The Incredible Hulk (2008)

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Overview

The Incredible Hulk is a reboot of Ang Lee's Hulk film, made by Marvel Studios as a part of their Marvel Cinematic Universe. The film was originally intended as a sequel but was changed to a reboot by Edward Norton. The film is expected to have a sequel in 2013 or later.

Creation

Ang Lee's Hulk

The initial idea for the film was that it was going to be a sequel to the 2003 Hulk film but after Universal failed to meet the deadline to film a sequel. After that, Marvel Studios decided to restart the project as a reboot. In January of 2006, it was then announced that Marvel Studios was going ahead with providing money for the film, with Universal distributing the film. Marvel felt the film had to deviate from Ang Lee's film to continue the franchise. The film's sequel which was intended to be released a year or two after the film, is going to be producer sometime after The Avengers in 2012 with Mark Ruffalo possibly reprising his role from The Avengers.

Plot Summary

The back story is shown over the opening credits. Dr. Bruce Banner is shown conducting an experiment involving Gamma Radiation on himself as Betty Ross, her father General Thaddeus Ross, and various other scientists look onward. After a while though, the experiment goes horribly wrong and a wave of destruction erupts in the room. In the end, two scientists end up dead. As the chaos dies down, Banner realizes after a while that he might be blamed for the deaths of the scientists and runs away.

Banner trying to suppress the beast.

It has been several years since he was first exposed Gamma Radiation and Banner is hiding out in , as a repairman in a soda plant. While repairing a switch, he cuts his finger and his blood falls onto to assembly line. Though Banner is able to get part of his blood back, he does not get all of it and worse, his blood gets mixed into one of the sodas. Shortly after, General Ross and his lackeys intercept a report of a man who died of Gamma poisoning from a soda in Milwaukee. After tracking the soda back to the source, they resolve to go after Banner with the help of specialist Emil Bronsky.

Meanwhile, Banner had been in contact with a Mr. Blue who had recommended a plant could cure his Gamma exposure. At first, the tests he does on his blood appear to work but then the Gamma Radiation over powers the plant. Banner then tells Mr. Blue about his failure and Mr. Blue then says he needs a blood sample in order to help further. At first Banner is reluctant to do that but eventually he caves in. After receiving the blood sample, Mr. Blue then requires the data from the original procedure. However, before Banner can respond he is forced to flee as General Ross and his battalion arrives.

"That thing was Banner"

They chase Banner through the streets of the Brazilian town, ultimately trapping him in the soda plant. Bronsky and the others are about to corner Banner, when they are taken by surprise by a huge figure. They try to counter but to no avail. Bronsky and the battalion ultimately retreat. Reuniting with Ross, Bronsky wonders what that thing was and what happened to Banner. Ross then informs Bronsky that that thing was Banner. When Banner comes to, he finds himself in a whole different South American country, and makes a journey towards the university in to recover the data from his original experiments.

Back at the army base, Bronsky is pleading with the General to give him another chance but wants more information from the General before he can proceed. The general then proceeds to tell him of the work during World War II regarding the creation of “super soldiers”. While he told Banner he was working on Gamma experiments to cure diseases, secretly the Ross was looking to the Gamma process as a way to recreate the “super soldier” program. Ross believes that what happened to Banner was a success and wants to capture him in order to operate on him. Agreeing that Bronsky would have to best shot of tracking Banner down, he gives Bronsky what remains of the “super soldier” serum in order to give him a shot against Banner.

Banner reaches the university to discover that Betty has a new boyfriend and is reluctant to approach her, opting to say with at his pizza place. Disguised as a pizza delivery man, he infiltrates the deeper area of the university, only to discover that the files from his original experiments were gone. Disappointed, he heads back to the pizza place, ready to move on again. Just as he is about to leave, Betty spots him, and though he tries to run away, she tracks him down and asks him to return to her house. It turns out that Betty kept a copy of the files before they were deleted and gives it to Banner. Banner explains that while the general wants to use the Hulk as a weapon, Banner wants to get rid of it as he believes it to be too dangerous. Though, Betty is happy at seeing Banner, he knows he must keep moving.

Banner and Betty.

So, the next day Banner is about to leave from the university lawn, when surprisingly General Ross, Bronsky, and the whole battalion show up. Banner flees immediately. He briefly loses the forces enough to swallow the USB drive containing the files, then continues to run. He finally gets trapped on a bridge guarded on both sides by soldiers. At the same time he can see General Ross roughing up his daughter, and thus is makes him angry. Despite having knockout gas canisters tossed up there with him, he able to change into the Hulk. This causes him to be able to bust through the glass bridge, enough to get General Ross’s attention. Ross throws everything he can at the Hulk, including large sound wave blasters, but nothing can stop him. Bronsky begins to chastise the Hulk, against the General’s wishes, and this causes the Hulk to swat Bronsky into a tree. Following an explosion of a tank, Betty becomes in danger of becoming hit by a fireball and the Hulk jumps into save her. As the smoke clears, the Hulk appears with Betty unconscious as the General watches in bewilderment. The Hulk then runs away with Betty.

