Review by Brian Tallerico

I've got good news and bad news. The Incredible Hulk isn't nearly as awful as its previews made it out to be, but it also isn't nearly as good as it could have been. If anything, Hulk is further proof that the superhero genre has entered its mediocre period. The success story that is Iron Man misses the fact that almost everyone agrees it's a three-star film at best and now we have Incredible Hulk, a film that's similarly impossible to completely dismiss but also nowhere near the pantheon of the genre. On the one hand, the fact that neither superhero movie so far this season sunk to the depths of the Fantastic Four movies, Daredevil, Ghost Rider, or Elektra is a damn good thing for all our sanity, but there's something disheartening about being seeing a run-of-the-mill superhero movie and being expected to be satisfied with it.

Most people thought Ang Lee's Hulk was too heavy, especially with the director's trademark theme of family problems, and that all fans really wanted was more action (and, of course, less Hulk-dogs). So, when Marvel announced they were doing a complete reboot, we naturally assumed it would be an action extravaganza. Fans looking for a bigger, stronger, faster version of the legendary green guy will be disappointed. Like Iron Man, the film is shockingly light on action set-pieces. There are really only three battle sequences, and Bruce Banner (Edward Norton) only hulks out four times total. The rest of the film is made up of a paper-thin plot about our poor hero trying to keep his green demons at bay (and one that’s been clearly cut in half in post-production).

The filmmakers choose to skip over the origin story, telling it all in what looks like a video game intro scene during the opening credits, but that choice sets a tone that lingers throughout the entire movie - something is missing. If the writers wanted to skip the origin and just tell a Hulk story that would be one thing, but the whole movie is about going back to the place where it all began to fix the problems caused there. Bruce wants his Mr. Hyde vanquished and he's been working with someone online, the mysterious "Mr. Blue" to find a cure. At the same time, General Ross (William Hurt) wants this super soldier for himself, so he brings on board a trained killer, Emil Blonsky (Tim Roth), and tries to even the mutated score. Of course, every good beast needs a beauty and Liv Tyler, as Ross' daughter Betty, adequately fills that role.

What do you ask of an action movie like The Incredible Hulk? There are two major battles that are so well-choreographed and shot that they almost make the movie worth seeing on their own and anyone who tells you they like it - those two scenes are why. To be fair, they're better sequences than anything in Iron Man just because the man who directed The Transporter movies has a better eye for action than the one who helmed Elf (although I expect a marked improvement in that arena in the second Iron Man flick). But outside of those two set-pieces, The Incredible Hulk is so boring that it borders on parody. Even the structure is laughable - Emil and Bruce fight in Brazil, fight at the school, fight in NYC, roll credits. The love story never works and the characters are as two-dimensional as we've yet seen in this genre that regularly loses its focus on character.

Much has been made of the behind-the-scenes drama with Ed Norton and the studio that saw a reported 70 minutes cut from the final film. I can't wait to see that movie. I'm sure Marvel and Universal thought that by trimming what was probably character and drama that they made a less-boring film, but the opposite is true. What they've missed is that if you don't have anything believable to grab onto or characters to care about, it actually makes the experience feel longer and lessens the impact of the action. There's less reason to care when you can feel the studio manipulation. The emotions in a film like this – loss, love, and, of course, rage - never once feel genuine, draining the power of even the well-made action scenes.  I worry that this is the future of superhero movies – focus on all the film’s energy on 3-5 action sequences and forget everything else. Do “just enough” but don’t do anything more. With the love for the superhero genre growing annually, don’t fans deserve more?  And doesn't the Hulk deserve more too?

Rating: TWO BONES

Release Date: June 13th, 2008

Rating: PG-13

Starring: Edward Norton, Liv Tyler, Tim Roth, and William Hurt

Director: Louis Letterier

Writers: Zak Penn and Edward Norton