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The Incredible Hulk
150 Plays4 years ago
A couple of episodes ago, we talked Ang Lee’s Hulk. So what better choice this week than its successor, the 2008 semi-sequel The Incredible Hulk? We compare it to Lee’s version, talk about the things that set it apart, and about how it’s the redheaded step-child of the MCU. Also: we react to the news that Jared Leto is returning as the Joker in Snyder’s Justice League. And we have…thoughts.
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Transcript
Audible Promotion Excitement
00:00:00
Speaker
Hey, Derek, guess what? Hit me with it. We just got a promotion with Audible. Audible, fantastic. I love Audible. Do you know what the cool thing about this deal is? What's that? If our listeners go to audibletrial.com slash supercinemapod, they get a free trial with Audible. And do you know what they get with that?
00:00:22
Speaker
What do they get with that? Tell me. They get one free audiobook of their choice and they get two free Audible Originals, which is special content that Audible makes available free for all its subscribers. Are you kidding me? That deal is so good I may go myself and sign them. Do you think they let you keep the books after you're done?
00:00:42
Speaker
No, you're not gonna tell me they let you keep the books after you're done. Yes, in fact, you can go sign up for a trial and you can cancel before the trial ends and you get to keep the books you've already downloaded.
00:00:55
Speaker
Well, I don't see how you can beat that with a stick. Exactly, yeah. And you can, lots of great books, especially for fans of the show. You can listen to Super Gods by Grant Morrison, which is all about like how the superhero comics have changed and evolved over time. Or you can check out Marvel Comics, The Untold Story. Which is a terrific book. I have that both in hardcover and I listened to that on Audible myself in my car while traveling back and forth.
00:01:21
Speaker
And there's also another similar book that's called Slugfest, which is about like the wars between Marvel and DC Comics. Oh, okay. So that's another one you got to check out too. So yeah, head on over to audibletrial.com slash supercinemapod and start your free trial right now. You got one free audio book and two free audible originals and you can keep them even if you cancel before it's over.
00:02:14
Speaker
Sir? Sir? Tell him to bring everything they've got in hand for Harlem. It has to be me. You have to take me back there.
00:02:31
Speaker
What are you saying? You think you can control? No, no, not control it, but I don't know, maybe aim it. And what if you can't? We made this thing. All of us. Please. Lando's near it. No, no. No, keep us high. Open the back door.
00:03:04
Speaker
Stop! Stop! What are you doing? Think about this. You don't even know if you'll change. You don't have to do this, please. This is insane. Betty, I've got to try. I'm sorry.
00:03:34
Speaker
you
Michael Keaton's Batman Return Speculations
00:04:18
Speaker
Welcome to the Superhero Cinephiles podcast. I am half of your host, Perry Constantine. And as always, I am the other half, Derek Ferguson. How you doing today, Derek?
00:04:27
Speaker
Oh, I'm feeling pretty good, actually. Can't complain. Today was a nice, slow day. I just stayed in the house and caught up on, you know, some writing, you know, that I had been neglecting for a while and got caught up with some household chores. You know, the usual thing, nothing special. I live a born life, folks. Trust me, I really do. I don't, I really, I don't go anywhere. Well, it's a pandemic. I don't go anywhere. I don't do anything. I don't see anybody. I just stay home and write and read and watch movies and
00:04:57
Speaker
nag my wife. So, yeah, not much going on here in my area, pretty much, you know, a lot of the same stuff. But I'm just looking at some news here. So, oh, yeah, I figured we got, we got to make this like a regular segment where, you know, before we jump into the movie. I think so. Yeah.
00:05:19
Speaker
you know, we covered the news because we did get a couple of pieces of news and one of them I saw, and I knew right away, I said, okay, Perry's gonna jump on this shit with both feet. Okay, well, let's see if I got it, because I'm just kind of like looking things over. But one of the things that jumped out to me is apparently Michael Keaton coming back as Batman isn't confirmed yet.
00:05:41
Speaker
Like he was on Jimmy Kimmel Live and he said, you know, I can't confirm anything. We're having discussions. We're talking about it and we'll see if it happens. So,
00:05:55
Speaker
So that casts a little bit of doubt on it. See, I didn't think you were going to lead with that. Oh, no. I think I know what you want me to do. I'm building up to that, because that's. Oh, OK. All right. OK. I'll go along. OK. All right. So the other thing is it looks like, which a lot of people have assumed, Flashpoint is going to be a DCEU reboot. And so.
00:06:24
Speaker
So yeah, because they're going to include characters like, you know, Ben Affleck and Gal Gadot are going to be in it, apparently. And so yeah, it could.
00:06:34
Speaker
could be in a complete reboot. Plus there's a photo from the Batman that seems to suggest the Flash logo and something else about like, you know, Superman and there might be like a Superman cameo in there as well. So yeah, so there's, it looks like Flashpoint might be like the official reboot of the DCEU. Well, I know I had seen, I think we might need to talk about it,
00:07:03
Speaker
the last time we got together was that Henry Cavill, you know, he hasn't signed for three Superman movies, but apparently he's gonna be making an appearance as Superman in three DC movies. Right, yeah.
Jared Leto's Joker in Justice League
00:07:17
Speaker
And then, now the big news, which you posted and I woke up to this morning, which, you know, thanks for ruining my day right at the start. Hey, what are you friends for?
00:07:31
Speaker
is Jared Leto is going to be coming back as the Joker in Snyder's Justice League cut. Now for me this is interesting because apparently
00:07:48
Speaker
They are taking this a couple of steps further than what we had surmised in previous episodes, whereas that we just thought, well, yeah, you know, they may just, you know, do a little tweaking here and there because the movie was finished, but apparently they are actually reshooting.
00:08:08
Speaker
or doing new scenes or whatever, you know, to go along with the existing, you know, footage that they have. Yeah. And apparently Jeff Johns has been removed as a producer from the credits of the movie as well. So that's another interesting little tidbit that came out. So, okay. So in your opinion, which, you know, I value,
Artistic Integrity and Revisiting Works
00:08:34
Speaker
What do you think this means exactly? Do you feel like they should have let, see, okay, first of all, let me tell you how I feel. I feel, you know what, there comes a point as an artist, and I know I've had discussions with people with this already, and they tell me, well, if you had a chance to go back and change something in one of your books when you do it, and I say, no, not really. Right.
00:08:56
Speaker
I leave well enough alone. And I can't go back and put myself into the mindset of the Dirk Ferguson that wrote that book four or five, six years ago. Right. Yeah. No, I'm exactly the same way because I mean, I look at my old books and I'll look at them and I'll think, oh, maybe I shouldn't have done that. Maybe I shouldn't have done that. Or maybe I should have handled this differently. And I'm thinking about because I'm trying to get my art skills up. And when I was doing
00:09:25
Speaker
When I did my master's degree, it was in creative writing and screenwriting. And my final thesis was to create a full-length screenplay. So I adapted my first Myth Hunter novel. And when I'm going back and I'm rereading the book and putting into the movie script, I changed a bunch of stuff then. But I wouldn't go back and rewrite that book.
00:09:50
Speaker
because that book is done, that's how it is. And if I adapted something else, then I'll probably change it. But otherwise, I'm not gonna go tinkering with something that's already done. Yeah, you know what? I would rather put all that energy into writing a brand new book. Right, exactly, same here. And say, okay, well, you know what? Let me see if I can do it, but better, but write a whole new book. Because like I said, now I gotta go back and put myself into
00:10:14
Speaker
my mindset of how I was at the time when I wrote that book. And I am not that person anymore. Right. And I don't know, I'm really not comfortable with this whole craze now that we got there. People want to go back and they want to fix their movies and everything. You know, once in a while, okay, I can see it in special cases like The Godfather or
00:10:36
Speaker
uh was the other one that was apocalypse now okay it's but not every movie has to be you know we don't have to treat it like you know is and i don't know well we should talk about this in numerous times and i just feel like this whole justice league thing is just way blown up more out of proportion they make
Streaming's Impact on DCEU and Theaters
00:10:54
Speaker
Everybody is making more out of it than it really is because when we come down at the end of the day, we're still just talking about it, please. And you know what I don't understand what people think this is going to lead to I mean do they, do they really think that
00:11:09
Speaker
they're going to bring Snyder back and give him control over the DCEU again, because it didn't work the first time. And even if fans want to see this movie, like, I think DC knows by now that because, you know, Wonder Woman killed at the box office, Aquaman killed at the box office, Shazam killed at the box office. All of these movies did a lot better than Suicide Squad and, you know, Batman v Superman and all that. They were much more well received. They had,
00:11:36
Speaker
you know, they kept rising, right? Because everyone, you know, what people don't remember is that even though BVS made a lot of money, it made like all its money in the first weekend. After that, it dropped like a rock because nobody wanted to go back and see it again. Right. And everybody told their friends, you know, don't see that movie. Right.
00:11:56
Speaker
So, and that's why Justice League was such a, was such a shit show because, you know, everybody remembered BBS and they're like, oh, I don't want to go see, I don't want to go see Justice League now, which is why Justice League was a total bomb. Yeah. Which is why, and I think you said it perfectly is that I don't understand where they think that they're going to lead to this other than the only thing that I can think of that they're going to get out of this is that they're going to get more subscribers for HBO max. Yeah. That's what they're doing. They're pushing that.
00:12:25
Speaker
as the streaming service for, you know, the DC universe. And this will lead to like original, you know, TV series or movies or whatever it is. That's the only upside that I can see why they're pushing this so hard because they're trying to get those people, especially with the situation with the pandemic still going on. Movie theaters, we still don't know when movie theaters are gonna open back up. Right. And they've got all of this potential content that they want to get out there.
00:12:55
Speaker
to strike while the iron is hot because you know as America is how we are. We fall out of practice of doing something for too long. We don't go back and do it. Oh, hell yeah. So movie theaters are closed for too long and people get too used to just sitting at home and watching which they are now, which I know I am. I mean, listen.
00:13:17
Speaker
And people tell me all the time, oh, don't you miss going to movies? So you know what? I'm going to be very honest with you. I've had 40 years worth of going to the movie theaters.