It is revealed after the battle that Betty’s boyfriend was the one who reported Banner to Ross. As Ross’s team is clearing out Betty’s house, her boyfriend is regretting having turned them in having seen what her father is like. Elsewhere, the Hulk takes Betty to high cave, as she comes to, the Hulk appears to recognize her though is also startled by thunder. General Ross returns to the army medical ward to find Bronsky in terrible medical condition. He thinks he is a goner, but we see Bronsky briefly move his hand. The next day, Banner has returned to normal and he and Betty are on the move. At a place they are staying, Banner proceeds to vomit up the USB drive he swallowed the day before. Also, Banner and Betty are becoming closer enough to begin to have sex, but Banner stops it because it is raising his heart rate too fast. So they begin go on the move again. At one stop, Banner mails the data to Mr. Blue who tells Banner where to find him so they can meet.

Will the cure work?

However, General Ross intercepts the email and is able to figure out where Banner is going. Then, one of his subordinates reports to him that Bronsky’s status has changed. At first, Ross thinks Bronsky has died but upon seeing for himself what has happened, he sees Bronsky has fully recovered. Ross is excited by Bronsky’s recovery, and so is Bronsky but not for the same reasons. Banner and Betty make their way to and come across Dr. Samuel Sterns who was Mr. Blue.

Sterns has been working on a cure for Banner but it is extremely dangerous. It involves inducing a reaction to cause to Hulk to appear then exposing it to the cure. On the one hand, if they do too high of a dose it could kill Banner, but on the other hand, if they do too low a dose it will not work at all and the Hulk will cause them to get hurt. They agree to go forward anyway. At first, the Hulk appears and Sterns is too amazed by the sight of the Hulk to go forward with the remainder of the cure, but then Betty yells at him to continue. Banner is returned to normal but appears unconscious at first until he comes back to life. It appears to have worked.

In discussion of what just happened, Sterns reveals that he has made copies of Banner’s blood. Sterns believes that Banner’s blood could be used to cure diseases and could accomplish amazing things. However, Banner demands that it all be completely destroyed, believing it to be too dangerous. Before they can come to an agreement, they are interrupted by the arrival of General Ross’s troops. They immediately capture Banner. Ross warns Banner that if he has gotten rid of the Hulk, he will jail Banner for the rest of his life. Betty tells Ross that she does not wish to be his daughter anymore, and Ross responds by saying that if she was not she would be joining Banner.

However, Bronsky has plans of his own. He points a gun at Sterns and wants him to inject him with Banner’s blood. Sterns points out that since he is not aware of what Bronsky has in him, the combination of the two could be dangerous or an “abomination,” but Bronsky does not care about the risks. After the procedure Bronsky, is turned into a large creature and destroys Sterns lab. He then begins to rampage through the city.

The Hulk Vs. The Abomination!

From a helicopter Ross, Betty, and Banner observe the creature running amuck in the city, and Banner determines that only the Hulk has a chance of stopping it. Banner then jumps out of the helicopter and tries to change but it does not appear to work. He crashes into the ground and this causes him to change into the Hulk. The Hulk then attempts to stop the creature, and Ross and the soldiers even assist him in that. After a long and hard battle, the Hulk takes a chain and begins to choke the creature. It is only until Betty shouts at him to stop, that he does.

With the creature stopped, the Hulk runs away, and the creature is taken into custody by Ross and his soldiers. Later, Betty waits on a pier for Banner to return. A month later, Banner is seen training in British Columbia. Banner is shown mediating and all of a sudden Banner sports a grin on his face and his eyes turn green. This implies that he has gotten full control of the Hulk. Meanwhile, Ross is drinking in a bar, when none other then Tony Stark enters. He derides Ross for his use of the “super soldier” serum. He then mentions to Ross that he is putting a team together, and Ross seems intrigued.

Production

Pre-Production/Development

Louis-Leterrier

During the release of Ang Lee's Hulk in 2003, screenwriter James Schamus had plans for a sequel to the film but starring the Gray Hulk instead. He considered Abomination who would become the villain of the Incredible Hulk and The Leader for villains. Marvel Comics liked the idea of using The Abomination as he was the most famous villain of The Hulk and posed a physical threat to the Hulk unlike General Ross. During the filming of the first Hulk film, Avi Arad gave a projected release date of 2005 for the film. Louis Leterrier, who was a fan of the tv show as a kid expressed interest in directing Iron Man for Marvel, but Jon Favreau had already taken that position and Leterrier was offered the Hulk instead. At first he was unsure if he wanted to take the project as he didn't know if he could replicate Lee's style, but Marvel told him that was not their intent and the film was going to a different take on the character.

