Shazam's History
Billy Batson is Shazam, a young hero empowered with the gifts of ancient gods by the Wizard.
Shazam!
Billy Batson became an orphan at a young age after his parents, C.C. and Marilyn Batson, died. After the death of his parents, Billy became cold and cruel to most people. Growing selfish and heartless, he went from foster home to foster home until he landed in an orphanage in Philadelphia. At the age of fifteen Billy was placed in the care of Victor and Rosa Vasquez, both former foster children themselves, who had already adopted a number of children.
Billy moved in to the Vazquezes' home where he met his new foster-siblings Mary, Freddy, Eugene, Pedro, and Darla. Billy refused to connect to the other children and rejected their attempts to get close to him. The following day, however, Billy stepped in to defend his siblings from bullies who were picking on them at school. That night, he snuck out of the house and was followed by Freddy, and the boys decided to hijack the bullies' father's car. Billy was caught and escaped on an underground train at the metro station.
The train transformed into a gateway to the Rock of Eternity, where Billy met the Wizard. The Wizard searched the boy's soul and saw that he was not perfectly good. When he told him so, Billy was instantly enraged at him for believing that any person is purely good and without flaws. The Wizard accepted Billy's point and looked deeper into his soul. After witnessing all the good Billy had done in his life, the Wizard bestowed his power upon him. With a word, he could transform into the champion, Shazam, and wield the Living Lightning. After granting Billy all of his power, the Wizard died.
At the same time, the ancient champion Black Adam was freed from his prison by Doctor Sivana who, through an accident, gained the ability to see magic with his injured eye. Sivana showed Black Adam the modern world, which Adam was not satisfied with. He started his plans to change the world and, to do that, he left to find the Rock of Eternity. There, he discovered that there was a new champion who Adam was determined to find.
Meanwhile, Billy met up with Freddy. After convincing his foster brother about his newfound superpowers, the duo went out for a night of shenanigans. Seemingly by accident, however, the two seemed to run into all sorts of trouble, all of which Shazam resolved. He helped a woman when she was being mugged, stopped a bank robbery and punched out a man who wanted to rob a store. All the while, they tried to use Billy's adult appearance to achieve goals such as getting money to drink beer. A spirit called Francesca appeared in a mirror to warn Shazam of the emergence of Black Adam, but Billy believed he was just hallucinating. Eventually, Billy got into a fight with Freddy after he told him he didn't want to go home or change back into his teenage form, and the two split up.
When he was alone, Shazam was finally found by Black Adam who attacked him without remorse. Billy managed to escape by changing back into his mortal form and hid in the zoo with a tiger he regularly visited called Tawny. Freddy told his foster-siblings what had happened, and they found Billy and convinced him to turn back into Shazam to stop Black Adam. They traveled to the metro station to try to return to the Rock of Eternity. There, Francesca spoke to Billy again, and she told him how Black Adam came to be.
Francesca showed Billy visions of a boy and his family who were enslaved in ancient Kahndaq, a country in the East where all magic originated from. The boy was forced to work in mines until his uncle saved him from a guard. The two tried to escape, but in the process they were found by the Council of Wizards. There, the Wizard decided to grant his power to the boy and give him a connection to the Living Lightning, but he refused and wanted to share it with his injured and dying uncle to save him; a wish the Wizard granted.
Seeing this, Billy thought that Black Adam was the boy of ancient times, a lost child just like he was. Not listening to Francesca's pleas, Billy ran out to meet Black Adam, revealing his mortal form to the other champion. In an attempt to talk Adam out of his unholy crusade, Billy tried to appeal to Adam's emotions but was rebuffed. There, Adam revealed that he was not in fact the boy, but the uncle. He killed his nephew when he learned that he did not want to use his powers for revenge.
Billy enough time to transform into Shazam. Billy faced his nemesis only to find that Adam had caught his foster siblings. Black Adam ordered Shazam to give him all of his power or he would kill his siblings. Billy remembered a piece of advice the Wizard had told him in his final moments, "Family is what it can be, not what it should be." Shazam realized that this was the secret spell, and he granted all of his siblings the ability to wield the Living Lightning.
They all tried to overpower Black Adam together, but were forced to split up when the Seven Deadly Sins, whom Sivana gathered together, were unleashed upon the city. They summoned a demon which started to destroy the city. Shazam and Adam continued their battle while the other Vasquez children fought off the demon and rescued civilians. Shazam and Black Adam arrived at the zoo where Tawny tried to help Billy and attack Adam. Fearing for the tiger's life, Shazam enchanted him, but the spell backfired and broke the balance of his existing enchantments and his siblings instantly started to feel a loss of power.