00:13:26
Speaker
You know, if you flew over here and we had a chance to go to the movies, yeah, fine. You know, that's one thing, but I don't know. I'm not really in no great big urgent hurry to get back to the movie theater. I'm really not. So, and I think that a lot of people feel like that now, you know, like they really, you know, hey, I can sit at home and watch this stuff. And I think the streaming services are with their ramping up
00:13:54
Speaker
especially with something like this, you know, Justice League, they're trying to commit fully into providing people with entertainment at home now instead of worrying about the movie theater. Well, I mean, it's not like when, you know, when you were growing up or even when I was growing up, because, you know, I grew up with the old projection TV screen as well, right? The old boob tube thing. So it's not like those days anymore, right? I mean, now you
00:14:19
Speaker
you know back when I was growing up I had this you know tiny little what like you know 1520 inch TV in my bedroom that was like you know kind of faded color and all that but now I mean people buy like you know 75 inch 4k TVs when they've got like home theater surround sound systems and all that and you a lot of people have
00:14:40
Speaker
perfectly serviceable or even with, you know, the virtual reality stuff like the Oculus Rift and all that kind of thing. I mean, you can have the same theater experience, you know, putting on a VR headset. Yeah. So a lot of people are trying to, they're looking at what they used to do in the theater and they're like,
00:15:00
Speaker
Well, you know, yeah, I could pay like an extra, you know, 20 bucks plus like, you know, a hundred dollars in concession stands. Cause they're always ripping you off anyway. Or I can, you know, buy a $10 buy a giant garbage bag of popcorn, eat it at home instead of my home theater. And I get to watch the movie in my underwear then. And, you know, I mean, Hey, listen, nothing beats when the movie is over. All I gotta do is walk.
00:15:26
Speaker
a few feet to go to my bed and I fall in the bed. And you know that, yeah, cause I mean upstairs and I'm not bragging folks. I'm just saying that I am a materialist and when I buy stuff, I like to buy big shit. I got, I got a 75 inch upstairs in the bay. I got one, okay, that's upstairs. And the one here that's in the basement that I'm looking at now is 50 inches. And to me, and to Marie really to my eye, I don't know. A lot of movies I see on Blu-ray, they actually look better
00:15:56
Speaker
than they did when I went to the movie theater to see them. Okay, so we had a little bit of a break there, so we're trying to jump back in. But anyway, we're talking about just like the home theater stuff, right? Right, right. And you're right in relation to, you know, the whole thing. And see, my thing is that I feel that like a lot of these studios, as I was saying, is that, you know, they got all of this content and they say, you know what, well, we got to do something with this stuff.
00:16:22
Speaker
And they just don't want to sit on it and hold on to it because they're not making any money in doing that. And then you have a gazillion streaming services now that are just dying for content. Oh, yeah. Yeah. I mean, they just had
00:16:36
Speaker
So you know that new Borat movie, apparently it's gonna be streaming on Amazon Prime for like two days, like this weekend or something like that. And then- Well, I'm not, Borat, you can miss me with that bullshit. Well, I don't know, I read some interesting
Political Intrigue in Borat's New Movie
00:16:50
Speaker
stuff. Apparently he got Giuliani in some compromising position. So, and apparently you got Giuliani in some hot water. So I'm looking forward- Oh, really? Yeah, so I'm looking forward to seeing it just because of that.
00:17:02
Speaker
Oh, okay. Cause yeah, you're right. The, the, I mean, it's, he doesn't do a whole lot for me when he's doing his Borat stick. I do think he's a good actor in general though.
00:17:13
Speaker
You know what, this guy, he is the most schizophrenic actor because when I see, I saw him in Les Miserables, he was brilliant in that. He was also in Sweeney Todd as well. Sweeney Todd, he was brilliant. He was in that, what was that? Martin Scorsese movie, you go. Whenever he's in something else, not being Borat, he's usually the best thing in the movie, if not one of the best things. But when he's doing that stupid Ali G and Borat stuff,
00:17:42
Speaker
You know, I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I can't watch him. It's just, you know. What else? He was in Talladega Nights. He was really good in that. And apparently he was in, you know, everyone's talking about the trial of the Chicago Seven right now. Yeah, yeah. I want to check that out this weekend. Apparently he plays Abby Hoffman in that.
00:18:06
Speaker
Yeah, and supposedly he's brilliant from what I've heard. Again, every time he's doing something other than his own material, he's fantastic. But when he's doing his own stuff, I just don't... He's a very schizophrenic actor. Yeah. And I did like him in Talladega Nights. Like Talladega Nights, I think is probably my favorite of all of those comedies that Will Ferrell was doing at that time.
00:18:31
Speaker
Yeah, Talladega Nights and what was it? Blades of Glory. Okay, I never saw Blades of Glory. Blades of Glory was hilarious. I like that in Talladega Night. Yeah, for some reason, I didn't think I was gonna like it and I ended up laughing my ass off. Yeah. For reasons I can't tell you why now. I have no idea. But it was funny, which is the main thing.
00:18:56
Speaker
Yeah,
Critique of Disney's Release Strategy
00:18:57
Speaker
yeah. But yeah, so he's got that, his new Borat movie is coming out this weekend on Amazon. And like, they're gonna have it free for this weekend. Netflix, I read just as well. They're doing like, they're offering like a 48 hour free thing as well. Where you can just sign up. If you're not a member or anything, you just come in and join in for 48 hours or something like that. I don't know how, I just saw something like that briefly.
00:19:23
Speaker
But yeah, you got all this stuff coming out. And I was talking with some other people and we were talking about Black Widow and like, well, would they go that? And I said, well, you know what the problem Disney did with Mulan was,
00:19:38
Speaker
Well, first off, there's all the, you know, filming it with someone who was against the Hong Kong protests and, you know, filming it in cooperation with the people who are running Whigger concentration camps. So there was that whole thing. But beyond that, they put it on Disney Plus, right? So you're telling people,
00:19:57
Speaker
Wait, I'm already paying for this service. And now I got to pay extra to watch this movie. But what they should have done is they should have just released it straight to video on demand services. Right. Yeah. Yeah. So that way people who are subscribed to Disney Plus, they're like, oh, I'll wait for it to come to Disney Plus. Or they would say like, oh, well, you know, it's on it's on iTunes or it's on Amazon or whatever. So I'll pay the 20 bucks to watch it there. And then I'll watch it again when it comes out Disney Plus like that. It was the mark. It was the packaging problem.
00:20:27
Speaker
And from stuff that I've read, my understanding that there was a lot of people who were really surprised when they actually got to see the movie because apparently they turned it into like a straight up and down adult war epic, martial arts epic. And they took out all of the singing and all of the cute, you know, all of the cuteness and all of the songs when they amped up the violence. Yeah, yeah.
00:20:51
Speaker
So I heard a lot of people, you know, of course it's sitting down with your kids, you know, to watch it. And instead of the cutesy, you know, I guess, you know, live action version of the animated movie that they got, what they got was pretty much, you know, Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon 3.
00:21:10
Speaker
yeah so and you know so it was i think they were they were hoping for a situation like that um what was that that trolls movie where like all the kids loved it and they kept begging their parents to watch it again so that parents so like that's why it made so much money because parents had to keep rent because that's in 20 bucks to rent the damn thing
00:21:27
Speaker
Yeah, yeah, yeah. I think that, yeah, that's what it was. You know, all in all, it was an experiment that, you know, Disney, and of course we know that Disney, you know, the mouse houses got all the money in the world. So it's an experiment where they could afford to lose money because they saw it as that, well, you know what? We're going to lose money on this anyway, because it's not going to be in the theater. Yeah.
00:21:52
Speaker
but let's try this and see what happens. And if it works fine, if it doesn't, cause I think that what's going to happen is that with their next big budget thing or whatever, I think you're right. They just going to release it to the regular streaming platform and say, you know, cause I think that's what they're going to do with this movie soul. That's going to be coming out Christmas day. Oh, what's this movie?
00:22:14
Speaker
It's an animated, of course it's animated, but I think it's Jamie Foxx is animating. He's a voicing animated character. I mean, I don't know much about it because I'm really, you know, I'm not much into Disney, you know.
00:22:30
Speaker
A lot of the animated stuff to me now is just, you know, it's just the same formula in different, you know, so I'm really, I don't honestly know that much about it. They're making a big deal about it because it's an animated movie with a black character, but they did with the Princess and the Frog, which really didn't impress me all that much. But again,
00:22:52
Speaker
Like I say, folks, you got to take it with a grain of salt because I recognize I'm not the target audience for those types of movies. So, you know, it just goes right past me. Well, yeah. I mean, I think Disney's learned their lesson because now you look at how Netflix is killing it with their movies that they're releasing straight to these servers. Like there was there was there was your favorite, the Chris Hemsworth movie. Oh, God. You know, but then. Oh, man. Like The Old Guard, like that one that one broke all sorts of records and that came out as well.
00:23:21
Speaker
Yeah, I fell asleep when that went to. Oh, really? I like that one. I don't know. Maybe I'm just getting old and jaded, but I said, OK, well, I'm sitting there, and I just don't understand why a bunch of immortals are living in caves and stuff like that, when they could be running entire countries. But see, that's me. If I was an immortal, yes, I'd be running an entire country. I would not be hiding out in a cave and talking about, well, I can't know.
00:23:50
Speaker
you know, I faked my death every 20 years and come back as my own son or something like, you know, some shit like that. You know, I don't know. And me, you know, I'm sorry, but I think that if the movie didn't have such a high profile name as the star, as Charlize Theron, a lot of people wouldn't have been talking about it. No, probably not. No, that's a good point. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. All right. So, um, should we jump into today's movie, which, uh,
00:24:21
Speaker
Go ahead. No, no, no. I'm just saying. Yeah. It's taking us a while to get to it, but for those of you listening, you're not, you're not privy to all the behind the scenes stuff, but I had to, I had to drive my wife to work this morning because it was usually she'll take the bus when I, when I do this show, but today it's pouring rain and her umbrella is broken. So I'm like, well, I'm not going to let my pregnant wife, you know, wait out in the bus in the rain. So I absolutely not. You gotta be, you listen, you gotta be a husband first.
00:24:48
Speaker
Yeah, yeah. And so Derek was nice enough to say, yeah, go ahead. No problem. So, so I went also, but also he's not telling you that there's some other stuff that's going on with me that frankly, none of your business, but he, but he's been more than good enough to accommodate me as well. So, you know, right. And then we started, then we got interrupted by a phone call and then he had to go take care of that. So, so yeah, it was just like, this thing just keeps getting pushed back today.
00:25:14
Speaker
Well, that's why I said, because I told my wife, I said, listen, going back down, I said, we're gonna do this episode. We're gonna do this episode coming hella high water. Hell yeah, yeah, yeah. All right, so, you know, we talked about Ang Lee's Hulk a few episodes ago, and today, Derek wanted to focus on basically the companion film to that, and that's 2008's Incredible Hulk.
