Bald Hulk Is Not A Euphemism: The Incredible Hulk #7 Review

Editor’s Note: Time for one last review before the comic stores open… one chock full of profanity and spoilers. You are warned.

A couple of months ago, the Fox Movie Channel reran the 1990 TV movie The Death Of The Incredible Hulk, which I grabbed on the TiVo because I was a child in the 1970s / 1980s and therefore grew up with the Bill Bixby / Lou Ferrigno television show and have a sense of nostalgia for it. Plus, I possibly hate myself.

Anyway, at the end of the flick, the Hulk suffers some kind of great fall (and yes, that is as specific as I can get. What, you think I watched that pile of shit sober?) and caused the death of Bixby’s Banner. The intention was never to actually kill Banner / Hulk, but instead to set up a future TV movie where the Hulk had Banner’s brain, which was derailled due to Lou Ferrigno’s commitments to sign autographs at regional comic book conventions for nickels, and due to Bill Bixby’s unexpected opportunity to perform in a second banana role to a prostate tumor.

What’s my point? My point is that even ratings-crazy and cocaine “enthusiast” 80s TV executives never intended to kill Banner permanently. And I guarantee you, neither does The Incredible Hulk #7 writer Jason Aaron.

This issue is the conclusion of the arc begun back in October, where we established that the Hulk and Banner had been separated, and that the separation had caused Banner to go apeshit crazy. It is now six months later, and we have since learned that… the Hulk and Banner were separated, and that the separation caused Banner to go apeshit crazy, and that Doctor Doom was involved at some point.

Which is a gross simplification of an interesting dual character arc examining what Banner and Hulk would be like if they were separated from each other, but from a plot point feels pretty accurate. We’re seven issues in, and we’re still on the same island with the same cast with the same stakes, only at some point in a previous issue, someone set off a Gamma Bomb which, unlike the first time Banner was exposed to one, turns him less into a Hulk and more into a Fine Paste. Which is an odd outcome considering Hulk’s origin; it would be like if Peter Parker were bitten by a second radioactive spider under the same circumstances, and instead of spider-powers he got spider-melanoma. Apparently the wildcard in turning into a Hulk rather than a permanent silhouette on a nearby wall is a hippie playing Bob Dylan songs at the edge of a safety trench. But I digress.

One of the key points of this issue is the cause of Banner’s insanity following his separation from the Hulk. The explanation of which is absolutely crucial to the story, a cool take on the Banner / Hulk relationship, and is clearly itemized here, but… it was presented to the reader in a one-sided battle between Hulk and Dr. Doom, a continent and a half away from where Banner is / was. Meaning despite the cool factor of that kind of A-List battle (Note to self: don’t fuck with Dr. Doom), it amounts to exposition wrapped in a lot of punching and zapping. It’s like watching Clarice Starling and Will Graham tazering each other while describing the etiology behind Hannibal Lecter’s taste for long pig: it’s important information, and it’s presented in an entertaining fashion, but it’s missing the most important thing: the subject. It’s like watching Ron Jeremy talking to John Holmes about fucking Ginger Lynn (again: grew up in the 80s) while Kung-Fu’ing each other; it’s good for a giggle, but if it gives you a boner you should perhaps question your priorities.

The second major point of the issue is the death of Banner, while in the arms of the Hulk, in the blast wave of a Gamma Bomb. Again, forget the fact that the last time this happened to Banner he turned into the Hulk, which could have led to a Hulk on Hulk battle, which would have been fucking awesome. Instead, here we get Hulk, cradling an enraged Banner as Banner futilely punches Hulk while Hulk is blasted hairless by the radiation blast wave (Note to self: “Bald Hulk” is something I will demand to hear in the hotel bedroom at SDCC), as Hulk whispers, “I’m sorry.” Which is a moving scene… or as moving as a scene can be when the reader is busy screeching, “Bullshit!”

Let’s play a round of Match Game for comic geeks: “Hulk… blanks… Banner.” If your answer was, “cradles,” or “comforts,” or God forbid: “spoons,” you should, again, perhaps question your priorities. I have serious trouble believing that Hulk would have any feelings about Banner being killed that didn’t originate from his prostate (sorry, Bill Bixby!). It is a moving scene that meets the needs of any action movie death scene – it reminds me of the wailing and gnashing of teeth when Bruce Willis died at the end of Armageddon, such weak sauce is it was – but it does not ring true to this reader, who has been reading Hulk comics since his sidekick was Jim Wilson.

The art by Whilce Portacio (Proving that my predictions vis a vis Mark Silvestri’s abilitiy to continue drawing this book on a monthly basis were dead bang on) is exactly what I want from a Hulk comic book. Portacio draws Hulk in a very McFarlane fashion: heavy, prothagonous brow, with beady eyes and a squat, wide stance. Yes, it is thin-lined and extremely busy, but that’s what Portacio does. To be objective, the Hulk’s figure varies wildly, to the point where Hulk’s forearms sometimes look like John Holmes and Ron Jeremy Kung Fu’ing with flappy hand-tipped condoms. But despite all this, the Hulk looks like a solid and implacable force of nature, which reminds me of the good old days, back when Todd McFarlane was doing crazy-assed shit in comics. Like drawing them.

Look, I do not in any way believe that Aaron intends for Banner to remain dead. If only because the Avengers movie – starring Mark Ruffalo as Bruce Banner, opening in American theaters in about 10 days – is a thing that exists in the real world that Marvel / Disney is hoping to make money off of. And leave it to Marvel to, in the face of that kind of publicity for one of their characters, to “kill” one of the book’s leads three weeks before the movie opens.

And it is for that, and several other reasons, why this book is a misfire despite being a decent character study of Bruce Banner. It presents that character work in a stilted, expository way, and masks that exposition in conflicts that have nothing to do with the main conflict. And it cranks up the pathos with a character death that feels temporary; it wasn’t even taken seriously enough to attract the attention of the New York Post, and this is with the main character being in a movie coming out in two weeks.

Bottom line: The Incredible Hulk #7 wants to be epic, but instead feels transitory and weightless, like it’s TV movie cousin… except the TV movie didn’t cost me four bucks.