Knowing that physically he was no match for Black Adam, Billy turned back into his mortal form and started goading Adam to do the same. The old champion did so in rage, unwillingly killing himself. Because he had not changed back in centuries, his mortal form aged hundreds of years in a single moment, causing his body to turn to dust. The Seven Deadly Sins retreated and the city was saved. In the aftermath, Billy grew closer with his new family.
Trinity War
After the defeat of Black Adam, Billy gathered his ashes and kept them in a jar. Understanding his enemy and even growing to respect him, Billy decided to honor him by burying his remains in Kahndaq. Unfortunately, the country was a war zone and no intruders were allowed, and, by deciding to go there, Shazam unwittingly sparked the existing tension between the Justice League, Justice League Dark and Justice League of America.
With all three Leagues in a fight and Shazam without a team, John Constantine lured Billy away from the battle with the promise of knowledge of his real family. Constantine, though, successfully managed to steal Shazam's powers to fight a demon, leaving Billy powerless. Together though, Billy and Constantine managed to kill the demon, and Shazam's powers were returned to him - not without hard feelings though.
Deciding to rejoin the battle for Pandora's Box, Shazam touched the Box himself and was corrupted by the evils within. The Box was wrestled from his hands by the other Leaguers, and Billy was returned to normal. Concluding the battle, the Box was revealed to open a portal to Earth 3, allowing the Crime Syndicate to enter their world and trap Shazam, as well as most of the other heroes present, inside the Firestorm Matrix as they prepared to dominate the world.
A few days later, Shazam was released from the Firestorm Matrix after the Crime Syndicate were defeated by Lex Luthor and his Injustice League.
Justice League and the Darkseid War
Following the defeat of the Crime Syndicate, Lex Luthor took it upon himself to rebuild the Justice League Watchtower and turn a new leaf, becoming a hero and inviting himself to join the Justice League.
In addition to adding himself to the roster, Luthor invited Shazam to join as well, and the two were eventually approved. As a Justice League member, Shazam helped the team fight and recruit the newest Power Ring as well as handle the outbreak of the Amazo Virus.
When Grail brought a war between her father Darkseid and the Anti-Monitor to Earth that resulted in her father's death, the effects caused a shockwave in the gods throughout the universe. Billy was then summoned to the center of his powers and learned that he was in fact the God of Gods. The Wizard that originally gave Billy his powers informed him that, because of Darkseid's death, the connection to the gods inside of him was severed. In response, the Wizard replaced the gods inside of Billy with new gods to derive his powers from: S'ivaa, H'ronmeer, Anapel, Zonuz, Atë, Mamaragan.
The Justice League, with Shazam among them, managed to fend off the war on their world after the Anti-Monitor was killed as well.[2] With the world back to normal, Shazam decided to leave the Justice League.
Doomsday Clock
In the wake of the chaos caused by the Superman Theory, the bulk of the superhero community traveled to Mars to confront Doctor Manhattan. Billy and the rest of the Shazam Family were amongst these heroes. The combined efforts of Earth's heroes were no match for Manhattan, and they were quickly wiped out.
The Seven Magiclands
After stopping a robbery at the Museum of the American Revolution, Billy and his Family went to the Rock of Eternity where they found The Station with a map that showed the Magiclands. The Family entered a train and traveled to the Funlands with Billy hoping to discover more about why they have their powers, instead they met King Kid, the ruler of the Funlands who claimed to be the Missing Seventh Champion of the Family.
King Kid explains some of the other lands and how they were nearly destroyed by Mister Mind years ago, Billy told King Kid that he can't choose him as a champion until he really feels it in his heart.[6] After they mentioned returning home, King Kid had his clowns captured the Family and sent some of them to other lands while both Billy and Mary were taken to The Below to work as slaves of the Funlands.[7] Billy tried to reason with King Kid, but after he refused Billy freed Mary and took away the gag they put in her mouth to prevent her front saying the magic word, once transformed, they both fought against King Kid and his army.
Billy and Mary later attempted to go to the other lands in order to rescue their brothers but due to the battle between Black Adam and Doctor Sivana on the Rock of Eternity they instead got transported back to their foster home, there he finds out that his biological father has come back for him. His father explains why he didn't come back for him earlier while Mary reveals to their foster parents that they're the Shazam Family. In an attempt to rescue his brothers, Billy goes to the Rock of Eternity but ends up being sent to the Darklands where he was briefly reunited with The Wizard who had been resurrected, the wizard tells him that here is an impostor afoot and that he needs to reunite his family.
