Actor Zachary Levi appeared at New York Comic-Con today to discuss his forthcoming superhero movie Shazam. The star kicked off his Q&A by warning the audience not to get his character — who was once known as Captain Marvel — confused with Brie Larson’s Captain Marvel. He then discussed the film’s tone in comparison to previous DC movies, talked about dealing with controversy surrounding the suit, and compared Shazam to The Goonies. With his quotes as follows…

Getting the Tone Right

“With every project, you have to be true to that project, and I think what was really fortunate for us with Shazam was it was really built into the story. You can’t make a movie about a 14-year-old that has the magic power to turn into a superhero, and make that too dower and glum. There’s a lot of fun and levity just built into it. So we didn’t really have to try. It just naturally came across.

“As far as the DC Universe and all that is concerned, you have to do right by every character, and I think people who have made these films have genuinely tried to do the best they could and I think with Wonder Woman we saw a lot of levity, we saw a lot of heart, because Gal Gadot is effervescent. She can’t not be that. So I think we’ve already seen some of that. And I think Justice League had some really fun, funny moments throughout. We just happen to be a movie that doesn’t skew younger, it just possesses younger in its nature. So it just is infused with it.”

Shazam = The Goonies

“It’s a lot of wish fulfilment and a lot of fun and a lot of heart and a lot of levity. I don’t know if anyone else felt this way, but when I was watching it [the trailer]… it delighted me. I felt joy. I felt the way that I felt when I was a kid when I was watching The Goonies. There was something very adventure-y about it.”

Suit Controversy

“As far as the suit is concerned and the strange hubbub that happened around that, it’s difficult to have an image. It’s one snapshot. There’s very little information. So we anticipated that there would be people who would be split on that. Then I think the trailer answered a lot of questions and gave a much more rounded idea of what the tone was, of what the movie was. Ultimately my character is the manifestation of what a 14-year-olds idea of a superhero is. So that’s why I look so dope!”

Connecting with the Fans

“You have to do right by the art of it. You have to do right by the character. You have to do right by the storyline. But I thin that the step that a lot of people miss was the conversation between the artists and the fans. Because there’s a lot of questions, and they are valid questions, and valid concerns, and I don’t think as an artist you are just somehow immune to answering questions. I think oftentimes it’s really great to do that… I like to be able to cross that boundary.”

Matching With His Younger Self in the Movie

“[Referencing actor Asher Angel] He’s everything I wish I was when I was 14. Unfortunately you would hope that you had months and months to study each other, and we had like a day. But we had meetings and rehearsals, and then it was a matter of trusting [director] David [Sandberg] and the proof will be in the pudding when the movie hits on April 5th.”