The Incredible Hulk: Behind the Scenes
00:25:43
Speaker
Yeah, yeah, it's a movie that, as a matter of fact, I watched it today with Patricia, you know, she said, Oh, well, what movie are you guys doing? I said, Oh, The Incredible Hulk. She said, Oh, I don't think I've ever seen that one. I said, Really, you don't? Okay, well, you know, well, let's watch it. So I'm watching it with her. And I have a great deal of affection for this movie on several levels. The main one is that
00:26:08
Speaker
I think it's one of the best examples that I can point to of a movie that while it is not a direct sequel to the Ang Lee movie, if you close one eye, it is. And if you will be able to just give a couple of things to pass, like they have a slightly reworked abridged origin story during the credit sequence where they kind of rejig of the origin.
00:26:35
Speaker
If you, like I said, if you close one eye and you go past that, there is actually nothing in this movie that violates what we saw in the Ang Lee Hulk. Now, in fact, here's something interesting about it. So apparently 70 minutes of footage was cut from this movie. Really? That's 70, seven zero, yeah. And most of that stuff was about the origin. Like there was a whole lot of backstory that they had filmed.
00:27:04
Speaker
And, but they had like a negative test screening because they had placed some flashbacks throughout the film. And the audience said it was actually too similar to Ang Lee's Hulk. And so then what happened was Kyle Cooper, who was an editor, he also created like the flipping Marvel logo pages. He edited together a lot of this footage into that opening montage scene we see at the beginning of this movie.
00:27:34
Speaker
Ah, okay. Now there are some telltale signs because originally you're right, when Zach Penn wrote the screenplay for this movie. He did write it as a sequel to Ang Lee's Hulk.
00:27:51
Speaker
And yeah, and you can see there are a lot of similarities to that, right? You've got the, you know, the relation, the antagonistic relationship with General Ross has already established. You have Betty being a scientist. You have Bruce opening up in the beginning of the movie in South America, where we saw him, Eric Bana's Bruce at the end of the first film.
00:28:09
Speaker
So a lot of that stuff is very similar. There are some tend to telltale signs though that it's different. For one, there's that opening montage. And I think this really clues you into a lot of it where you see Bruce actually experimenting on himself. Whereas that wasn't the case in Ang Lee's home, right? It was an accident that he ended up being exposed to the gamma radiation. And that mixed with what his father had done to him. Second is that they're specifically working on the super soldier serum.
00:28:38
Speaker
Right. And he's specifically working for General Ross in this. Right, because we see General Ross, he's there when the accident happens. We actually see he's there, yeah.
00:28:48
Speaker
Yeah, so he's there when the accident happens. Also, Betty gets injured when Bruce first transforms and she gets knocked out and she doesn't see him transform into the Hulk. And then because when they are at a Culver University and he starts to transform, Ross says, you know, now she'll see, now she'll understand. Right, yeah, exactly. You find that she had never seen him as the Hulk before.
00:29:11
Speaker
Right, exactly. That's why I said there's some things that you can take. And also I wanted to mention that during that opening credits, they also firmly established this takes place in the MCU proper because we see the SHIELD logo, SHIELD is mentioned. We see among the names of contacts that Bruce Banner has, one of them is Rick Jones. Yeah. And so there's the Stark Industries logo. I remember seeing that flash briefly.
00:29:39
Speaker
Right, yeah, so. Also there's apparently another tie-in and this was because there was an original beginning sequence where Bruce tries to commit suicide and he's in the Arctic. He's in the Arctic and he tries to commit suicide by jumping off an ice cliff or something like that and he transforms into the Hulk and lands. Now apparently they pan over and you see like a block of ice and in the ice you see Captain America frozen.
00:30:07
Speaker
I've heard that. Yeah, I've heard that. Matter of fact, somebody was telling me at one time that you go on YouTube and see that scene, but apparently it's been taken down because when I went to look for it, I've never found it. But yeah, they said there was a scene where you could see Captain Dorell or see his shield and he was in the ice. Yeah, I'm looking at a screenshot and it's very fanked. It's like one of those blink and you miss it things. Yeah.
00:30:30
Speaker
But yeah, and it's it's something like really it you have to really be looking forward because it's if this was not pointed out to me when I see it if you see it in the movie, it's hard to see. But yeah, it that that cameo was in there. But yeah, so that and what a lot of the big changes happened with when N Norton came up.
00:30:53
Speaker
Because once Edward Norton came on, you know, he started, he moved it like almost completely in the MCU and, you know, ignoring the first Hulk film.
00:31:08
Speaker
they decided to you know get rid of the origin story people were already familiar enough with that and then and so then he edited the stuff about about shield being part of that about the super soldier serum and also he introduced um uh he's the one who wrote uh leonard samson into the movie as well well i gotta you know what i have a tremendous amount of respect
00:31:33
Speaker
with Norton in this movie because, as I said, ad infinitum in the Ang Lee episode, he does nothing in here that violates what Eric Bana did. And I actually see a progression from, I look at them and I say, okay, this is the same guy. Yeah. But you know what's funnier though? Do you know who, so this movie was directed by Louis Ledere, I'm probably mispronouncing his name, but
00:32:01
Speaker
Don't worry about it, I do too. Yeah, so he, do you know who he originally wanted for Bruce Banner? Who? Mark Ruffalo. Really? He wanted Mark Ruffalo, Marvel insisted on Ed Norton, and then Ruffalo ends up playing, becoming the Hulk and Avengers anyway. Yeah, yeah. Well, listen, I mean, when you get to the end of this movie,
00:32:26
Speaker
And he does that thing with his eyes and he's got that smile on his face. I said, okay, that's Ruffalo. Now, okay, now he's the Ruffalo, Bruce Banner. So, you know, it's like, it's a little masterful piece of acting. I, you know, I highly doubt that these guys got together on it, but did three performances as Bruce Banner, three different actors as Bruce Banner, but the performances to me are so seamless. I buy that this is all the same guy. Yeah, yeah.
00:33:01
Speaker
What's the word I'm looking for? I just like it when I can see these movies and I'm not jerked out of it like Vince is seeing George Clooney, you know, play Batman. I look at him and I'll say, okay, that's not Michael Keaton's Batman. You know, this is a whole completely different Batman. It's not the same Batman. Right. Like you can kind of see, if you squint at Val Kilmer, you can kind of see him as a progression of Michael Keaton's. But you're right with George Clooney.
00:33:18
Speaker
which to me lends a lot of
00:33:26
Speaker
No, you can't. That's a completely different dude. So, but these three guys, they somehow, I guess, subconsciously, they all touched on the same elements that made Bruce Banner tick. And, you know, that's what they ran with. And I, I think I like the little, uh, okay. We right at the start of the movie, we see
00:33:50
Speaker
Bruce Banner, he's using martial arts as a way of controlling his anger. Yeah, yeah. And I thought that was a brilliant...
00:34:00
Speaker
you know, thing is that he's not just using science in order to, you know, help him with his issues. Right, yoga and meditation techniques and all that. Right. Yeah. Yeah. And, and well, credit though, that actually comes from Bruce Jones, who was writing the whole comic shortly before this came out. His run started like, I want to say like early, like 2000, 2001 is when his run was, I think, I'm pretty sure it was over by this point.
00:34:28
Speaker
But that's also where the Mr. Green, Mr. Blue thing comes from. That also came from Bruce Jones's run. Okay. Norton was a huge fan of Jones's run. So and so he incorporated a lot of that stuff like the Mr. Green, Mr. Blue thing. He also incorporated Bruce using meditation and yoga and martial arts training. He incorporated all that into the script as a nod to what Bruce Jones was doing on the character.
00:34:52
Speaker
Yeah. And I think, you know what, and I think it works tremendously well for the character. I always, you know, I always liked the fact that in these movies, Bruce Banner is portrayed as in his own way as being as dangerous as the Hulk. Yeah. You know, I mean, he's an incredibly resource. I mean,
00:35:13
Speaker
The man has no money, no, you know, no money, no clothes.
Bruce Banner's Character Depth
00:35:19
Speaker
He's in Guatemala and yet still makes his way to Virginia. They don't tell us how, but they told us enough about him before that you can believe that Bruce Banner figured out the way how to do that. And of course we can't lose sight of the fact that this guy, I think he's supposed to be like one of the five smartest people that's in the Marvel universe.
00:35:39
Speaker
You know, I mean, I don't know exactly where he stands in the ranking, but I do know that he's supposed to be up there with the Black Panther and Reed Richards and Tony Stark. Oh, yeah, definitely. Well, he figured about time travel, you know. Yeah. Ruffalo definitely drove that home, I think.
00:35:56
Speaker
that's when they really get to expand it. When they expand the universe out and when Ruffalo gets to play in that world, like that's when it really cements the idea that Bruce is one of the smartest people in the universe. You get hints of it here, but you really fully see it come to fruition until you get to Ruffalo. But that's also a large part because they've got a much larger world to play in. Like in this, it's still very small, very self-contained.
00:36:21
Speaker
but considering that this is, and I think that it was a very wise decision with them to go for a more action-orientated Hulk movie in this one. Okay, we already got the psychological drama of the first movie. Okay, that's cool. That's all you need. Now it's time for the Hulk smash, which is basically what we get in this movie. If you hate it that you didn't get Hulk smash in the Ang Lee movie,
00:36:45
Speaker
You definitely get Hulk smash in this one. Yes. Yeah. And they pretty much recast everyone. And with the exception of Lou Ferrigno, Lou Ferrigno is the only guy, well, him and Stan Lee. They're the only ones from the first movie who come back. And Lou Ferrigno is still playing a security guard. But he also voiced the Hulk. Like there are a few times when the Hulk speaks in this movie. And, you know, that's something I like too.
00:37:11
Speaker
You know, they found ways to use like some of the Hulk's iconic lines in both these two movies, right? They had in Ang Lee's movie, right? There's that one of my favorite scenes, which I think we forgot to mention. When Bruce has that dream sequence and he imagines, he dreams he's shaving in front of the mirror and the mirror's all fogged up and then he puts his hand on and the mirror's reflection is the Hulk. Yeah. And the Hulk smashes through the mirror, grabs Bruce and then says puny human.
00:37:40
Speaker
Puny human, yeah, yeah. I can't believe we forgot to mention that. I know, right? That's like one of the signature lines. Puny human, oh man, how do we forget that one? And here we get the iconic Hulk smash line.
