My Hulk movie rant (includes spoilers)

I think Peter Sanderson had a pretty interesting article about the Hulk movie. It's at http://filmforce.ign.com/articles/428/428813p1.html

I don't agree with every last one of his points, but I do agree with a lot of what he says.

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When did they mention a specific war? I only ask as I just got ahold of the ASM Essentials Volume 1 and in the Lizards debut issue (ASM 3 or 4), it's just stated that he lost an arm in the war. Given the published date I would assume that Stan was reffering to either WW2 or more likely Korea as Vietnam might not have been in the publics mind yet.

Well Talbot shouldn't appear as he was blown up by that grenade. However if they go with pre Quesada/Jemas policy, we haven't seen a body so he can always be resurrected ;O)

You're totally correct. Vietnam was probably a total short circuit in my brain. For some reason I associated Connors with Vietnam, but considering the date of Connors' creation, the origin of his injury was likely the Korean War. I wasn't thinking when I wrote that.

It (and the profoundly awful conclusion) was the movie's only real flaw, and probably what hurt it at the box office more than any other single factor.

Exactly. The Hulk had gone on his rampage, and Betty had brought him back. A climax. In my own view, Lee should have just cut the Absorbing Man angle entirely and allowed Bruce and David to have one last conversation in which perhaps they come to some sort of odd reproachement (or don't). The movie would end with David being hauled off and Bruce's fate undetermined. Credits roll.

(MUCH better set-up for a sequel, btw, than what was actually in the movie)

That whole sequence was ill-conceived and badly executed, and I hated the 'twist epilogue' imported directly from 1970s b-movies and completely out of character with the rest of the film.

It was a stupid conclusion, actually made much worse by the gamma bomb. The entire Absorbing Man element seemed alien to the movie to me anyway, and it's suddenly thrown into the mix at the end, just as was the epilogue, as though it was an afterthought cooked up in order to provide some sort of resolution. I understand what Lee was trying to do with the ending

Let me start off by saying i agree with most of what you said. Valid and justified complaints .

I posted a couple questions about the movie maybe a month ago and i also pointed out the similarity between what david banner was doing and the lizard...very strange that either the screen writer or ang lee chose to incorporate this.

I really am getting kind of tired of that type of argument, that 'You can believe a guy can turn green and throw around tanks, but you can't believe childhood acquaintances wouldn't meet each other up again at the same job?' As you said, there are things we expect to suspend our disbelief for, and other things that should be much easier to believe. If you go by that argument, well why not just make spider-man able to fly and have heat vision? I mean after all, if you can believe he got spider-powers, why can't he just fly? Very stupid argument.

I was also disappointed by this. In my post with questions i wondered what exactly the point was of that mushroom cloud...was it even a gamma bomb? In my opinion, they should have kept the origin of the hulk being created from a gamma BOMB.

I really don't understand why they couldn't have just called him rick. They didn't even have to give him a last name, just call him rick. Then if they need him for any future movie, *then* give the last name jones.

I really never thought about this until you mentioned it, but you're absolutely right. When watching the movie, you don't get a sense that the hulk is a psychologically different being that just wants 'to be left alone.' Hopefully in the second movie we will see isntances where banner says he hates the hulk and vice versa.

Bit off topic, but did anyone else think it was kind of stupid in T3 when he shot at all those policemen and then did a scan and read 'body count 0' or whatever? I mean yes he's supposed to be a good guy, but the terminator is not supposed to save every human life at whatever cost.

Though not as much bothered me about the movie, i do think you made a lot of good points. I was confused at some parts of the movie (e.g. why did they let david banner go and talk with bruce when he was all chained up?). Hopefully the second movie will do a better job explaining stuff and we'll get to see more hulk from the beginning.

Thanks for your thoughtful exchange, Martin. Appreciate the time you put into this. I'm gonna snip a lot, stuff that I expect we wouldn't agree on.

Well, I don't think the physics side was highlighted at all, only the medical and genetic part. There may have been a throwaway line or two about it, but by and large, you see both David and Bruce working on animals far more than you see them working on radiation. Probably because that is easier to portray visually for the lowest common denominator. As I said, I have always seen Bruce as a machinesmith, not someone who works on living organisms. I thought this movie made both David and Bruce come off as people who work on living organisms more than on machines.

PAD worked with some of this, positing that the gamma bomb destroyed inorganic things and left organisms alive in its area of effect

Sorry. I guess I was just responding to the tone of your rant. I rather liked the movie and with all the time spent in the movie developing the Bruce / Betty relationship I, frankly, rather thought it was your comment above that was pointless in the sense that I didn't think you actually had a point.

Well, there's the scene where we first see Betty, the scene where Betty asks Bruce why he doesn't wonder about his birth parents, the scene where Bruce has a flashback about him and Betty when they were an item and the long scene at the base during which Betty is trying to get Bruce to remember the past as a result of the 'Don't you remember?' comment that her father made to him before. It was pretty clear that Bruce had repressed memories and that they were responsible for him being a very private person who didn't want to open up. I interpreted the above exchange in light of everything that had been said previously.

Still implausible.

BRUCE: Hey? Remember me? I'm your old friend Bruce... OLD FRIEND: Ahhh! Security! Help! BRUCE: ...Kregzler.

because he asked to see him?

The stupid part was having Talbot trying to get a sample of the Hulk's DNA when all he needed was Bruce's DNA. David realised this so, with Talbot dead and Bruce unwilling to co-operate, David was suddenly valuable to the military. Admittedly this obviously wasn't made clear.

He may have asked to see him, but ross didn't like david banner, so why would he grant him anything? Let alone the fact that david started raving and ranting...and i know that ross did give the command to kill them both, but they let david babble for quite some time before giving that order. I don't think i was the only one left wondering.

He must have cut some sort of deal. That's all I can say.

He tells Betty 'I'm doing this for you.' Betty thought Bruce might be able to resolve his relationship with his father. Its possible that Ross thought that David might provoke Bruce into changing and force him to incinerate him. Maybe a better solution for everyone than Bruce spending his life in that chair or being fried in cold blood. He despised David Banner and those feelings seemed to carry on to Bruce but he was still affected when he had to order the nuclear strike at the end.