Marvel Studios' She-Hulk: Attorney at Law

I suppose I just assumed Ang Lee's Hulk was Broad Strokes canon.

Rather sad they never delved into that, it would have answered the questions about how the Hulk states go.

Bruce's questions about how he's the only one with "another guy" would be clearly stated that its a personal thing specific to him.

I have seen people bringing up the subject when Blonsky was brought in as like Jen he doesn't have "another guy" and has clear control that he can transform between human and Hulk form with no issue.

Blonsky and Jen wind up asking the question "What exactly is wrong with Bruce?"

Edited by slimcoder on Nov 5th 2022 at 12:40:50 PM

Bruce is also the only one to be "directly" Hulked Out by gamma radiation - Blonsky and Jennifer both got a derived and arguably diluted version by being exposed to his already mutated blood (or a serum based on it.)

It could be the circumstances of his empowerment affect their expression.

And Blonskey had his own rage issues. One of the to reasons for his parole IIRC was an altered mental state. But yeah, at this point, I feel like Bruce should start to realize that the mindless rage has got something to do with him, not how Hulk state should be.

Who knows, that might be explored with his son/Hulkling in Young Avengers, if it turns out that show exists in more than fan imagination...

Shower thought: I wonder if Blonsky also goes to Luke Jacobson for his custom self-help attire?

Jen handwaved her initial lawyer outfits by wearing male suits, since her She-Hulk stature and frame is relatively possible. Blonsky's height is rarer by comparison, a wide boi, and his clothes didn't seem looser in the finale.

What I took from the second episode was that Blonsky spent 20 years in prison working on his own issues until he was able to mentally integrate his Abomination self. He doesn't precisely say it that way, but it's implied. This is why he's so Zen and why he starts a meditation retreat — at least if he's being honest about that.

What's different between Blonsky and Jen is that she never took the super-soldier serum. She never got the amplification of her negative personality traits from that, and of course Bruce didn't either.

So if we think about the big picture, Bruce, Emil, and Jen all have very different Hulk experiences. Bruce tries to impose his own experience on her, and that doesn't work because they aren't the same.

Curious how Skaar and the Leader are going to factor into how different their experiences as Hulks are going to be.

Been a while since I watched The Incredible Hulk, but didn’t Ross say whatever Bruce was working on and took was derived from the serum?

Edited by Cross on Nov 5th 2022 at 7:25:59 AM

I think it was an attempt to recreate the serum actually but I could be wrong there.

I don't recall either, but that sounds true to what I do remember. I guess Jen technically got the serum by proxy by taking in Bruce's blood, but that's not brought up in the show.

I recall they went with the Ultimate origin here so Bruce's transformation into the Hulk was due to a botched attempt at recreating the super soldier serum

It never sat right with me how the Ultimate universe tied Hulk to the Super Soldier Serum.

I don't know about The Incredible Hulk, but I know that in The Avengers Nick Fury tells Cap that Bruce tried to recreate the super soldier serum and thought that gamma radiation was the missing ingredient. So, a failed Captain America serum is the canon Hulk origin for the MCU.

The MCU started out as an Ultimate Marvel adaptation for the most part, with the worst parts of Ultimate Marvel ironed out of course. Now it's borrowing more from classic 616 Marvel.

Though the Ultimate material is still firmly in place, most prominently seen in Hawkeye who is a straight adaptation of his Ultimate self with only his ultra-violence and conservative leanings excised

The Hawkeye show makes it clear that he has no carnie background nor was he trained by Swordsman.

The Super Soldier serum actually makes perfect sense if you buy the belief it is some sort of morphogenic field for the soul.

1. Bruce's huge anger issues make him the Hulk

2. Blonsky becomes a literal monster

3. Jenn is just her best self because she's closer to Steve.

Though that's what Gamma already did in the source material. If you survive exposure to it anyway.

In Leader's case I think it was he wanted to be smart so he wound up a diabolical mastermind at the cost of a physically stunted body

To be specific, he wanted to be smart like his brother who was a scientist.

Did we ever meet the Leader's brother in the comics?

• googles* Oh, yeah, Madman. Kind of a D-list Hulk villain, no wonder I didn't remember him.

It is bizzare to me that Smart Hulk doesn't seem to understand that his DID predates his gamma accident. He's had fifteen years of therapy, including DBT and has intergrated the Hulk and Banner personalities but still hasn't stumbled upon his childhood or why the Hulk and the Banner exist seperatly? Or maybe he does understand it, he just hopes that secretly everyone else is like him, at least a little bit.

I kind of resent how much The Incredible Hulk stayed so clear of the introspective nature of Ang Lee's Hulk. The cerebral nature of the character is the most interesting part of it for me, and it's just not found a space in 14 years of MCU.

Of all the problems Ang Lee's Hulk had (Bruce's characterisation, the action sequences, cinematography and the weird decision to have everyone whispering constantly) the decision to focus on the Hulk being a personification of child truama was one of it's strengths (the villain and the soundtrack was also amazing).

what was wrong with Bruce's characterization? It was more or less accurate to the comics. I also don't see any issue with the action sequences.

Bruce just isn't relatable in that film to me. He's also withdrawn to the point of being hard to really get a feel for.

As for the action sequences, while I really like the final fight against absorbing dad for how inventive and even abstract it was at times, ot really felt like a good conclusion to that film's conflict.

However, the previous fights against the dogs and the millitary are kind of lackluster for me and don't fit the rest of the film in tone. For one the physicality of the Hulk didn't really make him seem particularly savage, he's pretty much a quiet kid trying to make sure he and Betty are left alone, which would be a fine reading for the Hulk if all the cerebral stuff around those scenes didn't treat him as much more of a force of nature.

I did like the pilot trying to suffocate the Hulk by flying as high as they could with him latched to his cockpit.

I think part of the issue is that a lot of people seem to forget what the Hulk's "deal" is, which is the fact the Hulk is a Misunderstood Monster. The Hulk should never harm the innocent or be a threat to them. He's the original X-man in that he's being hunted and tormented by society for something he MIGHT do, not something he actually has done.

A friend of mine said the ideal short Hulk scene should be the Hulk stumbling upon a bunch of criminals or a predator menacing someone, throwing the criminals away, and then the person he rescued screaming then running away.

Hmm... I guess it depends on where you started reading. I've read The Hulk as being everything from the misunderstood innocent to being a werewolf analogue (not inherently evil, but will cause damage if pressed or if you get in the way) to actually being inherently evil (I remember there was a recent series that revealed that the whole "Hulk" thing was basically an eldritch evil). I will agree that narratively, the "misunderstood innocent" is more satisfying in that we, as the reader, know that The Hulk would be fine if people just stopped hassling him, but rustle his jimmies they will.