00:37:54
Speaker
Yeah. And finally, when he's in the big battle in Harlem, when he's fighting the abomination. Something else I really liked a lot of the visuals in here and a lot of the way the Hulk fights because this movie came out after the Incredible Hulk Ultimate Destruction game, right? Which was amazing, right? Do you play that game? No, I did. Okay. Do you still have your Xbox, your original Xbox?
00:38:20
Speaker
No, I've got Xbox one now. Oh, OK. Is it backwards compatible, like with the old? Yes, some games. I mean, there's, you know, like a lot of games, like I'm a big fan of the Soul Calibur games and the Fight Night. Oh, so I was able to hold your the original Xbox games, you know, do some research, see if they can play on the Xbox one, because there was an amazing Hulk video game called Incredible Hulk Ultimate Destruction.
00:38:50
Speaker
and see if you can drag it down because you will love that really makes you feel like what it's like to be the Hulk like it's you know how everyone talks about like the Arkham games making making it like what it feels like to be Batman or the the latest Spider-Man game makes you feel like Spider-Man Hulk did it incredible Hulk ultimate destruction did it first okay yeah so definitely try to check that out if you can find it and
00:39:20
Speaker
There are a lot of different moves that the Hulk has in that game. Like he can put, like you can smash cars and he can turn them into like boxing gloves. And he does that here. Or he takes another car and he turns it into a shield. He does that here. All that stuff comes from the ultimate destruction video game.
00:39:36
Speaker
And it was really cool because they found a lot of different ways to, because that game was really creative and showing like, because you think Hulk, you think, oh, he's big and strong and he can jump and that's it. But they found a lot of creative ways to use his super strength in them, in that game. And the movie used a lot of those here. Yeah, you could, yeah, I mean,
00:39:56
Speaker
There is the tendency to think of the Hulk as just being a mindless brute, but he's not. I mean, the Hulk is actually, especially in this movie, because it's got one of my, and it's got some incredibly amazing action sequences. And I always like it because as I said with the Ang Lee Hulk, I've always felt like the Hulk's number one enemy is actually the United States Army. And he has a terrific fight scene with them in this one.
00:40:24
Speaker
Yeah, at the university. At the university, yeah, it's just an amazing fight scene. And when he runs up against the sonic cannons, and he uses the shields in his hand, you know, the twisted pieces of metal that he's been using as shields, you know, and you can see, well, you know, he's reasoning it out that he can use these to destroy. So he's not a mindless monster, as he's been portrayed to, I don't know, far too often, as far as I'm concerned.
00:40:50
Speaker
I think there was one point, I think it was in the comics. I can't remember who wrote this or when it was established, but there was one point in the comics I remember when they were saying that Banner actually has some measure of subconscious control over the Hulk. And that's why the Hulk is very careful to avoid killing people, rampages.
00:41:16
Speaker
And so like, and because it's this idea that Banner is able to hold some kind of subconscious control over him. And that would make sense. That would actually play into what you're saying. The idea that because he still has this intelligence, this subconscious, he's able to figure things out. The Hulk probably doesn't really understand he's doing it, but he's able to do it.
00:41:35
Speaker
Yeah, that works for me. That works for me. I'd also like to touch on something that we had mentioned in the Ang Lee Hulk.
Hulk's Visual and CGI Evolution
00:41:45
Speaker
One thing that bothered both of us was that, you know, you look at it now and the CGI is like, you look at it and you say, okay, it looks really wonky now because the Hulk, you know, he's way too green. He's like green green. But here in this one, the CGI is like a hundred times better.
00:42:04
Speaker
Yes, definitely. In fact, I'd go so far as to say that of all the CGI hulks we've seen throughout these movies, this one is my favorite design.
00:42:14
Speaker
I think so too. You know why? Because sometimes he's a little bit more green than gray and other times he's a little bit more gray than green depending on, you know, so. One of the things too is they intentionally make him look more like Ruffalo when Ruffalo takes over. Because Ruffalo is doing the motion capture. Right. So they intentionally make him look more like Ruffalo in those things.
00:42:39
Speaker
And that's understandable. It works especially well when you get to Endgame. But this one, they actually based it heavily on the comics. I'm just looking, here we go. It was based on Dale Cohn's drawings. Oh, okay.
00:43:01
Speaker
where, and it says here, the Hulk being beyond perfect has zero grams of fat, is all chiseled and is defined by his muscle and strength. So he's like a tank. And that's exactly how he looks in this. He is ripped in this movie.
00:43:14
Speaker
I mean you want to talk about Jack. Yeah. I mean this is a whole. Yeah. Oh yeah. He is just completely Jack like that scene in in Harlem when he transforms and he's walking like you just see like all the like the muscle lines all over the place just like
00:43:32
Speaker
Oh my, when he just finally, he just, I mean, he just lays the final smack down on the abomination. This puts his, stomps his foot on his chest and he roars. And what cracks me up is the expression on Thunderbolt Ross's face. And he's telling the soldiers, okay, put your guns down. Put your guns down, please. And then you go back to Avengers and it looks like, you know, Hulk's been having a few donuts. It's kind of been lacking all around the gym.
00:44:01
Speaker
Yeah, yeah, it's yeah, I got to agree with you and I really love the look of the Hulk in this movie because I mean, yeah, I mean You know, okay, if you're gonna have a movie that's called the Incredible Hulk Damn it. Give me a Hulk that looks incredible. And that's what they do in this one. He looks incredible I mean he looks like like based off Dale cone is really good thing because he looks like he stepped right off the comic page
00:44:27
Speaker
Oh, yeah, absolutely. Yeah. And yeah, I think that's probably one another reason why I like the way he, because he actually does look like he stepped right out of the comic book. In fact, they do recreate a lot of Hulk covers. Like there's the one where when he smashes this, I think it's the end, when he smashes his fish down and it creates those cracks in the ground. Another iconic Hulk. That's an iconic, yeah. That was by Mike Diodato, I believe.
00:44:53
Speaker
But yeah, an iconic cult cover. And they do a lot of that. They recreate a lot of images from the comics in this movie. And it's in a way that is subtle. Like you remember when we talked about Daredevil, they tried to do the same thing. And it seemed a little bit too on the nose when they did it in Daredevil, but here it works a lot better.
00:45:14
Speaker
Um, let's see. Uh, so as you mentioned, the entire cast was, um, from the, from Ang Lee's movie is gone and they're all recast, but this is going to piss you off because you know, who really wanted to come back for this movie and was told no. Uh, Jennifer Connelly? Nope. Who? Sam Elliott.
00:45:36
Speaker
Oh, well, I can understand that. He wanted to come back. And Marvel said, no, no, we're doing a reboot. You want to go a different way. Yeah. Well, you know what? As I have said many times before.
00:45:51
Speaker
If it wasn't for Sam Elliott, for me, William Hurt would be the definitive Thunderbolt Ross, because he's just so damn good in it. And a matter of fact, he's one of the few actors that could have probably stepped into the character and taken it away from Sam Elliott and make it his own. No, you don't think as, sorry, go ahead, finish your thought. No, no, no, I was just gonna say, again, I can see this as being the same guy from the Ang Lee movie.
00:46:17
Speaker
Yes. Yeah. You know, it's not a, it's not a jarring transition where I'm saying, okay, well, this is a totally different, this is, he, you know, my guess is that being the meticulous actor that he is.
00:46:29
Speaker
William Hurt probably did study Sam Elliott closely, his performance, and he kind of, you know, took the best bits of that and made it, because yeah, I could, yeah, this is the same guy. Yeah. Well, something else too, is that even though I think Sam Elliott, Sam Elliott has a more embodies Thunderbolt Ross, like the character, but William Hurt looks more like the character.
00:46:55
Speaker
Yeah, exactly, yeah. And I think that adds to it. He looks, when I see him, I see the Thunderbolt Ross from the comics. Yeah. Yeah. And that surprised me because when Hurt was first cast, like I'm most, I'm used to him from like, you know, dark city. That's what I think of when I think of William Hurt. Oh, okay, cool. So, you know, I think of him with like, you know, the dark, you know, thin hair and the clean shape and face. So I'm like, really? That guy's going to be Thunderbolt Ross. And then when I saw the images come out, I'm like, oh, wow.
00:47:25
Speaker
He looks just like the character from the comics. Yeah. Yeah. I look, I say, oh, man, it's phenomenal. But again, I mean, William Hurt is just that good of actor that, you know, like how you see some actors will take a role from another character and you say, well, damn, why did he take that guy? You know, you don't exactly hate him, but you say, well, that's not him. But William Hurt is, you know, you look at,
00:47:52
Speaker
There's an added little bit of gravitas that Sam Elliott has, only because Sam Elliott is, I feel that in real life, he's probably more of a real life badass than William Hurt. Yeah, yeah. So he was able to bring that to the role, but William Hurt, he has that intensity. He has that sharply divided loyalty where he's trying to connect with his daughter, but he doesn't know how,
00:48:20
Speaker
All he knows how to do is just say that he's protecting her, he's protecting her, and actually what he doesn't really want to protect her, he just wants to insulate her from the world. Like he has a great line where he's talking to Dr. Sampson, who makes an appearance in this movie. Doc, the guy who will eventually be, I hope they're going to introduce Doc Sampson.
00:48:39
Speaker
I've been waiting for him to come back at some point. But yeah, it was Ty Burrell was playing. Ty Burrell, yeah. And now that they're doing the She-Hulk TV series, I'm thinking that that's the perfect time to bring back Doc Sampson.
00:48:52
Speaker
You know what I would really love to see? If they did Doc Sampson TV series with him actually psychoanalyzing the characters of the Marvel Universe. I've been wanting a Doc Sampson comic book like that for years. Yeah. Do you remember when Peter David was doing X Factor?
00:49:11
Speaker
that is, well, he did it this way. Like he had one issue where the team is undergoing, has to undergo like, because they're a government sponsored team, they have to mandate with regulations. One of those regulations is they have to undergo psychiatric counseling after some traumatic event. So they had this really tough mission and they're being analyzed, they're meeting with psychiatrists and it's spotlights each of them. And it's such an amazing character piece. It's called examinations with E-M-X.
00:49:41
Speaker
It's such an amazing character. It's one of the best things Peter David has ever written and that's saying something when you're talking. Oh yeah, that's saying something right there and so.
00:49:50
Speaker
And then at the end of the issue, you find out it was Doc Sampson the whole time who was interviewing all these guys. And then he did the same stick because Peter David did another X Factor run just like a few years ago. And he did, you know, re-examinations where he brings Doc Sampson back to analyze the team. And like, you get a comic book like that where, and you can make it tongue in cheek, right? Remember, what was that, that animated series from the late nineties, I think it was, Doc. Oh, Dr. Katz. Yeah. A serial version of Dr. Katz.
