Hulk (2003) and The Incredible Hulk (2008) compared

Having just watch Ang Lee’s Hulk again, I now feel more qualified to compare it to The Incredible Hulk.

I feel both movies are equally good. Yes, yes, I know, that’s almost controversial—you’re supposed to love one and hate the other, right? If I had to give each movie a quantified rating, I’d probably rate them the same… though I’m not entirely sure what that rating is. :)

Each one has its strengths and weaknesses. Combined, they would be amazing, IMO. As it is, we’re left with two good, but “imperfect” films. As far as comparing and contrasting them goes…

First, I feel the Ross in Hulk is a much better character than the one in The Incredible Hulk. I understand his character and his motivations far better in Hulk than in The Incredible Hulk. In fact, he’s a rather sympathetic character in Hulk. Undeniably, the Hulk is a threat and one that should be contained, since he appears to be out of control. And, certainly, Ross is trying to protect his daughter. Yes, he’s basically a dick, but he’s a dick I understand. (Except, perhaps, when he confronts Banner the first time—he seems a bit too aggressive given where the story has been at that point.) In The Incredible Hulk, on the other hand, his character is much more 1-dimentional. He seems to more or less have only one motivation: make the ultimate weapon and capture the Hulk. (Somehow these are interrelated… more on that later.) In fact, I cannot even imagine why, in The Incredible Hulk, he unleashes the Hulk to fight the Abomination. It makes no sense. He’s never shown, in the film, much concern before for anything except his singular goal—how does stopping the Abomination accomplish this goal? His singular goal.

The two Bettys are less straightforward to deal with. The Betty in Hulk is a believable character, but perhaps not as likable as the one in The Incredible Hulk. She doesn’t seem enormously fleshed out in Hulk—and why she’s trying to play psychotherapist with Banner, I don’t know. I mean, helping him work through his issues would make sense, but the way it happens in the movie is just a bit too much. Meanwhile, the Betty in The Incredible Hulk is a much more likable character and an ally of the Hulk, which I like. The scenes where she interacts with the Hulk make much more sense and work better. Where as Hulk’s Betty simply has to show up to calm the Hulk down, The Incredible Hulk’s Betty makes a deliberate effort to help him reach that calm. On the other hand, her flip-flop with her boyfriend is a bit hard to believe. Or perhaps hard merely to sympathize with. She’s away from him and back with Bruce for two nights and she’s in bed with Bruce? Wow. Either they must have been quite the couple (which we’re not shown) or she’s kind of… well, I’m hesitant to say “slutty,” but it kinda fits here. And it’s not quite consistent with the rest of her character. Why have her dating someone else at all if they’re going to have her immediately hook up with Bruce? Why not just skip the whole thing altogether. Make her friends with the therapist if necessary, but date him? Bad idea. (Plus, if he’s her therapist, that’s a big no-no for him and something he could easily lose his license over.)

Banner himself is equally difficult to assess. The Banner of Hulk is much more interesting, certainly. I rather like the idea that he’s such a repressed person that being the Hulk is enjoyable to him because he is finally allowed to let go. But, on the other hand, I don’t quite buy why he’s a repressed person, since he’s shown to have been that way since he was young. Some will say his character is very Freudian, and while I agree insofar as the repressed memories and childhood issues bit goes, I would say he’s almost more Jungian—what he has tried to deny in himself flares up dramatically in the form of the Hulk. But this Banner is also a bit odd in that his transition from liking the transformation into the Hulk to fighting and controlling it happens instantaneously—and I don’t really buy it. Enter the “cheese” of “I’ll never let you [make me turn into the Hulk]”—nice idea, but poorly implemented. I see no transition from his telling Betty he likes it to him wanting to contain and fight it. The Incredible Hulk’s Banner, on the other hand, is quite consistent in his attitude toward the Hulk, and I like that. His attempts to fight the transformation make sense and I like that, too. He’s a bit less interesting than Hulk’s Banner, but he’s a more consistent and believable character.

The Hulk himself? Well, The Incredible Hulk wins hands down here, in my opinion. I like his aesthetics better, I like how he fights better, I like his transformations and actions while transformed better. Over all, I think he “works” much better than Hulk’s Hulk. I truly felt his rage in The Incredible Hulk, while in Hulk, I kind of didn’t. It seemed, in Hulk, more as if once Banner got mad the Hulk came out and ran around until Betty came out to stop him. I never really felt like it was a rage issue in Hulk. Similarly, The Incredible Hulk’s Hulk much better represents a sort of enraged, primal man, which I rather liked. Hulk’s Hulk just “is.” He’s power, he’s freedom for Banner, but he’s not, in himself, representing much of anything. Or at least nothing I found enormously interesting.

Similarly, I think The Incredible Hulk’s fights were superior to Hulk’s. Especially, in their “choreography”—I totally dug the fight between the Abomination and the Hulk in The Incredible Hulk and his fight on the campus was cool, if illogical (who deploys tanks onto a university campus? honestly!). The ones in Hulk weren’t bad, either, however… though I question why the Hulk has such a hard time with the Hulked dogs but was able to dispatch tanks so easily. The Hulk-Dogs weren’t a bad thing for the Hulk to fight, in my opinion, but I just didn’t buy them as strong enough to be much of a challenge for the Hulk. Though it isn’t until later in the film that you truly see much demonstration of the Hulk’s nearly unlimited strength. I thought The Incredible Hulk established and worked with the Hulk’s strength much better. I’m still not keen on either one having a Superman-level of invulnerability to all damage, but whatever.

Villain-wise, I’d tip things a bit in Hulk’s favor. While the Abomination was cool and a worthy foe for the Hulk, I didn’t think that he was established convincingly enough. Blonsky’s desire to transform into the Abomination was not well-established at all—it seemed forced. Furthermore, why Ross was so adamant to pursue the Hulk when he had access to, apparently, such a successful super-soldier serum is beyond me. I mean, one injection from it, and Blonsky is suddenly quite the acrobat. True, no Hulk, but if they were able to make that much progress without the Hulk, I don’t think Ross would have had so much of a drive to capture him… especially since the Hulk is so uncontrollable. Ross could have worked if they’d given him more of a motivation to pursue the Hulk relentlessly, but since they didn’t we’re left instead to fill in the blanks on that. Hulk’s Ross has, as I mentioned, no such motivation issues. On the other hand, the Talbot character in Hulk is a total joke. He seems to exist just to be a stereotypical sleezeball and to piss off Banner/Hulk. Crappy dialog, crappy characterization—a total waste.

David Banner/the Absorbing Man? Hard to say. I more or less bought his character, though perhaps not quite the alternation between paternal behavior and hubris-fueled “evil.” His attempt to absorb the Hulk was sufficiently evil, but I’m not quite sure I “got” his transformation to complete megalomania. His “I gave you life and I can take it back!” bit was similarly of quality “villainousness,” but just wasn’t completely believable. If his transformation into the Absorbing Man was supposed to have done that, we weren’t shown it.

Finally, while I applaud Ang Lee’s attempt to integrate some comic book-ness into the film, his panel-style aesthetic totally failed, in my opinion. Just a bad idea. Especially given the tone he seemed to be going for with the film.

Overall, both films had a very different feel. Hulk felt more like a drama, which I liked, while The Incredible Hulk felt more like an action movie. The Incredible Hulk was a good action movie, but I rather liked the idea of a superhero drama, of exploring what it means to be the Hulk. Like I said, I equally like both films, and they both have their strengths (and weaknesses). I still, to the this day, do not understand why Hulk gets so much flack.