Conversation so far:
What happened to Captain Marvel in the late 1980s?
The first post-Crisis appearance of Captain Marvel was in the 1986 Legends miniseries.
What did Captain Marvel do in the Legends miniseries?
re-launch the Captain Marvel mythos and bring the wizard Shazam, Dr.
Sivana, Uncle Dudley, and Black Adam into the modern DC Universe with an altered origin story.
What else did Captain Marvel do after the Legends miniseries?
Thomases, Giffen, and DeMatteis introduced into the Captain Marvel mythos was that the personality of young Billy Batson is retained when he transforms into the Captain.
Does the Billy Batson character get developed in the 1980s?
This change would remain for most future uses of the character as justification for his sunny, Golden-Age personality in the darker modern-day comic book world, instead of the traditional depiction.

Question: What was the traditional depiction of the character?
Self-contained rewrite: What was the traditional depiction of Billy Batson?