00:50:20
Speaker
Right, exactly. Yeah, the guy that was psychoanalyzing all the different stars. Right. And they would come on as animated version of themselves and doing the voice. And Dr. Casper, yeah, exactly. Do that. In fact, you know what? Do that as an animated series. That way you could probably get, like, Chris Evans or Robert Downey Jr. to come back. Because they don't have to... Sorry, go ahead. No, no, no. I'm sitting here agreeing with you.
00:50:50
Speaker
Yeah, but and that would be great. Like I would love to see that. And in fact, especially if it's just animate, you could easily bring Ty Burrell back to play, to do the voice.
00:51:03
Speaker
Bingo. I mean, once you do it in animation, there really is no reason for people not to do it, because I hear all the time, they said they love doing animation, because they don't have to get up early, there's no makeup, you know, they come in their pajamas. Right, exactly. Yeah, you know, they love doing it. So, and of course, it's more lucrative now than it was years ago.
00:51:26
Speaker
Yeah. There was also an extended scene where Samson and Bruce like sit down and they have a conversation and you could find it on the DVD. They have it on the deleted scenes or you can probably find it on YouTube as well. But it's this really great scene. I'm really upset. I was really pissed that they cut that out because it's such a really good scene where you see the two of them interact with each other. And Ty Burrell, if you've never seen him except on the sitcom that he does, he's a really good actor. Yeah.
00:51:55
Speaker
He's a much better actor than people give him credit for, but that's like I said, they've only seen him. What's that, Modern Family? Probably Modern Family or he was the jerk in the Dawn of the Dead remake. Yeah. And see what else. But like here, he's not doing like the funny voice and he's not doing the quirky. I mean, he's giving it a straight performance here. Right. Oh, he was also in Muppets Most Wanted. Yeah. Okay.
00:52:25
Speaker
And he did, wow, he did the voice of Captain Marvel on the superhero squad show. Oh, okay. I never saw that. It was like, it was a very geared for kids. I know that. Yeah,
Fan Expectations and Media Critique
00:52:39
Speaker
yeah, yeah. I remember seeing one clip where the punisher's driving them all around and he's just like, he like won't stop narrating or something like that.
00:52:47
Speaker
And they all look like they're all the size of Funko. That's what they look like. Yeah, the little Funko things. It was geared for kids, which I have no problem with. I was talking to some idiot a while back where, because they're doing an animated Batman cartoon about the Batmobile.
00:53:10
Speaker
Oh, yeah. Yeah. You know, you know, where the Batmobile, you know, organizes the other bat vehicles. And I guess when Batman is sleeping, they go out and they fight crime. So I'm talking to this guy. He's like 50 years old and stuff like, ah, that's a sucky idea. Why is it a sucky idea? Oh, I can't. They just make a straight back. I said, don't you have a no straight Batman movie? I said, you got the movies. Why can't there be something? You got the video games. Oh, my God. Why can't they make something for kids? Yeah. Yeah.
00:53:40
Speaker
You know, and I mean, no lie, Perry, this guy was really highly upset. Well, that's the son of shit that ruins the characters. Are you fool? I thought you were an adult, man. You know, he got really, oh, he was pissed with me. I said, okay, well, listen. Look, I mean, let's be honest here. I mean, if the comics of the 1950s didn't ruin Batman, a TV show about the Batmobile is not going to do it.
00:54:05
Speaker
I keep on my computer. I have a whole bunch of covers from the 1950s, 60s Batman comic book. And whenever I run into one of these idiots that tell me about how the TV series ruined the character, I throw a whole bunch of these covers at them and say, okay, now you tell me how. Matter of fact, the TV series was a step up from the comic book.
00:54:31
Speaker
I mean, they had them, I remember one episode where, or one comic, I think it was one of the old Superman comic covers, where it's like Superboy and Bruce Wayne, right? Young Clark Kent, young Bruce Wayne. And he shows that he had, Superboy has like this machine that lets him see into the future and he's used it with Bruce Wayne. He's like, look, Bruce, in the future, we become superheroes and best friends. What he fails to mention is that, look, Bruce, your family gets gunned down in a fucking alley.
00:55:00
Speaker
Yeah, right. Exactly. He doesn't tell him that part. Yeah. I mean, this was a Batman, mind you, that aliens were flashing the bat signal on the moon when they needed, and Batman would jump in his bat rocker ship and go to other planets to fight crime. So, you know, come on, give me a break already about what ruined the character. I mean, you're, uh, Morrison did the Batman of Zura in our thing. That came from the fifties comic books. That was straight from the fifties comic. Exactly.
00:55:26
Speaker
There's another one where Batman had like a multicolored range of suits or something, depending on. Yeah, the rainbow costumes of Batman. And Robin couldn't figure out, well, why are you dressing up in a black, he had a black one, an orange one, a red one, and he just kept changing the costumes for some reason. And of course, I mean, I don't know. As I've said many times before you and I have had this discussion, I just feel that people take their entertainment far too seriously.
00:55:55
Speaker
It's supposed to be fun. It's not supposed to be, again, going back to what we were talking about with this whole Justice League thing, which to me has got blown completely out of proportion, you know? People have turned something that's supposed to be entertaining and fun, and they've turned it into like this near-religious cult-like thing, I feel. I really do. The spider cult is unbelievable. Yeah, it's like a cult-like thing. And a sign of how cult-like it is is that these are people that actually
00:56:25
Speaker
actually advocate violence if you don't agree with them. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. That's one of the reasons why I was against the Snyder Cut at all, was because of those people. Like after that, as far as I'm, I'm all for director's cuts, I'm all for ultimate versions, even if I don't, like when they were first saying like,
00:56:44
Speaker
When the Snyder cut thing first started, you know, like what, like a year or two ago, when people first started talking about it, I said, well, you know, it might be interesting. Why not? I didn't like the movie. You know, I don't like Snyder, but I'd be willing to, I'm not going to begrudge anyone having the Snyder cut, but when they started advocating violence, if the Snyder cut doesn't come out, then I'm like, all right, now you went too far.
00:57:04
Speaker
Yeah, and you said it best. You shouldn't reward bad behavior. You don't. You just simply don't. But see, these were things that people were never taught as a child because of the society that we live in now where everybody's supposed to express themselves and you're not supposed to. No, you teach children at an early age that bad behavior does not get rewarded. And guess what? They grow up to be adults who understand that their bad behavior will not be rewarded. That's how it's supposed to work in the real world, folks.
00:57:35
Speaker
Apparently we no longer live in the real world. We live on earth too. So going back to Incredible Hulk. So do you know, apparently Lou Ferrigno actually recommended Norton for the role of Bruce Banner because Ferrigno said that Norton reminded him of a young Bill Bixby. See that.
00:57:57
Speaker
Yeah, and you would probably recognize this more than I do, because I only have vague memories of the TV show. But even still, I can see there are so many callbacks to the TV show. Right down to the experiment, the way he's experimenting on himself, that's right out of the opening of the TV show. That's right out the opening of the TV show. They even have a scene where Bruce Banner, where he lands in Guatemala,
00:58:21
Speaker
and the guy's giving him the lift and he's walking up the road and they're playing that lonely man in theme from the TV show.
00:58:29
Speaker
I think they also play it when he, after he leaves the pizza place and Betty fine. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. They actually, yep. That's it. That little tinkly piano thing that's becoming known as the lonely man theme. They play that twice in the movie. So also the, the reporter, cause remember when they're interviewing after the Hulk battles, the military and Jack McGee. Yeah. Jack McGee is the name of the reporter.
00:58:53
Speaker
Yeah, who of course was the guy that was chasing Bill Bixby, who we see in a cameo from the TV show, The Courtship of Betty's Father, early on in the movie. Ed Norton is watching TV and practicing his Portuguese. And we see a brief clip from the TV show, which I'm really glad that they got in there in some kind of way. I'm really glad because Bill Bixby's performance as Bruce Banner
00:59:18
Speaker
you know, that's become so iconic. And he was really invested a lot in the character and the TV show himself. I'd have to look this up, but I do believe that he actually directed some of the episodes. I believe so, yeah. You know, I've actually got to sit down and watch this show at some point because I've only seen like bits and pieces like years ago. I've never actually sat down and watched it.
00:59:44
Speaker
Well, you know what, if you can't, and I know that you can, because unlike most so-called comic book fans, you can understand the limitations of the time period that it was made in. Right. You know, and yeah, I think that, yeah, you'll get a lot out of it because in its own way, it is faithful to the spirit of the character. And, you know, even though we don't have like super powered hope that's jumping, you know, and,
01:00:12
Speaker
doing all these things that we see him doing in this movie, it's faithful to the inner conflict of the characters. And that works for me.
Nostalgic References to Hulk TV Show
01:00:25
Speaker
Is Bruce Banner, okay, you remember the fugitive? Yeah, yeah. Well, this is basically what the TV show is. It's if Dr. Kimball turned into the Hulk every once in a while to solve his problems. Right.
01:00:42
Speaker
It's a good show. It's not exactly what I would call a touchstone of superhero TV cinema, but much like the Wonder Woman TV show with Linda Carter and the Batman TV show with Adam West, it has become so ingrained into our pop culture. I mean, just like you said yourself,
01:01:06
Speaker
they do the line, you know, the classic line, don't make me angry, you wouldn't like me when I'm angry, you know, they have how they play it in both in Ang Lee's version and in this one, right? Yeah, Ang Lee's version, he says it in, in Spanish or Portuguese, right? And then this one, he's trying to say it in Portuguese and he ends up saying, don't make me hungry. Yeah, yeah.
01:01:28
Speaker
He messes it up. But I mean, and, and he's like, well, wait, that's not right. Yeah, he said, yeah, wait a minute. I messed that up. But this is a phrase that has passed into a pop lexicon. People say it. And you know what? Bam. They immediately know where it came from. Oh, the Incredible Hulk. You know, that was also going back to Ang Lee. That was another one of my favorite moments in the movie was when Talbot's beaten on him. Right. And he says, he says, Talbot, you're making me angry.
01:01:56
Speaker
Yeah, you're making me, listen, you're making me angry. And I mean, because even with...
