If there is a forgotten red-headed (or green-skinned) stepchild of the Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU) it's 2008's The Incredible Hulk. Opening just six weeks after Iron Man, but five years after Ang Lee's unloved 2003 take on the Jade Giant, Hulk (Hulk Dogs, anyone?), it's been seemingly Memory Holed because the role of Bruce Banner was recast by Joss Whedon for 2012's The Avengers with Mark Ruffalo replacing Edward Norton and going on to appear in or voice over a dozen more MCU films and TV shows while Norton hangs out with Terrence Howard, the original Rhodey.
It's also not that great a movie and as the only solo Hulk film (due to distribution rights being held by Universal though Marvel could use the character in as many other projects as they wanted to), but with the villain of the 35th MCU film, Captain America: Brave New World, being someone from the MCU's 2nd film, it was time to revisit the stepchild footnote in case I ever felt like watching CA:BNW - something that considering I've only seen two of the 13 Phase 4 & 5 movies in the theater and haven't even bothered watching a couple, so precipitous has the quality dropoff been for Kevin Feige's woketarded M-She-U, which remains a coin toss. Mostly it was because I'd used Google Opinion Rewards credits to buy it 5-1/2 years ago on digital 4K and never watched it and probably haven't seen it since getting the Blu-ray in 2008.
After recapping the Hulk's gamma radiation experiment origin story during the opening credits - note to Batman movie makers: We don't need to see Bruce Wayne's parents' murder portrayed ever again; we know what happened - we join Norton's Banner hiding out in the favelas of Rio de Janeiro, where he works under-the-table at a soft drink bottling plant. It's been five months since he's had an "incident" (i.e. gotten all green and ragey), but he remains on the lam after injuring Gen. Thaddeus "Thunderbolt" Ross (William Hurt in his first of five MCU appearances before passing away in 2022 & Harrison Ford assuming the role in CA:BNW) and his daughter, also Bruce's girlfriend, Betty Ross (Liv Tyler), five years earlier. He's learning techniques to control his anger & response to stress and communicating via secure satellite with someone called "Mr. Blue" who may be able to help develop a cure for Hulkness.
After an accident causes a bottle of pop to be contaminated with his blood, afflicting an old man in the USA (Stan The Man Lee in one of his many cameos), Ross traces the pop back to its source and sends a team led by Emil Blonsky (Tim Roth) to capture him. Naturally, it goes sideways with Banner Hulking out and escaping, waking up in Guatemala. (How did he travel over 4000 miles through a half-dozen countries including the Amazonian jungle? Hey, shut up.) He then hikes up through Mexico to get back home where he hopes to retrieve the data from his experiments to send to Mr. Blue.
Despite his efforts to stay hidden from Betty, she spots him and chases him down. While she's moved on and is dating Ty Burrell from Modern Family (playing the Bill Pullman role, IYKYK), she clearly still loves Bruce. Fortunately, she saved the data he's looking for when Daddy Thunderbolt was packing up their lab after the accident. Unfortunately, when Bruce sends the data to Mr. Blue, the email is picked up by S.H.I.E.L.D.'s surveillance nets and Ross plans another attempt to trap Bruce.
This time his sleeve ace is intended to be Blonsky, who has been dosed with a version of Captain America's Super Soldier serum that they attempted to recreate the lost formula. When the mission fails again, almost killing Betty and Blonsky, the serum is the only reason he survives the blow Hulk deals him. If a little serum worked somewhat, then surely pumping a ton of it into him will make him stronger, right? Nope, as the flawed formula transmogrifies Blonsky into Abomination, a monster so strong and violent that Ross has to allow Bruce to Hulk out to fight him in the climatic battle.
It's interesting seeing how humble the MCU's earliest efforts were - if not for the Nick Fury and Tony Stark end credits cameos and the passing references to Stark Industries or S.H.I.E.L.D. there'd be no hints Iron Man and The Incredible Hulk were connected - when Marvel Studios was simply trying to independently produce their own films with the characters they hadn't licensed to Fox (X-Men, Fantastic 4, Daredevil, etc.) or Sony (Spider-Man).
