This is my favorite comic book character from when I was a child. I loved the comics and tv show. It'd be great to see a decent movie treatment but sadly, I don't think it'll happen. I think his origins are just as interesting, if not more so, than Superman's. I could be wrong, but I think Captain Marvel is the stronger of the two, as he's "The World's Mightiest Mortal", as opposed to Superman, "The Man Of Steel." That's a never-ending debate.
I won the 1970's DC series from my brother on a Super Bowl bet. It may have been Super Bowl IX and he chose his then favorite team, the Minnesota Vikings. The Vikings lost Super Bowl VIII, too, but I don't think that was the year we made our bet. The bet was if I won, I'd get the comics, if I lost, I'd have to do his chores for a month.
I came across a Captain Thunder cover recently and also a couple of Superman vs. Shazam! covers. I remember reading the former, but not the latter.
This is what Wikipedia has on Captain Thunder:
Captain Thunder (1974)
In Superman #276 (June 1974), Superman found himself at odds with "Captain Thunder", a superhero displaced from another Earth and another time. Thunder had been tricked by his archenemies in the Monster League of Evil into doing evil by a magic spell, and Thunder therefore was made to do battle with Superman. Captain Thunder, whose name was derived from Captain Marvel's original moniker, was a thinly veiled pastiche of Marvel; down to his similar costume, his young alter ego named "Willie Fawcett" (a reference to the publisher of the original Captain Marvel stories, Fawcett Comics), and a magic word ("Thunder!") which was an acronym for seven entities and their respective powers. He got his power from rubbbing a magic belt buckle with a thunder symbol on it and saying "Thunder." He got his powers from Tornado (power), Hare (speed), Uncas (bravery), Nature (wisdom), Diamond (toughness), Eagle (flight), and Ram (tenacity). Superman held him while he used his wisdom to escape the effects of the spell.
At the time of Superman #276, DC had been publishing Shazam! comics for two years, but had kept that universe separate from those of its other publications. The real Captain Marvel would finally meet Superman in Justice League of America #137, two years later (although he met Lex Luthor in Shazam! #15, November/December 1974).
Source:
Shazam! DC Comics
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