01:02:04
Speaker
Okay, me and my wife would watch it earlier, and when he said it, she cracked up. Yeah, you know, she's not that big a whole thing, but she knows where it came from. Right, yeah. You know, I mean, everybody knows that line. Don't make me, you wouldn't like me when I'm angry. Everybody knows that. So yeah, so the whole TV show is one of these things, which is why going back to what we were saying earlier, that's why I'm glad that they just did that little compressed
01:02:29
Speaker
uh recap of his origin during the credits scenes because yeah we don't need to know the art you know we don't need to be told the origin of the Hulk all over again people we know it even who don't know the comic books who don't they remember the tv show from when they was kid or you know whatever yeah and i do remember watching the tv show every now and then i catch an episode on uh cable um and i remember the i remember the opening and that opening sequence in this movie feels just like the opening in the in the tv show
01:02:58
Speaker
Oh yeah, yeah. I feel very nostalgic when I watch it. Cause I said, okay. Cause they got that shot of him that's in the chair and he's got the cross sights on his face and the grid more. I said, yeah, okay. That's right from the TV show. Yeah. Yeah. I'm trying to look up, but apparently it doesn't look like it's on. It used to be on Hulu, but it looks like it's not on there anymore. So. Let me ask you, we haven't talked about him yet. Your boy Tim Roth. How did you feel about him in this movie?
01:03:25
Speaker
Oh, you know what? The only real problem I had with him is that he doesn't really have any real motivation, right? Like after he, like he wants this power, but he doesn't really have any, like at first it makes sense, right? When, you know,
01:03:42
Speaker
Ross is telling him you know well you know get out of the get out of the trenches you know with your rage you could be with your record you could be a colonel by now, and he says no I'm a fighter I've always been so he's like you know it takes a toll on your body like that. He understands that like I understand that but then after he goes through it right he gets this power he has.
01:04:03
Speaker
Tim Blake Nelson as Stearns, you know, give him Banner's DNA and fully transforms him into the abomination. But at that point, when he's going through like the rampage in Harlem, he just has no real reason to do that. He just carried on cranky. He's not even cranky, man. He's just busting shit up because he can.
01:04:27
Speaker
Well, you know what? Okay. And see, here's where they messed up because if they had kept Glenn Talbot alive, and if he had been, you know, the character in this movie, then we would have understood his motivation. Yeah. Well, actually that was originally the intention. The abomination was actually going to be kind of like a composite of Talbot and Emil Blonsky. Okay.
01:04:56
Speaker
trying to find the yeah he was it was an earlier draft he was going to be um yeah he was going to be a composite character with Glenn Talbot so I think the the abomination may have actually have been Glenn Talbot and Talbot transforms into the abomination yeah yeah but then later on they ended up I mean it kind of worked out for the best because they ended up bringing in Adrian Pastar in Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. who did a really good job as Talbot
01:05:19
Speaker
Right. So yeah. So I think that if they hadn't killed, but they killed them off in the Ang Lee movie and, but then we would have known because we would have said, okay, well we understand that, you know, Talbot and Banner, they have history and that's why he's so pissed off at this guy. Cause yet, I mean, really you get to feel that this is a guy is an aging soldier who is rapidly reaching the point where he's not going to be of any,
01:05:47
Speaker
good use to anybody cuz like you said, as Ross says, yeah, cuz he looks at him, he said, well, how old are you, 45? And he says, no, 39. So the guys, his years of combat have taken the toll on his body. He hasn't got too much longer left. So he sees this as a way to continue doing what he's doing. But I agree with you that they really don't
01:06:13
Speaker
portray that very well. You know, I think what have worked in this character is if you give him like a death wish, like you make him someone who wants to go out fighting because he knows he's at the end of his rope. Yeah. Yeah. I don't know. And I don't blame that on Tim Roth because he's an excellent actor, but he does a really good job. I mean, he does. He's really good in the movie. It's just that his characters really have a reason.
01:06:38
Speaker
Yeah, his character really isn't written that well. But they needed an antagonist. They needed somebody to eventually be the abomination. So they said, okay. And they couldn't just start off the movie with him being the abomination because of course we need him for the big battle in Harlem at the end of the movie. Now something else too is I hate the look of the abomination in this movie though.
01:07:05
Speaker
Yeah, as good as the Hulk looks, the abomination looks that bad.
01:07:11
Speaker
I don't know what the hell they were thinking with this. I mean, he looks like this weird mix of like doomsday and yeah, I don't know what it. Yeah, I don't like what they did with. That's right. That's who he looked more like. Because when I saw him, I said, that's not the abomination. That's doomsday. Yeah, he looks like he looks like doomsday with like Lex Luthor's head. Yeah.
01:07:37
Speaker
I said, that's not the abomination. I said, where's the, you know, where's the wings on the side of his head? You know? Yeah. The ears, like, I don't, I would have wanted something a lot more, but this is just, I mean, I get why they were doing it, right? They were trying to make him look like something, you know, totally misshapen and, but it just doesn't really work for this guy.
01:07:55
Speaker
Yeah, it doesn't, although I admit that it does work because it's a cool ass moment where the Hulk just like he said, you know, like he just like tired of his shit and rips off one of his own spikes and got through the heart. When I say you go, that's a good for you. It was like at that point he was just sick of his shit.
01:08:15
Speaker
I mean, that is one of, like that CGI throw down in Harlem, that is one of the best scenes in this movie. That's one of the best CGI fight scenes ever, actually. Yeah, yeah, I mean, that's worth the price of admission. Yeah, definitely. Because it's like, I mean, the whole just like cuts loose, you know, and really, like for the first time in two movies, we get to see him totally absolute, because he doesn't
MCU Interconnections and Future Possibilities
01:08:38
Speaker
have to worry about killing this guy.
01:08:41
Speaker
Yeah. And you know what? The thing is, too, the abomination is still alive at the end of this movie. Yeah. And Tim Roth has said that I don't think Marvel will ever use me again, but it would be fun. So I mean, I think he would do it again. I think I would love to see him come back and evolve and change. Also, we haven't mentioned him, but Tim Blake Nelson as Samuel Stearns, right?
01:09:03
Speaker
We see that lingering thing with him starting to transform into the leader. I would love to see him come back, especially after we've seen his amazing performance in Watchmen. Oh, yeah, absolutely. Yeah. I mean, they really did. Excuse me.
01:09:24
Speaker
and go through a really convoluted bit of business to get the gamma stuff in his system. Yeah, yeah. Where he did it. And I have to admit that I knew he was somebody when I'm watching the movie because, okay, the first time I saw it, I said, well, I know that name, but I don't know. But then when the blood dropped into his head, I said, oh shit, how could I forget? He's the leader. Oh, okay. I remember when I first watched this movie, when I remember watching the theater and he was communicating with this Mr. Blue guy, I remember wondering,
01:09:54
Speaker
you know, is it really gonna be, I wouldn't have been wondering, you know, is it gonna be, would it, is it like Tony Stark or is it like Hank Pym? So I was actually a little bit disappointed when it was Samuel Stearns. That's what, you know what, that's who I thought it was too. Especially because we get that cameo at the end when, you know, Tony Stark shows up. Yeah, yeah. That's who, yeah, that's who I thought it was. The first time I saw it was in the theater, I said, I bet you, I bet you that's Tony Stark he's talking to. Yeah, yeah, that's what I thought too. Because. You saw the Stark Industries logo in the opening as well.
01:10:24
Speaker
Right. And as a scientist, of course, Blue's men will reach out to another scientist. Right. Yeah. You know, for help. And who else would you reach out to but Tony Stark? Right. You know, and I said, OK. And of course, by that time, I'd heard about the plans for the Avengers and all that other kind of stuff. And I said, OK, this would be a perfect way for, you know, the hope to, you know, be introduced into everything that is Tony Stark on the sidelines trying to help. And so, yeah, I was a little bit disappointed.
01:10:53
Speaker
But the cameo made up for it. And it does really, when you think about it, it makes more sense for it to be Samuel Stearns. Yeah. I mean, I was a little disappointed because I was hoping for that, but I do understand why they didn't go that route. And in fact, if I recall correctly, putting Iron Man in the movie, putting Tony Stark at the end, that was a reshoot because that was not originally the plan.
01:11:20
Speaker
That's what I heard. That's what I heard is they actually had, yeah, they went back and did that. Because they were originally just going to have this, they were just going to have the little mentions, like, you know, the Stark Industries logo, the SHIELD logo, and they weren't going to have any overt cameos or anything like that. But then Iron Man made all the money. So then they're like, oh shit, we got to put, we should put him in this movie.
01:11:46
Speaker
It made all the money. Some of the money, not half of the money, all the money. They went back and they're like, all right, let's shoot this scene with Tony Stark coming in. And you can tell they were planning for a very different kind of Avengers movie originally. Because these two movies were, because you have Tony Stark coming in to ask General Ross. And he says, we're putting a team together.
01:12:14
Speaker
And then in, and then Iron Man 2, like apparently the end of Iron Man 2, that's when he, this movie takes place after Iron Man 2, because that's when he's agreed to help out Nick Fury and work as a consultant. But then in the Avengers, right? When Colson comes in about the Avengers initiative, you know, Tony says, you know, I thought it was, I thought the Avengers initiative was scrapped.
01:12:42
Speaker
So there was like, they were planning for something different, which Ross was going to be involved with, apparently. Yeah, apparently. Well, yeah, well, you had to be more of the more, more closer, probably more close to the Ultimates. And then when, when Whedon came in, he wrote the script and made it more, made the Avengers more independent, like in the comics.
01:13:02
Speaker
So yeah, because apparently Ross, I mean, cause why else would Tony come to Ross if, you know, if the intention wasn't for him to be, which is probably why will we see Ross, you know, pop up again. He's so pissed off at the whole notion of the Avengers. Cause the project was probably taken from him. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. In fact, that's a, that would be a great backstory to see like what happened in between.
01:13:28
Speaker
I would love to do a little bit more and see more of that like what happened how did he get taken away from him and all that. And also, apparently at the end, the director had the idea where he was going for two different he was leaving the door open for two possible options for the Avengers, right because you know when Bruce changes, and he's got that smile on the face.
01:13:48
Speaker
The letter error was leaving it open for either, you know, Bruce has control over the Hulk and he can transform at will or Bruce in the Hulk is kind of, he's kind of like embraced the Hulk and embraced the anger. And he can be an antagonist in the Avengers movie. Right. Okay. Yeah. It could have went either way. Right. Yeah. And also you have, who's it?
01:14:17
Speaker
Martin Starr, right? Martin Starr appears in this movie and he's the student who lets Bruce into the lab. Right. And he ends up later on, he becomes Peter's teacher in Homecoming. Oh, really? Okay, I didn't, I didn't. Yeah, see, I learned something, I did not know that.
