"The Incredible Hulk" is a bit of an odd film in that it's technically a sequel to the first one but with a completely different cast and a few noticeable changes meaning it's probably easier to classify as a reboot. It would also prove to be Edward Norton's one and only film as the Hulk with Mark Ruffalo taking over the role in time for Bruce Banner's next appearance in the first Avengers film. However, it received better reviews than its predecessor and performed respectably at the box office so let's see how its held up in the intervening ten years, shall we?
Five years on from the events of the first Hulk film and Bruce Banner is still holed up in South America and is now working as an electrician in a bottling plant. As he has worked out that he transforms into the Hulk when his heartbeat goes over 200bpm, he is doing everything he can to try and prevent that happening including yoga and meditation which has helped him keep things under control for the previous five months. He's also in e-mail contact with a scientist colleague who is trying to develop a serum with the pair using the alter egos "Mr Blue" and "Mr Green".
Banner's cover is blown when he cuts his finger working on the production line one day with a drop of his blood falling into the pop bottle. When a man in Wisconsin (that'd be Stan Lee doing his cameo) drinks the bottle he becomes sick with gamma radiation poisoning which alerts "Thunderbolt" Ross (played in this film by William Hurt) who traces the bottle to its plant and sends a division led by British Royal Marine Emil Blonsky (Tim Roth) down to Rio to arrest Banner. Initially Bruce tries to escape from his flat to the bottling plant where he runs into a gang of men from work who have been trying to rough him up for a while and start laying into him. Of course, that causes his heart rate to go to 200bpm and...well, you can probably guess the rest but it begins with "Hulk" and ends in "smash"...
Banner wakes up in Venezuela (wow, that must've been some night) and, realising that he's been forced to go on the run again, Banner flees to Mexico and from there back to the States and his hometown of Culver in Virginia. Crashing at his friend Stan's local pizzeria, his plan is to sneak on to campus (watch out for a cameo here from the original Hulk Lou Ferrigno as a security guard!) and recover his research by logging on to Betty Ross, his one-time girlfriend and research partner's account. Unfortunately but predictably, the research has long since been deleted and Bruce prepares to leave town and continue his search for an answer elsewhere.
However, on his way out of the pizza restaurant, he unexpectedly runs into Betty who's played by Liv Tyler in this film. Luckily for Bruce, she has a spare copy of the research at her house on a USB stick and gives it to him to take with him. Unfortunately I have to say here that Tyler's acting is well and truly dire in this film as she sounds like she's just got off a six month course of EST for most of it - I dunno what's happened because she's normally a good actress.
Ross Sr manages to track down Banner to the university after a tip off from Betty's suspicious boyfriend and Blonsky and his team turn up to ambush Bruce and Betty as they're heading for the bus depot. En route, Blonsky has managed to get hold of a dose of the serum which originally transformed Banner (a variant of the "Super Soldier" serum that created Captain America...but more on that in a few weeks' time) from Ross which has given him enhanced power and speed but he's still no match for the Hulk who throws him full velocity into a tree pretty much breaking every bone in his body.
Bruce and Betty go on the run and eventually hole up in a forest cave outside the city. Bruce decides that his best shot now he has the data he needs is to contact Mr Blue, revealed to be a New York biochemist called Samuel Sterns, the pair head for the Big Apple. Ross gets word of their movements and sends a miraculously healed Blonsky, now dosed up with a second helping of the serum, and his team after them.
Arriving in New York, Bruce and Betty meet up with Sterns who puts him in a room and carries out a Hulk transformation before injecting him with a dose of antidote which turns him back to normal. Afterwards, Sterns explains that he's been keeping Banner's blood samples that he was sending him in his lab and believes that they could have the potential to be a huge benefit to the world of medicine. Bruce, however, isn't so sure and orders him to destroy them as he doesn't want them weaponised. Unfortunately that's the cue for Ross' troops to turn up, shoot Banner with a sedative dart and take him and Betty away.
