{"id":32527,"date":"2014-02-21T06:27:57","date_gmt":"2014-02-21T11:27:57","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.filmbuffonline.com\/FBOLNewsreel\/wordpress\/?p=32527"},"modified":"2014-02-21T09:02:49","modified_gmt":"2014-02-21T14:02:49","slug":"history-of-the-comic-book-film-hulk-not-that-good","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.filmbuffonline.com\/FBOLNewsreel\/wordpress\/2014\/02\/21\/history-of-the-comic-book-film-hulk-not-that-good\/","title":{"rendered":"HISTORY OF THE COMIC BOOK FILM: HULK…NOT THAT GOOD."},"content":{"rendered":"

In a multi-part series, Comic Book Film Editor William Gatevackes will be tracing the history of comic book movies from the earliest days of the film serials to today\u2019s big blockbusters and beyond. Along with the history lesson, Bill will be covering some of the most prominent comic book films over the years and why they were so special. We take a look at a Jade Giant\u2019s first go around on the big screen.<\/i><\/p>\n

I am of the firm belief that if Hulk <\/b>ended with the scene where Betty meets up with the Hulk in San Francisco, we\u2019d be talking about it as one of the best comic book films of all time. Unfortunately, it didn\u2019t end there, and what came after makes it instead one of the most disappointing comic book films.<\/p>\n

\"hulk1cover\"<\/a>The Hulk was created by Stan Lee and Jack Kirby as a sort of Jekyll and Hyde for the Atomic Age, and Cold War version of Frankenstein. He was Bruce Banner, a nuclear physicist who was work on a gamma radiation bomb. He is caught in a bomb blast while rescuing a teenager who wanders on to the testing site and instead of killing him, the radiation turned him into a superstrong beast that would appear whenever he got angry.<\/p>\n

Initially, the concept was one of Marvel\u2019s early failures. The Hulk\u2019s first series only lasted six issues.\u00a0 But as the character appeared in cameo appearances in some of Marvel\u2019s more popular books such as The Amazing Spider-Man and Fantastic Four there was an upswing in popularity. The character first got a co-starring strip in a comic called Tales to Astonish<\/i> , eventually a series of his own.<\/p>\n

The character reached the apex of its popularity in 1978 when the character received a live-action TV show on CBS. The Incredible Hulk <\/b>starred Bill Bixby as \u201cDavid\u201d Banner and Lou Ferrigno as the Hulk. The TV show changed the origin so that Banner got his powers through genetic manipulation rather than being caught in a bomb blast.<\/p>\n

The series lasted until 1982, with three follow-up TV-movies from 1988 to 1990. The same year the final made-for-TV movie debuted, the process of bringing the Hulk to the big screen began. Producers Avi Arad and Gale Anne Hurd began the development process, with Universal brought on board starting in 1992. Screenwriter Michael France was hired in 1994 and developed a script that had the Hulk fighting terrorists. This script was rejected and France was replaced by John Turman the next year. Turman\u2019s series of scripts hewed closer to the comic books, with General Ross and the U.S. Military as the primary villains.<\/p>\n

Here is where it gets convoluted. France was brought back in as writer in late-1996. However, when Joe Johnson was brought on to direct, the studio asked the projects producer, Jonathan Hensleigh, who wrote the hit Jumanji <\/b>for Johnson, to reunite with the director. France was paid off and let go without ever writing a word. Unfortunately, Johnson passed on the project, and Hensleigh moved into the director\u2019s chair. Turman was back to write a couple drafts, which were rewritten by Zak Penn. The highlight of this round of scripts was a fight between the Hulk and a group of sharks.<\/p>\n

\"Hulkposter\"<\/a>Taking that into consideration, it\u2019s no surprise that Hensleigh took over the writing reins himself, with the Hulk fighting convicts who were altered by gamma irradiated insect DNA. Hensleigh\u2019s rewrote the script with J. J. Abrams, Scott Alexander and Larry Karaszewski, and the project made it all the way to the casting stage before Universal, realizing that it had a $100 million picture in the hands of a first-time director, got cold feet.<\/p>\n

Exit Hensleigh in 1999 and re-enter Michael France at this point.\u00a0 France took another shot at the script, with rewrites from Michael Tolkin and David Hayter in 2000. Hayter brought in the Hulk\u2019s comic book adversaries The Leader, Absorbing Man and Zzzax.<\/p>\n

It wasn\u2019t until 2001, after more than 10 years of development, that the Hulk film made the final leg of its journey to the big screen. That was when Ang Lee, fresh off his Oscar nomination for Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon<\/b>, came on board. He brought James Schamus on to rework the script. This time it actually took, and the film was on the way to the big screen.
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