01:14:43
Speaker
So yeah, and that was obviously not planned. In fact, in the novelization of the movie, which was written before anyone was cast, that character was actually supposed to be Amadeus Cho.
01:14:59
Speaker
oh yeah the kid okay yeah right kind of like becomes you know the new rick jones right and then he ends up becoming a hulk himself yeah but he yeah but he's supposed to be like one of these super geniuses too right right yeah um so that was the intent that was the novelization i can't remember it may have been peter david i'm not sure but whoever wrote the novelization they threw that in though that it was amadeus ciao
01:15:23
Speaker
Obviously, Martin Starr is not that guy. So in the credits, he's not credited as anything. I think he's just credited as like suited or something. But now, retroactively, just like they've made Peter be the little kid in Iron Man 2. Yeah, yeah. They retroactively, they said, yeah, Martin Starr was in college when Bruce Banner came by. All right.
Character Development: Ross, Quicksilver, and More
01:15:48
Speaker
Liv Tyler. So how'd you feel about Liv Tyler in this movie? I liked her. I mean, listen, she's no Jennifer Connelly. Nobody is. But again, it's an example of where I see this is the same character. She does nothing in this movie that violates what Jennifer Connelly did. And as a matter of fact, we have seen that she has probably grown to become a little bit more emotionally healthier since Stagley movie.
01:16:17
Speaker
She's dating other people and she's got a new job. And she completely broke up with her father. She just told him, listen, you know what? I'm tired of your bullshit. Because I think there's one point in the movie where she tells, well, we haven't talked in like two, three years. And she just decided, you know what? I want to leave all that behind me and just go on with my life. So when we see her in this movie, she's a little bit more emotionally healthier than we saw her in the previous movie. So much like Bruce has,
01:16:47
Speaker
She's used this experience to learn some new skills.
01:16:51
Speaker
socially and emotionally and get on with her life. Which is why I really, like I said, I can't get over that enough that I see a progression of these characters from the first movie, which is like, it's not just like, okay, we're dropping in on them and they're in the same place. All of the major characters in this movie, Bruce, even Thunderbolt Ross, even he's changed in some ways. Yes, he's still a major asshole,
01:17:19
Speaker
But the one thing I like about him is that we always get insights into why he's an asshole.
01:17:29
Speaker
Sorry, go ahead. No, no, no, go ahead. I was just gonna say that scene that you referenced earlier when Doc Sampson is talking to Ross and he says, you know, I used to wonder why she never talked about her father. Now I know. And then Ross walks away and he's like, where does she find these guys? Yeah, exactly. Yeah, we get it. Of course, no doubt he would wish that she would want to pick a guy just like him.
01:17:50
Speaker
And you know, but we get to see that the guy, yeah, he may be an asshole, but he's not being an asshole just to be an asshole. He's an asshole for a reason, that there are certain things he believes in. And he does genuinely love his daughter. It's just that he's a crappy father. And there's nothing he can do about that. He's a crappy father. And he knows he's a crappy father. He's a much better soldier than he is a father. And you know what? That's all it is. We can't fault the guy for being the way that God made him.
01:18:19
Speaker
That's it. We can only fault him because he don't want to change. He likes who he is. Oh, yeah, yeah, absolutely. Which is, again, one of the reasons why, okay, I get into this discussion with people sometimes when we talk about, I'll talk with people about certain characters. And I will always say two of my favorite characters are like Quicksilver and Namor. And people will say, yeah, but they're assholes. I'll say, yeah, but that's exactly why I like them.
01:18:46
Speaker
That's what makes him interesting. Yeah. I mean, not everybody has to be noble and heroic. And yeah, you know, these guys are perpetually pissed off for whatever reason. I'm not sure if we ever talked about this, but again, this is going back to the Peter David X Factor. The best scene in that issue was when he talks to Quicksilver.
01:19:10
Speaker
And he talks to Quicksilver, and the first thing he says is, Val Cooper tells me that you suffer from PMS. And Pietro's like, what? Excuse me? And she says, and he goes, Pietro-Maximov syndrome, a tendency to be haughty and arrogant.
01:19:28
Speaker
And then Quicksilver explains why he's like that, right, he says like well imagine, imagine what you're, how do you feel if you're standing behind the ATM, standing in line at the ATM and the person in front of you doesn't know how to use it, or you're standing in line at a restaurant and
01:19:44
Speaker
you know the guy working the counter doesn't understand you know the concept of like you know how to order order a simple burger and fries right like that he's like how do you feel in those moments he's like well you know frustrated angry maybe and he's like yeah now imagine every second of your life was like that
01:20:00
Speaker
right yeah he said my he's like i perceive things as fast as i can move so for me every second of every day i'm always dealing with people who don't know how to use the atm machine who don't understand who can't decide on their order before they get to the front of the line and it was just like such a revelation because that makes so much sense for that guy yeah it does it makes so much you know what and i know because
01:20:29
Speaker
That's the reason why I exclusively use, you know, the drive-through when I go to fast food restaurants. Because McDonald's hasn't changed its menu in 40 fucking years. Why do you wait till you get there to decide what you want? Oh God, yeah.
01:20:45
Speaker
I will never understand that mentality. You've been on this line for 15 minutes. Why is it you do not know what you want when you got to the counter? So one of my jobs, it's right near a mall. And so sometimes I go there for lunch after between shifts and then I'll go in there. And usually what I'll do is like, I've got like an hour and a half or so to kill. So I'll go there, I'll have lunch and then I'll go to Starbucks, grab a cup of coffee and sit there with my laptop and do some work.
01:21:11
Speaker
Right. Problem is this mall is very close. It's like it's very close to like a stop off point for cruise ships. So there are lots of so the cruise ship will will dock for like, you know, a few hours or whatever, people will get to go off the ship and they'll take them over and they can do duty free shopping at the at the mall. You always have people who tourists who come into this Starbucks and they're all it's always busy, right? It's always crowded. So I get in line and they hand you out menus as you're waiting in line.
01:21:42
Speaker
And they hand out, and for the tourists, they have English menus too. So we get to the front of the line. There's always some person who never looks at the fricking menu and they're standing in line, they're talking with their friends for like 10 fucking minutes and they get to the front of the line and then they start looking at the menu. Oh, what should we order?
01:22:03
Speaker
Remember, and I remember one episode of Scrubs, Dr. Cox said that in the 30 minutes, it takes me to get to the front of the line. If the guy in front of me hasn't figured out what he's gonna order in that 30 minutes, I should legally be allowed to kill him. Yeah, and know what? That's why Dr. Cox is my favorite character on that show because I feel the exact same way. I should legally have the right to strangle that person to death. Fellow Perry, he's a fellow Perry.
01:22:32
Speaker
Oh my god. All right. Liv Tyler, I mean, I was just so spoiled by Jennifer Connelly that every character here is either a step up from the character in Ang Lee's movie or a step to the side, right? Not worse, not better. No, no. Norton, I think, is better than Vanna.
01:23:01
Speaker
Uh, hurt is not as, is not better than Elliott, but he's as good as Elliott. Okay. Agreed. But Liv Tyler, I feel like is a step down from Jennifer Connelly. Well, listen, not to say again, not the same thing bad against Liv Tyler. Cause I do like her, but let's face it. Anybody has stepped down from Jennifer Connelly, you know, really. I mean, once you had Jennifer Connelly, you know, you don't go back.
01:23:31
Speaker
You know who else was apparently a front runner for Bruce Banner who David Duchovny. Oh God, no, really you don't think you don't see that at all. You know what David Duchovny I, I don't know who this guy knows to get the work that he did but to me he's like,
01:23:51
Speaker
You know, I don't understand. He's one of these people. Okay, let me just put it this way. He's one of these people whose popularity I don't, you know, I don't get, I don't see it. I don't understand it. You know, I was not a big X-Files fan. My wife was, and I would watch it, you know, because she makes me watch. Did you ever watch a Californication?
01:24:18
Speaker
Uh, yeah, which was nothing but a remake of a movie. Uh, that, uh, there was a movie with, um, what's the name from threes company, John Ritter. Yeah. John Ritter. I'm trying to think of the name of the movie. Uh, uh, when I find the name of it, but if you ever see that movie, you'll see that that's exactly where they got California for communication from. It's the same. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. So yeah, yeah. I've seen, uh,
01:24:48
Speaker
I think I saw like the first two seasons of Californication and I just said, you know, there's nothing in here that interests me, including his performance. I just don't, it's just like he, the only time I ever found him interesting as an actor was when he was on Twin Peaks, when he played the cross dressing FBI agent. Yeah. That's it. Okay. Okay. Okay.
Edward Norton's Influence on Film
01:25:11
Speaker
Yeah.
01:25:12
Speaker
But on that, I didn't like Jillian Anderson either. She's another one. Her acting skills totally escapes me. I don't understand where she's regarded as this totally amazing actress. Okay. Fair enough. But I thought there was an interesting choice. But I'm looking also here. So apparently, now this is something else, is that
01:25:40
Speaker
A lot of things that people, some people will probably know, some people probably don't, is that Norton is apparently incredibly difficult to work with. Oh yeah, I've heard that. Yeah, like, in fact, he basically took over American History X so much so that the director, you know, has disowned the official cut of that movie. I've heard that, yeah. In fact, he tried to petition the DGA to get the Alan Smithy credit on it.
01:26:10
Speaker
because he did not like how it came out. And that was because Norton basically took the production away from him. He just did this movie and I tried to watch some of it and I, I don't know, I turned it off after about like 45 minutes, this movie called Motherless Brooklyn.
01:26:27
Speaker
And apparently he bought the rights of the novel. And the only thing that he used from the novel was the title. Apparently that's what he did. Much like with Blade Runner, could you notice the story with that? Blade Runner, the novel is nothing at all like, you know, the title and, uh, Ridley Scott, you know, he admits that, yeah, that they just bought the title because they liked the title. They never planned on using the novel. So apparently that's what he did with this movie called Motherless Brooklyn is that he bought the novel.
01:26:57
Speaker
and apparently it's a completely original story or just about this close to one and with no elements from the actual knot which like pissed off a whole bunch of people including the writer of the novel so yeah he's got a history of doing stuff like that yeah also he apparently um
01:27:16
Speaker
He also said later on that he wanted to make, Norton said that he wanted to take the Hulk in the direction of the Chris Nolan films as well. And he wanted to do like a long, dark, serious take on the Hulk franchise. And Marvel didn't want to do that.
