Ah the aroma of stale beer and failure

[jlh]

So I saw The Incredible Hulk tonight with ali_wildgoose and bhanesidhe. And the nonspoilery thumbnail review is, to quote rubydebrazier, if you like this kind of thing, you will find it is the kind of thing you like. Not nearly as good as Iron Man, but I think Iron Man was my superhero movie of destiny, so the comparison is unfair.

oneangryrabbit wrote last night that what people want to see is Hulk smashing shit, which I'm sure is true, but for 8-year-old Clio, what I adored about the TV show was the pathos, the longing loneliness of Bill Bixby's Dr. Banner. I know the shout outs to the TV show—Bixby on the screen in a clip from The Courtship of Eddie's Father, Ferigno as the security guard, and the emo piano music that closed the show as Dr. Banner moved on to another town—were kind of fan service, but they were the few parts I actually liked. It's that part of the Hulk that always interested me, as much as he does interest me: Dr. Banner's crazy lonely emo thing.

It was also nice to see Edward Norton in a sympathetic role. I do like him, and I'd grown weary of the endless parade of villains. (Though, speaking of which, has Tim Roth done anything interesting and non-villainous since Pulp Fiction?) I also wonder if it signifies, this parade of early 80s film stars playing flawed father figures, first Jeff Bridges and now William Hurt (very distractingly sporting his Body Heat moustache).

I found the fight scenes, especially the last one, to be very long and uninteresting, but I don't like fight scenes much under the best of circs. (I know, very non-feminist non-fangirl of me.) Much of the film was almost insanely predictable, but then so was Iron Man. Edward Norton has the disadvantage of not being a guy in a suit, or being able to feed my "making stuff" kink, so he wasn't as able as RDJ to push the film forward through sheer force of personality.

I can't decide if I would recommend this or not. I guess, as I said, if you were going to go see it you probably should. If you weren't, but were vaguely thinking of it because of the Iron Man / New Avengers tie in, save your money.

Comments

[sistermagpie.livejournal.com]

I may just wait to see this on DVD because I do like Edward Norton and I was a fan of the TV show. I'm glad they have the shout outs! EN can play very gentle like Bill Bixby, though Bill Bixby's more all about that.

[emsariel.livejournal.com]

I'm right there with you regarding the appeal of the TV show. It was, like, so amazing to see this show about a comic book hero where the hero always ended up walking off being sad, and his sole superpower was the last thing he wanted to use... *cries*.