I went into the theater to see this, thinking it was gonna be an ok film, and left with about the same feelings.
The four aspects of the movie (Billy embracing his new family, his search for his mom, the villain's story, and the Shazam antics) had positives but seemed lacking.
Billy's interactions with the other foster children were so limited outside of his superhero persona that I never felt the familial bond between them. They all had such little dialogue and screen time shared between them. The exception being Freddy, who got the most bonding time with Billy, but again, that was mostly with his Superhero persona.
This wouldn't bother me as much if I felt like Asher Angel and Zachary Levi were playing the same character but I didn't get that either. Apart from the intro, teenage Billy seemed so dour and one note for most of the movie, while Shazam was incredibly goofy and lighthearted. Maybe if there was more screen time for the younger version that showed off more of his lighthearted traits for the adult version to match up with, I would've connected more with the character's journey, but it just wasn't there.
Also, the villain's story was pretty average. I felt like I'd seen the same plot a million times already in other superhero films. The only thing that makes it stand out from others is the darker tone. The opening scene felt so mean spirited and off that I thought I was watching something from a Zack Snyder DC film. There were definitely some tonal issues throughout. We go from goofy Shazam antics to Silvana's demons (?) ripping the heads off of people and killing his family. I think going more light-hearted would've helped for the sake of consistency.
The one highlight of the film was its humor. Zachary Levi knocked it out of the park as Shazam. The scenes with him and Freddy were incredibly entertaining, and while I thought the relationship between the two wasn't handled as best as it could've been, those scenes were great in isolation.
I'm definitely still looking forward to a sequel. With the origin story out of the way, maybe more time can be devoted to the aspects I felt were lacking. Regardless, I thought this one was just ok.