01:27:40
Speaker
Yeah, he says they're, I mean, yeah, they're, and he's apparently had a lot of problems working with people and he basically tried to take over. Cause you look back when this movie came out, like all Norton was very excited to come back. And then later on, he says, Oh no, I didn't actually want to come back. So he keeps changing the story every few years.
01:28:00
Speaker
And he's a good, I mean, you know, listen, Edward Norton is one of my favorite actors. You know, I- Oh yeah, he's an amazing actor. Don't get me wrong, but you know- I mean, you know, yeah, I mean, I, you know, and I would like to think that his diff, his being difficult actually does come
01:28:18
Speaker
from a place of true creativity, rather than he just wants to be a prima donna, which I've never heard about him actually being. I've never heard of him being a prima donna or anything like that. It's just that he likes to be in control, I guess, of whatever he's doing, or he wants to feel like he's in control.
01:28:38
Speaker
Right. Yeah. You know, whatever. I mean, listen, I don't know. I don't pretend to know what's in the mind of people. But I just think it would... First of all, I think it would have been very interesting to have seen him, how he would have interacted with the larger MCU and the other actors that's in the cast. We definitely would have got a much different take on Bruce Banner. Oh, yeah. If he had continued, you know, from Mark Ruffalo.
01:29:02
Speaker
Much as I like him, you got to admit he's more of a family friendly. He is. Yeah. Bruce Banner, you know, he's kind of like a cute, cuddly Bruce Banner. Well, something else I like about Ruffalo is that he looks more like a scientist. He does. Right. He feels more like, you know, because you're watching. I remember I was watching this last night and I'm looking at the beginning when Bruce is meditating in Brazil and I'm looking at him and I'm thinking like this guy's too buff to be Bruce Banner.
01:29:33
Speaker
Yeah, yeah, yeah. I mean, yeah. I mean, the guy looks like a martial artist. He does. You can tell that, yeah, he actually does look like a martial artist. He doesn't look like a scientist. Right. You know, he, although, although he convinces you that he's a scientist with his acting, you know, say, okay. And, you know, listen, we have had a long history of scientists who are buff and, you know, martial arts experts, stuff like that, but that's not Bruce Banner. Yeah. Yeah.
01:30:00
Speaker
Like you said, and Mark Ruffalo has got like these little nervous ticks that he does, and he does these things with his hands and with his glasses when he's talking, that I could see like, you know, like a scientist who is kind of like his mind is working on another level while he's talking to you. And he's not aware of what his, he's not aware what the rest of his body is. It's a weird thing, but when
01:30:24
Speaker
Ruffalo's banner is talking and his hands are doing something. You get the weirdest feeling that he's talking to you and he's not really aware of what his body is doing. Yeah, you know, we don't see that with Norton. But then again, this is the guy who is working on total control of his body in order to control his anger. Therefore, that's why his movements are very precise and very controlled. We don't get that with Ruffalo. Now it could be because, as we have said, this is a Ruffalo who has embraced
01:30:53
Speaker
being the Hulk to a point. So he doesn't have to keep that tight control over on himself all the time. Right. Yeah. That's right. I really, that's what I like about Ruffalo's version is that he's someone who has come to accept the Hulk. Yeah. Yeah. And he's much more comfortable with it. And that I really, that's a
01:31:14
Speaker
It's a somewhat unique take, because you don't see that a lot in the comics. And really, if you're going to have the Hulk and the Avengers, you need to have that, right? Because you either need to have Banner be comfortable enough becoming the Hulk, or you need to have a situation like the smart Hulk. You can't have a situation where he's always afraid of transforming, because that makes him a very unreliable teammate.
01:31:40
Speaker
And then again, as we see, like I said, one of the things I enjoy about seeing the Hulk in these movies is that we always see him progressing.
Hulk's MCU Evolution to Professor Hulk
01:31:50
Speaker
And then we come to the point where we come to Endgame where we see that Hulk and Banner had become so comfortable with each other that they're actually able to coexist. When he's the professor Hulk now, and he's taking selfies with people and he's the Hulk like all the time.
01:32:06
Speaker
Yeah. Yeah. But he's managed, you know, him and the Hulk have come to some kind of agreement and you know, they're able to coexist. Yes. You know, which is, I mean, the ultimate, now we've got like the ultimate vert to steal, you know, a phrase we've got now like an ultimate version of the Hulk where he's Bruce Banner and the Hulk. Right. Exactly. All right. Okay. So, um, any other last things you wanted to say about Incredible Hulk?
01:32:33
Speaker
Only that if you have not seen this movie already and I cannot understand why you haven't seen it that I would advise that you you know on your next rewatch of the MCU movies that you definitely make time and room for this one because this is you know what I I'm not going to say that this is like
01:32:54
Speaker
the most outstanding MCU movie, or this is the best Hulk, well, you know what? It probably is the best Hulk movie out of, you know, this one, you know, I like Ang Lee, but this one, yeah. I like this a little. Yeah, I like this better. For the longest time, I liked Ang Lee's version better, but over the years, because I've watched this movie so many times, like, and yeah, it's just because like, it's, there have been so many times when I was like, oh, I just want something to put on in the background. And for some reason, I kept coming to this movie.
01:33:24
Speaker
I don't know why, but I just kept coming to this movie. And so over the times, like my opinion is, I'm like, you know what? I actually think now I like this better than the Ang Lee one. It's got a better CGI Hulk. Yes. It's, I mean, listen, if you listen, if we're just going to go just on the third act alone, this has got Ang Lee's Hulk beat period. I mean, third act was incomprehensible. Yeah. I mean, just on the big, I mean, at least this one has a satisfying conclusion. Yes.
01:33:53
Speaker
that we can understand. So just on those two bases alone, I'd have to give this a slight nod. And like I said, it's a little bit more action orientated. We get right into the plot.
01:34:04
Speaker
Yeah. But yet again, as I've said at Infinitum, I like the fact that there actually is nothing in this movie that violates the Ang Lee Hulk, which I really think, you know, shows me that they respected what he did. And they just didn't want to throw out the baby with the bath water and said, well, you know, we're just going to do a complete reboot and we're going to throw everything. And no, they didn't do that. You know, so yeah, you, like I said, if you can close one eye,
01:34:31
Speaker
you can see this as being a direct sequel to the Ang Lee Hulk. Yeah, and this is kind of like the redheaded stepchild of the MCU, right? Yeah, it really is. Up until Ross appeared in Civil War, they'd never acknowledged this movie existed, except there's the one line. Right. Ruffalo has the one line in Avengers when he said, last time I was in New York, I broke Harlem.
01:34:57
Speaker
Yeah. For years, that was the only reference we had to Incredible Hulk. Yeah. That's an excellent point that you make. They kind of say, well, yeah, it kind of did happen, but we don't talk about it much.
01:35:17
Speaker
Yeah. All right. But still, but still, hey, as you know, excuse me. And as everybody though, who's been listening to us long enough, the Hulk is always going to be one of my favorite characters. And, uh, yeah, I watched, you know, uh, I'm like you, I tend to like, I'll put this movie on and it'll be playing in the background comfortably while I'm watching it. You know, cause I do enjoy it a lot. It is, it's to me,
01:35:47
Speaker
It's a well-made superhero movie. It's one of the best well-made superhero movies that I would recommend to anybody. I would recommend this to people who grew up watching the TV series. As a matter of fact, I wouldn't give them the Angley Hulk. Much as I love the Angley Hulk, I would not give, you know, I said, no, no, no. You put that down, you take this one. Go watch that one. And if you like that one, then go back and watch the Angley Hulk. Right.
01:36:13
Speaker
Okay. So that brings us to the end of this episode. And since you picked Incredible Hulk, that means my choice is next.
Brightburn Announcement for Halloween
01:36:23
Speaker
And I'm thinking because next week we got Halloween coming up. So I wanted to go with a horror theme superhero movie and I thought we could watch Brightburn.
01:36:36
Speaker
Okay, so you do something a little bit different avoid kind of like the obvious ones like Ghost Rider or something like that but go with one that you know is fairly new and people don't haven't talked about it like a million times and it I Remember, I don't I don't remember if it got a whole lot of attention I remember there was a buzz about it when the trailer first came out But I don't remember hearing a whole lot about it after that fact So I think it was one of these movies that was just kind of like forgotten about it
01:37:01
Speaker
You know what I think happened? I think once word of mouth got around about what I perceive as to be the gimmick of the movie, once it got around, the people say, oh, never mind then. I don't have to go see it in a movie theater. I can wait till it comes on. Yeah, yeah. Streaming. Because my wife and I, matter of fact, funny you should mention that. We watched this not too long ago, Patricia and I. We did. We watched it about like two weeks ago.
01:37:25
Speaker
I think it was on Amazon Prime or something like that. She said, you know anything about this? I said, yeah, I need a little something about it. She said, I hate you. And then we sat down and watched it. And then, OK, this is how obvious the movie was, as I've said to you many times and our friends listening to this. My wife knows diddly about superhero movies, but
01:37:49
Speaker
I would say 30, 40 minutes into them. She got it. She said, Oh, okay. I see what they doing. Yeah. Yeah. That's obvious. It was. Yeah. Okay. So, um, join us next time for a little bit of a Halloween themed episode when we're going to be talking about bright burn. Um, till then, you know, as always head on over to superhero cinephiles at, uh, on find our Facebook group, uh, join in vote for, um, what you want us to cover for our getting very close to 50th episode.
01:38:18
Speaker
And yeah, and that about does it for this week. We will talk to you next time. And just before we go, I would just like to say a little something different this time to you, good people listening to us. Perry and I really appreciate the fact that you take your time out of your busy lives to listen to our podcast and we don't take it for granted. Thank you very much for listening and for supporting.
01:38:45
Speaker
Yes. Very good. Very well said. All right. Thanks so much for listening and we will talk to you next week. Okay. Good night. God bless.
01:38:59
Speaker
Thanks for listening to the Superhero Cinephiles Podcast. If you have any questions or comments about this or any other episode, or if you have a superhero movie or TV show you'd like us to cover in a future episode, you can email us at superheroescinephiles at gmail.com, or you can also visit us on the web at superheroescinephiles.com.
01:39:19
Speaker
If you like what you hear, leave us a review wherever you get your podcasts. Each review helps us reach more potential listeners. You can also support the show by renting or purchasing the movies discussed, or by picking up our books, all of which can be accessed through the website, as well as find links to our social media presences. The theme music for this show is a shortened version of Superhero Showdown, a royalty-free piece of music, courtesy of pheasantudios.com.