Yeah... it's Soap Box time!
Well not really... but as a tried-and-true comic book fan from further back than you think... I am constantly a little disappointed when I hear people panning comic book movies.
Case in point, Ang Lee's "Hulk" from 2003.
Yes, it took almost 40 minutes for us to SEE the big green monstrosity... yes, his size seemed to fluctuate more than the Sean Connery dragon in Dragonheart... and people claim 'there was no plot... and no point' to the movie.
See... you're not understanding.
That IS the point.
The Hulk is a seething gamma-irradiated ball of angry.
ALL. THE. TIME.
(And... for those who didn't know... in the comics, the Hulk was written as being almost ten feet tall... so a lot of the size proportions in Lee's film were pretty accurate...)
The direction Lee took The Hulk might not have been the best, nor was it completely in 'canon', but it made sense from a 'flow' standpoint... here we have a child that grew up knowing abuse... and then experiments... a bad accident literally unleashes the 'Hyde' from our meek Doctor Jeckyl... and much thrashing and thunderous fist-trashing (of a military base, San Francisco, and Nick Nolte in that order) ensued. If anyone has ever known a victim of abuse, they will recognize the non-assertive, passive-aggressive nature that Bana tried to portray in Bruce Banner.
There is also the 'victim of abuse turning into the abuser themselves' metaphor that literally, PHYSICALLY manifests. This is the worst fears of the victim come to life - a very big, very green and very angry life.
People saw the Hulk tearing the turret off the top of a tank and wondered 'What was the point? How did that add to the movie?"
What they don't know is that THAT is what the Hulk comics were all about.
Well not really... but as a tried-and-true comic book fan from further back than you think... I am constantly a little disappointed when I hear people panning comic book movies.
Case in point, Ang Lee's "Hulk" from 2003.
Yes, it took almost 40 minutes for us to SEE the big green monstrosity... yes, his size seemed to fluctuate more than the Sean Connery dragon in Dragonheart... and people claim 'there was no plot... and no point' to the movie.
See... you're not understanding.
That IS the point.
The Hulk is a seething gamma-irradiated ball of angry.
ALL. THE. TIME.
(And... for those who didn't know... in the comics, the Hulk was written as being almost ten feet tall... so a lot of the size proportions in Lee's film were pretty accurate...)
The direction Lee took The Hulk might not have been the best, nor was it completely in 'canon', but it made sense from a 'flow' standpoint... here we have a child that grew up knowing abuse... and then experiments... a bad accident literally unleashes the 'Hyde' from our meek Doctor Jeckyl... and much thrashing and thunderous fist-trashing (of a military base, San Francisco, and Nick Nolte in that order) ensued. If anyone has ever known a victim of abuse, they will recognize the non-assertive, passive-aggressive nature that Bana tried to portray in Bruce Banner.
There is also the 'victim of abuse turning into the abuser themselves' metaphor that literally, PHYSICALLY manifests. This is the worst fears of the victim come to life - a very big, very green and very angry life.People saw the Hulk tearing the turret off the top of a tank and wondered 'What was the point? How did that add to the movie?"
What they don't know is that THAT is what the Hulk comics were all about.
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