WARNING: The following contains spoilers for Shazam! #1 by Tim Sheridan, Clayton Henry, Marcelo Maiolo & Rob Leigh, on sale now
The Shazam family is one of the most closely-knit groups in the DC Universe. Their bond even played at the heart of the Shazam film, with the DC Extended Universe incarnation of Billy Batson sharing his powers with his friends and family, like Freddy Freeman.
However, that bond is threatening to break in Shazam! #1 by Tim Sheridan, Clayton Henry, Marcelo Maiolo & Rob Leigh. In fact, it appears the core DC Universe version of the family is about to suffer a serious loss. Freddy is apparently on the verge of death, and his only chance may rest with Billy venturing into Hell itself.
Recently, Billy Batson has been trying to adjust to his place within the Titans Academy. Despite his experience as a costumed hero, he's grown increasingly troubled by his inability to fully control his powers. His powers shorting out happens in front of the entire student body, exposing his identity to the other students and even allowing him to be upstaged by Jon Kent. That's when he's visited by his sister, Mary. It turns out Billy's problems with his powers have led him to stop responding to her messages, as well as the messages from their best friend Freddy Freeman. As Billy's best friend, Freddy has long had access to the powers of Shazam as well and has been a hero alongside Billy. But according to Mary, his illness has grown far worse in recent weeks.
Freddy has apparently ended up in the hospital -- with a diagnosis that only ensures a handful of weeks left at the most. Billy blames himself for his inability to connect to the powers of Shazam, which he believes could allow him to save his friend. Billy tells Mary to let Freddy know he'll see him tomorrow -- with or without his powers. But it appears that a temporal event (seemingly the Rock of Eternity sent spiraling through time by the Black Adam of the distant future) and rocketed into hell is responsible for his powers -- and the powers of the Shazam family -- being out of control. Listening to the Titans discuss this (and agree to not warn him out of fear he would do something rash), Billy does something very rash and agrees to venture into hell alongside Dane -- one of his classmates and a star pupil of Raven.
This should allow Billy to venture into hell to try and figure what's happening with his powers. However, it also sets up a step towards his Future State fate, which was a particularly gruesome one for Shazam. In the era of Future State, it was revealed that Raven was infected and possessed by the Horsemen of the Apocalypse. To contain the darkness within her, she was trapped within the Rock of Eternity, which had been relocated to hell in the present day. Billy Batson remained as her guard, while Shazam returned to Earth to try and be a hero. However, he was eventually manipulated by Neron and ultimately the prison around Raven broke -- unleashing her darkest form, the Unkindness, onto the galaxy in the distant future.
After wiping out almost all life across the entire history of reality, Black Adam was able to send the Rock of Eternity back in time -- and promises to destroy Raven before she ever became the Unkindness. It seems that fallout is now playing out for the present-day Billy Batson, and he may be able to use it to his advantage -- if he can even survive the depths of hell without any of his powers easily available to him. Even if he does succeed, there's the chance he doesn't make it back to Earth in time with his powers and misses his chance to say goodbye to one of his best friends. The clock is ticking, and Billy Batson might not have any chance to save the day this time.