If there was one breakout star of last year’s Marvel’s The Avengers, it was undoubtedly Mark Ruffalo’s Bruce Banner, aka the Hulk. But given that the incredible green hero has already headlined two relatively unsuccessful attempts at a major motion picture, how could Marvel Studios capitalize on the newfound interest in the character without repeating the same mistakes that sent the earlier Hulk films astray? One report may have the answer: Send the character into space.
Latino Review, citing anonymous “trusted sources,” ran a report this morning that Marvel Studios plans to adapt the 2006 comic book storyline “Planet Hulk” — where the smash-prone anti-hero gets launched into space for the good of humanity – during the second Avengers movie, followed by a stand-alone Hulk film where he goes on to conquer the war-torn alien planet where he lands. According to the site’s pseudonymous “El Mayimbe,” the plan would also include a third Avengers movie adapting World War Hulk, the final installment of “Planet Hulk” where the Hulk returns to Earth with an alien army to revenge himself against Earth’s Mightiest Heroes.
If true, this approach makes a lot of sense; it avoids the pitfalls of the two earlier Hulk movies by placing the character not just in an entirely different environment, but an entirely different world full of aliens who — as we learned in The Avengers – can be smashed without a second thought. It also takes advantage of the outer-space setting that will serve as the backdrop for upcoming Marvel movies like 2014′s Guardians of The Galaxy.
But if that’s why it makes sense, there are also quite a few reasons why Marvel Studios might not want to go for this plan. Firstly, “Planet Hulk” as a whole — and especially World War Hulk — turns the Hulk into a villain, specifically a villain who invades Earth to subjugate the human race. Secondly, the basic plot arc of the first half of “Planet Hulk” isn’t a million miles away from Edgar Rice Burroughs’ 1917 novel A Princess of Mars, which was adapted last year into a costly and embarrassing box office bomb called John Carter for Marvel’s parent company, Disney.
Thirdly, and most importantly, almost all of “Planet Hulk” revolves around the Hulk, and not Bruce Banner. Even a rewrite to add more “puny Banner” to the movie is likely to leave him interacting with CGI aliens instead of other humans, and is that really the best way to use Mark Ruffalo, considering how well he played off against Robert Downey Jr. and Chris Evans in Avengers?
While the report remains unconfirmed, Marvel Studios President Kevin Feige himself confirmed that the studio was planning its third “phase” of releases last month, with Ant-Man and Doctor Strange named as two of the films the studio planned to release after 2015.
Marvel Studios did not respond to Wired’s request for comment on this story.
Report: Is Marvel Firing the Hulk Into Space in <i>Avengers 2</i>?
This article
Report: Is Marvel Firing the Hulk Into Space in <i>Avengers 2</i>?
can be opened in url
http://spraynewstar.blogspot.com/2013/02/report-is-marvel-firing-hulk-into-space.html
Report: Is Marvel Firing the Hulk Into Space in <i>Avengers 2</i>?