However, after he's left the lab, Blonsky corners Sterns and has a word with him, asking if he could have a dose of the serum he's been working on. Sterns says no but Blonsky, whose sanity has well and truly gone walkabout since he started taking the serum, threatens him. The dose causes Blonsky to transform into the Abomination, a giant Godzilla-type beast who's just as powerful as the Hulk. He beats the living daylights out of Sterns who also ends up infected with the serum causing him to start mutating (presumably into the Leader as per the comics which makes me wonder if he would have been the main villain had a sequel happende) before going on the rampage through New York. Realising the monster he's unleashed, Ross agrees to let Banner go as the Hulk is the only one who has any hope of taking the Abomination down and thus the stage is set for the final "Rampage" style confrontation. Which I'm not gonna spoiler here.
Although it's not perfect, this is still a big improvement from the 2003 Ang Lee Hulk film with a plot that's much easier to follow and much better action sequences (let's be honest, the previous film hardly had any at all). The things wrong with it - it arguably goes over into being a bit too simplistic at times and the acting is very uneven (Roth is great as Blonsky, Norton is decent as Banner but as we mentioned earlier, Tyler is well below par as Betty - to be honest, they'd have done better to ask Jennifer Connelly who was one of the few decent things about the first film back). Looking back, it's still probably the weakest of the 20 MCU films so far but even so, it's still a more than respectable effort by the standards of what we've seen so far in this blog. There's lots of nice little knowing nods to the '70s Hulk TV series and films as well - watch out for the old Hulk end theme playing while Bruce is in Mexico and the student photographer called Jack McGee who captures the Hulk's fight with Blonsky at the Uni on his cellphone!
However, this is the last Hulk-based film to date - as we mentioned earlier, Norton decided against filming a sequel and, with the new Mark Ruffalo-portrayed Hulk making his debut in the Avengers, the project was put on ice, initially temporarily but now seemingly for good. However, the Hulk will make a few more appearances in this blog, both in the three (and upcoming fourth) Avengers films and "Thor: Ragnarok" so don't worry, this is far from the last we'll see of the big green feller. As for this film, it's not quite up to the standards of the other MCU films but it's still a good effort and probably the strongest of the eight (count 'em!) Hulk films we've reviewed in this blog.
FINAL RATING: ✊✊✊✊✊✊✊ (7/10)
CURRENT MARVEL FILM TABLE
1. Iron Man (2008) (10/10)
2. Spiderman 2 (2004) (9/10)
3. Spiderman (2002) (9/10)
4. X-Men 2 (2002) (8/10)
5. Men In Black (1997) (8/10)
6. X-Men (2000) (8/10)
7. The Incredible Hulk (2008) (7/10)
8. Blade 2 (2001) (7/10)
9. Blade (1998) (7/10)
10. The Incredible Hulk Returns (1988) (6/10)
11. Spiderman 3 (2007) (6/10)
12. Fantastic Four - Rise Of The Silver Surfer (6/10)
13. The Trial Of The Incredible Hulk (1989) (6/10)
14. The Punisher (2004) (6/10)
15. Conan The Barbarian (1982) (6/10)
16. Elektra (2005) (6/10)
17. Conan The Destroyer (1984) (6/10)
18. X-Men: Last Stand (2006) (6/10)
19. Blade Trinity (2004) (6/10)
20. Men In Black 2 (2000) (6/10)
21. The Incredible Hulk (1977) (5/10)
22. The Fantastic Four (2005) (5/10)
23. Doctor Mordrid (1992) (5/10)
24. The Punisher (1989) (5/10)
25. Doctor Strange (1978) (5/10)
26. Nick Fury: Agent Of SHIELD (1998) (4/10)
27. The Fantastic Four (1994) (4/10)
28. Hulk (2003) (4/10)
29. Red Sonja (1985) (4/10)
30. Captain America 2: Death Too Soon (1979) (4/10)
31. Spiderman (1977) (4/10)
32. Ghost Rider (2007) (3/10)
33. Bride of the Incredible Hulk (1978) (3/10)
34. The Death Of The Incredible Hulk (1990) (3/10)
35. Man-Thing (2005) (3/10)
36. Return of the Incredible Hulk (1978) (3/10)
37. Spiderman: The Dragon's Challenge (1979) (3/10)
38. Howard The Duck (1986) (2/10)
39. Captain America (1990) (2/10)
40. Captain America (1979) (2/10)
41. Generation X (1996) (2/10)
42. Spiderman Strikes Back (1978) (2/10)
43. Daredevil (2003) (2/10)
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