at his hideout, and, later, by traveling directly to the Rock of Eternity. Note also that said rock existed at the center of space/time, so Shazam might have simply known it was all "fated to pass."

Yeah, I thought that was all unnecessary as well, but there you have it. It isn't in continuity anymore, so don't worry about it.

[Citizen V]

To explain what had become of the Marvel Family during the decades (1940s-1970s) when legal restrictions prevented Fawcett Comics from publishing any more of their adventures, DC Comics, when it revived the Marvel Family after buying out Fawcett's assets, wrote a backstory that during the 1940s, Dr. Sivana had placed the Marvels in suspended animation in a spaceship orbitting the sun. The Marvels did not revive from suspended animation until the 1970s.

Question: why didn't the old wizard Shazam intervene to free the Marvels during all that time?

Buried Alien (The Fastest Post Alive!)

The answer is in bold,or you answered your own question.

[Buried Alien]

The answer is in bold,or you answered your own question.

Come on, now...if you read my original post well enough to highlight specific passages out of it, then you couldn't have missed that I was asking about the *in-story* explanation, not the real-world explanation.


Buried Alien (The Fastest Post Alive!)