Hulk Gray

His biggest inspiration was the comic Hulk: Gray by Jeph Loeb and Tim Sale which completely retold the Hulk's origin for the modern era. His idea was to show Bruce Banner's struggle with the monster within him. Kevin Feige said the film would show " that element of wish fulfillment, of overcoming an injustice or a bully and tapping into a strength that you didn't quite realize you had in yourself". Avi Arad said the film would feature " a lot more of the love story between Bruce Banner and Betty Ross". Writer Zak Penn, who wrote a draft for a Hulk movie in 1996 said the film would be a follow up to Hulk but would be much more in tone like the tv show and Bruce Jone's run on the comic. He compared his script to James Cameron's Aliens which was substantially different from Ridley Scott's Alien, but was still in the same universe.Penn would write three drafts for the film, before leaving to direct The Grand. Edward Norton, who had in the past had rewritten films he was starring in rewrote Penn's script, which pleased both Leterrier and the studio and firmly established the film as a reboot. Leterrier acknowledged that the film did have something that possibly connected the two films, Bruce Banner hiding in South America which is where the Hulk was last seen at the end of the 2003 film.

Norton explained his decision to not make the film an origin story saying " I don't like the phrase origin story, and I don't think in great literature and great films that explain the roots of the story doesn't mean it comes in the beginning". His story was similar to Ultimate Marvel's version of the Hulk, him being created by the Super Solider Serum. He deleted the character of Rick Jones all together and reduced SHIELD's role in the film.

Filming

Filming commenced on July 9, 2007 with filming primarily taking place in Toronto because the mayor at the time, David Miller happened to be a big Hulk fan and helped the crew out by closing down Yonge Street for four nights to shoot the fight between Hulk and Abomination at 125th Street.The crew had to agree though to clean up every night so business could go on normally during the daytime hours. The first action scene in the film, the Culver University battle was shot at University of Toronto and Morningside park. To shoot the scene where soldiers try smoke the Hulk out from a closed walkway, the crew built a glass wall to contain the smoke. Other scenes were also shot at Financial District in Toronto as well. A condemned factory in Hamilton, Ontario doubled as the Brazilian factory.The underground floors of the factory served as General Ross' military command center. Three weeks of filming were also in New York City, two weeks in Rio de Janeiro. After eighty-eight days of filming, filming concluded in November.

While in Toronto, the project joined Toronto's Green-Screen Initiative, an environmental filming project to cut carbon emissions and waste during filming.The Hulk being green, is actually an environmental analogy that has grown in popularity in recent times.

Effects

As the actions for Gollum and King Kong were motion captured by Andy Serkis, Leterrier decided to use motion capture for the Hulk and Abomination in the film. Norton and Roth both did around 2500 takes of various movements and actions for their characters such as Hulk's "thunderclaps". In order to record the most subtle facial expressions, phosphorescent paint and strobe lighting were used. Instead of choosing Industrial Light & Magic who had done the CGI effects on Ang Lee's Hulk to do the effects, Leterrier chose Rhythm & Hues. The visual effects company Image Engine spent an entire year working on one shot where Banner's gamma irradiated blood was seen falling through three factory floors into a bottle.

Redesigned Hulk

The Hulk was given a facelift from the previous film, this time with a much darker shade of green than before. The inspiration for the design was how Dale Keown drew the character. Leterrier felt the previous Hulk " had too much fat and the proportions were off". He imagined the character as a tank, as Leterrier put it " The Hulk is beyond perfect so there is zero grams of fat, all chiseled, and his muscle and strength defines the creature so he's like a tank".Visual Effects Supervisor for the film, Kurt Williams thought of the Hulk's physique as a linebacker instead of a bodybuilder. His height was chosen to be nine feet as they didn't want the character as if he were too inhuman. His color was an olive or even gray slate color. His skin tone was saturated as human's skin tone's are impacted by emotions and they wanted the character to feel human. They also chose to have Bruce Banner's eyes turn green when he was transforming as a nod to the old series.

Abomination

A change was also made to Abomination's design as Leterrier felt the audience wouldn't understand why he looked more reptilian or fish like than The Hulk who resembled a person. His origin was also changed to explain his disfigurement, he was injected from multiple spots in his body, creating a hideous creature. Instead of using solely CGI to portray Emil Blonsky, Leterrier used prosthetic makeup and animatronics to complement the CGI and add realism to it. Also shown is sidewalks breaking when he walks due to his immense weight. The character's height was chosen to eleven feet, taller than the hulk though he is portrayed as less graceful.

The destruction in the film was mostly done practically instead of relying on CGI for the shots.For the scene where soldiers are attempting to smoke out the Hulk, the filmmakers used dry ice and steam. They also really destroyed a Humvee by dropping a weight on it.In the film it is destroyed in the film at the Culver University battle.

Soundtrack

Craig Armstrong was hired by Louis Leterrier as he was a fan of the band Armstrong was the arranger for. Marvel was surprised at the choice as they didn't know if he had previously scored an action film, he did in fact with 2001's Kiss of The Dragon. Armstrong was a big fan of two green heroes, Green Lantern and The Hulk though he admitted to not having seen the previous film. He composed the majority of the score in three weeks while in Los Angeles. The orchestral portion of the score was recorded over the course of four days in late April 2008. The other portion, the ethnic instruments were recorded in London and then were mixed with the orchestral recordings.

Reception

The film received mostly positive comments from critics and fans alike with fans being somewhat more receptive of the film than critics. According to Rotten Tomatoes, on which the film gained a 66% approval rating from critics " The Incredible Hulk provides action and excitement to please comic book fans and re-ignite this fledgling franchise".