In the Darklands he meets the ghost of champions, who patrols around the Darklands for anyone who doesn't belong there to sent them back to their home before anything happens to them, he tries to ask a favor from Billy but the rest of the Ghost Family stop him and tell Billy that near the Bell Tower there's a way home, in the tower he finds Freddy and Darla along with a humanoid tiger and they all go back their foster home. Once Billy finds out his father is being attacked by the Seven Deadly Sins and Black Adam he transfers his powers to him making him the seventh champion. Billy and his father fight the Deadly Sins and Black Adam before they are joined by Mary, when their powers start to fail the Wizard sends the three to the Wozenderlands. There the wizard brings the other members of the Shazam Family and tells Billy that because his heart is torn on who are his real family, the connection that makes him share his powers is not working. Billy doesn't want to choose and claims that because he is the champion he can decide how the spell works, so he manages to share the powers of Shazam through all other six members, something that the Wizard though it was impossible.
When Doctor Sivana allows King Kid and the Funlands access to Philadelphia while they unlock the Monsterlands, the Shazam Family go and stop King Kid's army. Billy later witnesses the Wizard attacking his father which infuriates him making him turn into Shazam to attack the Wizard, he's soon helped by the rest of his Family before sending him back to the Rock of Eternity. When his father is attacked by Black Adam, his father uses a spell to separate Adam's soul from his body, realizing that his father can't possibly know a spell like that, Billy deduces that Mister Mind isn't on Sivana but in his father's body since he arrived, Mister Mind then realizes the Monster Society from the Magiclands on the Earthland.
After Mister Mind reveals to Billy that his father wasn't looking for him, but was rather a street pickpocket thief, he forces Billy to read a spell that unites all the seven lands, Billy also casts a spell to make himself smaller and fight Mister Mind inside his father's head. He beats Mind and in the process knocks out all the other enemies except for Superboy-Prime, who was trapped in the Monsterlands and was freed after Billy's spell that united the other lands. Prime stops Billy from casting a spell to separate all the other lands, he beats all the other members from the Shazam family but is later punched by Black Adam, both Billy and Adam team up and they manage to take down Prime by summoning both of their lightnings by saying the magic word. He then separates the lands once again, lets his father go after finding out the truth and takes Superboy to the Justice League. Billy also spares Adam and makes him a new member of the Shazam Family.
Secret Six
Sometime later, Billy was confronted by the Batman Who Laughs, an evil version of Batman from a dark and twisted universe. The One Who Laughs used a special batarang on Billy, which infected him, turning Billy into a Joker-like version of himself. The Batman Who Laughs tasked Billy with infecting Superman using one of these special batarangs.
Billy made his way to the Batman Who Laugh's Batcave and awaited the arrival of Superman. Eventually Superman arrived to the scene with Batman, prompting Billy to immediately transform and attack them.[18] Although Shazam was more than a match for the pair when they fought one-on-one, he was eventually overwhelmed and forced to retreat without completing his objective.
In his foster home, the infected Billy rudely began to insult his foster family. After getting into an argument with the Vasquezs, Billy was confronted by Mary who tried to get him to open up to her, but Billy didn't listened, he transformed and flew away, although not before telling Mary that none of them were worthy of being his family. Billy found the Titan Atlas and attacked him in order to test his new limits, leaving the Titan badly beaten.
After meeting multiple gods, King Shazam was intercepted by Mary as Lady Shazam in the middle of his battle with the Greek God of War Ares. Billy fought his foster sister and even got Mary to lower her guard by playing innocent, only so he could punch her in the gut and infect her with the same corruption that was affecting him.
Billy was returned back to normal along with the other heroes thanks to Lex Luthor cutting off the source of the Dark Metal that infected him.
Titans Academy
Billy eventually became a student at the Titans Academy, there he met Miguel Montez and the two became roommates. Billy was also experimenting some problems with his powers, as the Rock of Eternity had moved from his usual place and The Wizard was nowhere to be found. During an incident he lost his powers mid flight and had to be saved by Superman, revealing his identity to everyone at the academy. Billy later got visited by Mary, who told him that Freddy's condition was getting worse, as he had a debilitating neurological disorder and the Shazam Family lost his powers too. After overhearing from a secret meeting between the Titans and Doctor Fate that the Rock of Eternity was on the Underrealm, Billy decided to go there and was accompanied by Dane.
They went to the Casino de Dante Carlo and the two separated, Billy later met Amoreena while asking for the location of the Rock of Eternity. Billy and Dane both went into conflict with Sulibak and his gang after Dane cheated on an already rigged game. While escaping, Billy received help from Amoreena who revealed she was Sulibak's daughter, he also managed to find the Rock of Eternity. With the source of his powers closer to him, he managed to transform once again and fight Sulibak until his powers started to fail again, though he was saved by Dane.
