Review: "HULK VS"

I reviewed "Hulk Vs Thor" previously on my "Bagged & Boarded" site. The site is now password-protected so I'm pasting the review here:

Finally saw "Hulk Vs. Thor" on DVD with my family on Saturday evening. Picked up the DVD on Friday afternoon but didn't get to watch it with the kids because I came home late at night on Friday after teaching another History/Geography class. Also taught another English class on Saturday afternoon. Anyway, it was a Saturday evening and my kids were at the end of their patience already waiting for me to pop the DVD into the player to watch the animated movie with them. Like the other Marvel animated films, this one is a Lion's Gate release as well (previous films include "Ultimate Avengers I & II", "Iron Man", "Doctor Strange" and "Next Avengers"). It's also written by the dynamic duo Craig Kyle and Chris Yost (who also did the "X-Men: Evolution" cartoon series and the "New X-Men" & "X-Force" comics).

Storywise, this animated movie had little to offer. We get a simplistic Loki brings Hulk to Asgard to spread carnage story. For comic readers, we've seen this plot a million times in old "Avengers" issues. In other words, the story merely provided the excuse for ol' Greenskin to go all out berserk and smashing everything in his path in the Golden Realms of Asgard! The fun is seeing everything in an animated movie. A lot of work has been put into the backdrops and character designs. We get appearances by all our favourite Asgardians - Volstagg, Hogun, Fandral, Balder, Sif, Amora, etc. My favourite was Hela, the mistress of death (little surprise since she was my favourite character during the Simonson run on "Thor" as well). My kids were rolling on the floor laughing after the 12th time Thor was plummeted into the ground by the Hulk (sans Bruce Banner). Thor, as usual, was more adept at shit-talking than actual fighting. In fact, there's hardly any other character who's more adept at shit-talking than the Mighty Thor, when you really think about it! "For Odin, For Asgard... For the Realm Eternal..." When I was a kid, all that sounded like a battle-cry. In the cynicism of my old age, that was simply shit-talking. Of course, Thor with his flowing red cape and feathered-helmet is probably the only shit-talking character who can still look noble (not to mention cool-as-hell) while muttering such gibberish! :)

In conclusion, it was 45 minutes of pure Hulk carnage. The ol' Greenskin tore down the walls of Asgard, threw soldiers about, defeated the Warriors Three + Balder the Brave, smashed the entire squadron of Valkyrie warriors, knocked down Frost Giants and slam-dunked the shit-talking Thunder God; before being reunited with the spirit of Bruce Banner and sent back to Earth! Straightforward, stupid fun but fun nevertheless. Enjoy. :)

Now, for some unknown reason, I didn't get the "Hulk Vs. Wolverine" film in my DVD pack. I am going back to the DVD shop to look up the bloke who sold me this pack, look him in the eye and declare, "I will have words with thee!" Thankfully, by a stroke of coincidence (of is it the weaving of the Norns), 8TV decided to show the old Bill Bixby "The Incredible Hulk" TV show on its 11:45pm slot on the same night!!! My kids were elated that I allowed them to stay up late for that. What was even better was that the PILOT EPISODE was on the same night! Now, I was a huge fan of the TV series as a kid (even more than the comics, I must say) but I had never seen the PILOT EPISODE showing how David Banner became the Hulk in the first place!

Watching the pilot episode was a strange experience. Most of the scenes in the pilot are repeated in the famous opening scenes for later episodes but watching the full pilot finally provided some context to those famous scenes. Aside from the scenes showing how Banner bathed himself with gamma-radiation on the rotating chair, we also get a look into the experiments that he was involved in prior to that. Bill Bixby was just simply this fantastic actor who can evoke sympathy with every exasperated line he uttered. We see the man struggling with guilt because of his failure to save his lover from a burning car. Then we see him take the desperate step to bathe himself with gamma-radiation in order to find the key to obtaining superhuman strength. For comic-purists, this origin differed greatly from the original Lee-Kirby story but in the 1970s, nobody complained! Lou Ferrigno's Hulk was the dumb brute rather than the articulate and murderous savage in the first issue. Put in another way, there was more of the "Frankenstein monster" in him than "Mr. Hyde". Finally, we also get the first appearance of Jack Colvin's "Mr. McGee" - the most annoying tabloid reporter in TV history. His single contribution to civilization was to get Banner to say, "Mr. McGee, don't make me angry - you won't like me when I'm angry!" :)

When I was 15 years old, nothing excited me more than a Hulk vs Wolverine comic. Well, except for maybe a Hulk vs Thor comic or the next installment of the "A Nightmare On Elm Street" movies. Anyway, what I'm trying to say is that I like a comic featuring a good brawl as much as any other person. With the "Hulk Vs Wolverine" DVD, I finally got to be like a 15 year old again. Like I mentioned above, my original DVD did not have this installment. I picked up another DVD and was pleased to find it included inside. Watched it again with my kids last night and we all had a great time. Some highlights:

• Sabretooth's facial expressions when he saw the Hulk rushing towards him.
• Hulk calling Lady Deathstrike an ugly girl - he should see this girl with a critter-like smile that I know!
• Hulk calling Deadpool the "talking man".
• In fact, every scene with Deadpool is gold - and I never even liked the comicbook version of the character!
• Flashbacks to the Weapon X experiment and Logan chopping off the Professor's arm.
• Hulk tearing Deathstrike apart - reminiscent of what ol'Greenskin did to Tigra in Peter David's "The Last Avengers Story".

In short, I actually enjoyed this one better than "Hulk Vs. Thor" above. Maybe that's because I'm somehow tired of Norse Mythology these days. In fact, I was just in Borders two days ago and flipped through the recoloured Kirby collection of "Tales of Asgard". Time was, I would've bought that book and licked every page out of love in the past. These days, I feel... well,... nothing. I mean, I still stand in awe at Kirby's artwork and character designs but somehow I just can't work up the feelings to buy the book. I don't even know why. I ended up buying two X-Factor hardcovers instead...