We forget that Iron Man, Hulk, Thor, and Captain America were considered second-string characters compared to Spidey and Wolverine and that The Avengers wasn't a sure thing to happen, much less succeed, when the first Iron Man hit theaters in 2008. Sandwiched between Iron Man in May and The Dark Knight in July, The Incredible Hulk was in meaningfulness trouble even before the change in casting.
Director Louis Leterrier was coming off a trio of Luc Besson-penned actioners - the first two Transporter flicks & the underrated Jet Li showcase Unleashed - and he does a good job taking the job seriously when most early-Aughts comic book movies still treated them as trifles; something that'd change with the one-two punch of Iron Man and The Dark Knight which cast top-shelf actors and took the stories seriously. The first act plays more like a monster movie, especially in the first Hulk sequence which keeps him in the shadows or obscured by smoke, as he snatches the soldiers and tosses them like dolls. The aftermath of Bruce's Hulk-outs is shown as leaving him weakened, begging for alms, vulnerable. Norton's occasionally twitchy performance is leavened here. (As annoying as he is in real life, Ruffalo was a big upgrade.)
The problem is the script by Zak Penn (Elektra, X-Men: The Last Stand) is subpar and one-note, begging lots of questions like how did Bruce connect with Mr. Blue, whom he finally meets and learns is Samuel Sterns, who after exposure to Bruce's blood is shown having his head swell in a quick shot setting up a payoff that wouldn't come for another 17 years and 33 movies, returning as CA:BNW's villian, The Leader. (As bad as that seems, Blonsky didn't reappear until the woeful Mouse+ series She-Hulk in 2022 as a joke character.) What does Betty do other than look limpid, though that's due to Liv Tyler's minimal thespian skills?
Another stumbling point is the visual effects. The 2003 Hulk suffered from poor VFX, especially the shade of green on Hulk - reportedly it looked great in black & white and for a time they considered doing the comics' Gray Hulk - and rubbery Gumby physics, but while the effects here are an improvement they still look plasticky and weightless like a videogame cutscene, especially the final battle with Abomination. Just a year-and-a-half later Avatar would nail realistic-looking skin complexion and by 2012's The Avengers and the Ruffalo-based Hulk, the quibbles about how it looks were gone.
One arguably better aspect is the moody, intentional cinematography. Recent VFX-laden films are often criticized for flat, washed-out color palettes. This often gets blamed on the predominance of digital cameras, but it's more often due to so much of the frame being filled with pixels added months later, live elements are shot in manner mimicking bright overcast with minimal shadows and flat contrast so they can composite in the backgrounds. The downside is that it looks and feels artificial.
Because so much of the film is film practically on locations - hilariously, Yonge Street in downtown Toronto is used to represent Harlem by hanging an Apollo Theater marquee off a building next to famed Toronto strip club Zanzibar (which inspired the club in Flashdance!); it's also the same block in the first Suicide Squad where Joker and Harley are driving the purple Lamborghini - with extras and wreckage and explosions, only having Hulk and Abomination added, the 4K HDR10 presentation has really deep contrast and rich colors, at times bordering on noirish. Night scenes look better than daylight, especially the Hulk battle against the army at the college where daylight doesn't do the CGI many favors.
Audio wise, in addition to no Dolby Vision there is no Dolby Atmos audio, but the DD+ track has good bass extension to lend a whallop to the gunfire and Hulk smashing. For some reason there are zero extras included with this release. I checked both iTunes and Movies Anywhere and all the commentary, deleted scenes, BTS content, etc. that came on the Blu-ray is omitted here.
While I'm lukewarm on The Incredible Hulk as a movie, it's a very good digital 4K release. However, the deeper color and HDR comes at the expense of a barebones movie-only release. Frankly, I'd recommend the Blu-ray over this if you can get it for the same price under $10 because of the better audio physical has over streaming and extras.
Score: 5/10. Catch it on streaming/cable.
The first scene in the trailer isn't even in the movie.
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