For almost 20 years, the character Captain Marvel and his family and friends languished in comic book limbo. Then, in 1972, DC Comics came to an agreement to publish the adventures of the Marvel Family, but had to use the title, Shazam, as Marvel Comics now owned the Captain Marvel name, and was publishing their own character using that very name.

In 1973, DC published the first issue of Shazam, and added all the Fawcett stories to their own continuity, saying all those adventures took place on a parallel world called Earth-S. The 20-year gap between stories was explained in the first DC issue, as the evil genius, Dr. Sivana had apparently captured the Marvel Family and trapped them in an elemental creation of his called "suspendium."

DC's revival of the Fawcett heroes was very well-done, featuring top-name writers and artists such as Denny O'Neil, E. Nelson Bridwell, C.C. Beck and Kurt Shaffenberger. These men all captured the look and spirit of the Golden Age stories, but sales were sluggish on the title. When Beck left in a huff, apparently unhappy with the title's direction, after 10 issues, it was really the swansong of the book. Shazam lasted for five years and 38 issues, but never achieved the sales or acclaim of the Fawcett years.

In 1976, during the character's solo run, Captain Marvel met Superman in the pages of Justice League of America. The characters would again meet in 1978 in one of DC's 72-page giant Collector's Editions, but following the demise of his own title, the world's mightiest mortal would slip into infrequent guest appearances in other titles, and had his own back-up story in World's Finest Comics for a brief stint.

Until Crisis on Infinite Earths.

After Crisis, when all the parallel Earths in the DC Universe were "misplaced," many of the heroes on those worlds came over to Earth-1 with the rest of the current DC heroes. Captain Marvel joined the new Justice League, and even received his own title once again in 1987, titled Shazam: A New Beginning. However this title was short-lived (thankfully), as the bleak, modernized version of the Fawcett world did not hit a chord with fans.

In this title, Billy lived in San Francisco and finds the wizard Shazam in an abandoned subway tunnel, with no magic train. Sivana is Billy's uncle, and engineered the deaths of Billy's parents, using the money from their insurance policies to finance his evil experiments. This revamp also gave Billy two new cousins, Magnificus and Beautia Sivana.

Another interesting twist of the 1987 mini-series was that Billy retained his own child-like personality upon becoming Captain Marvel, making for quite an adjustment for him; a youth in a superhero's body.

In the Legends mini-series, Captain Marvel is a prominent character, and he later retires from the Justice League. (now Justice League International) Cap also had his own stories in the short-lived Action Comics Weekly.

In 1994, DC released the Power of Shazam graphic novel, where Jerry Ordway, given carte blanche with the character by DC, again revamps the origin story. He ignores the 1987 origin, instead opting to re-capture and expand upon the Fawcett traditions. In this story, Billy and Mary's parents are killed by Theo Adam after they discover a priceless scarab during an archeological dig financed by Sivana. Mary is later adopted by the Bromfields, while Billy goes to live with his crooked uncle Ebenezer who takes all his inheritance and makes the lad live on the street.

Billy is later led to Shazam's cave by the spirit of his father and upon speaking the magic word becomes the world's mightiest mortal. He manages to defeat Black Adam and ruin Sivana's financial empire.

The graphic novel's critical and financial success spawned a monthly series in 1995 of the same name. The Marvel Family is reunited, and other characters such as Sinclair Batson, Captain Nazi, Uncle Marvel, Mister Tawny, Ibis and Bulletman are also re-introduced. The series also showed a side of the wizard Shazam previously unknown: his children Satanus and Blaze, sired from a liaison between the wizard and a demoness who seduced him.

Dr. Sivana and Mr. Mind also reappear in the title, once again cementing their claims as official thorns in the Marvel Family's side.

Since the monthly series ended, Captain Marvel has once again been relegated to crossover appearances in the DC Universe, but at least the company seems to be treating the character with respect. Marvel appears in the Underworld Unleashed mini-series as the object of the villain's desire: the "noblest soul of all." And in the alternate-reality series Kingdom Come, while Captain Marvel is on the side of the villains, he makes the supreme sacrifice to save the world.

More recently, Captain Marvel and Mary Marvel have been recurring characters in JSA and JLA titles, Captain Marvel Jr. appears in Outsiders and Teen Titans, Dr. Sivana was the villain in an arc of Outsiders, and all the Marvels play roles in DC Countdown and the mini-series leading up to and including the upcoming DC Crisis storyline.

While suffering through many stops and starts during their DC span, Captain Marvel and the Marvel Family remain popular characters when treated with the respect and tradition they deserve. As DC looks to its future, the company would be well-advised to include the Marvels in their plans as more than 60 years of continuity is simply too much to casually brush aside. Like Superman and Batman, Captain Marvel has been an integral part of comics history and deserves the same status of those characters.