Incredible Hulk & Smart Hulk

After The Incredible Hulk in 2008, Marvel hasn’t released any of the standalone movies of Hulk. Even though Disney has regained some of the rights of Hulk, Universal Pictures have still not released the copyrights of the major aspects of this character. Therefore, Marvel cannot include the full potential of Hulk in MCU movies.

Fans are very much sad about this lack of co-operation between Universal Pictures and Disney. But after 15 years of The Incredible Hulk, Disney is going to regain the complete rights of Hulk by June, 2023. And after that, Marvel and Disney might just plan out a standalone movie for Hulk. The plot of which is mostly set in She-Hulk Episode 2.

Have you already seen the second episode of She-Hulk? If yes, then you have probably seen Smart Hulk leaving the planet with Sakaarians in their ship. He is probably convinced to head back to that planet to help its citizens out of some Hulk-kind of a problem, or it can be something else, which time will tell us.

Earlier in the first episode, we saw She-Hulk beating the shit out of our Hulk. Marvel has an old tendency of using Hulk to showcase the power of other characters. Let’s give you a recall of all those scenes in the MCU where Hulk was used as a mere toy, which we do not expect of him to be:

The character has an impeccable strength in comics, and we have seen a full platter of it in The Incredible Hulk. The capability he has is so underused in MCU movies. One thing is for sure! If this character gets a perfect storyline collaborated with amazing VFX and action director team, then Hulk might not possibly have defeated Thanos, but would have made him run away from the Asgardian ship, to come up with a strategy for beating Hulk.

We want to see that Hulk return! We want to see the true power of Hulk Smash and Thunder Clap, which is described in the comics.

Now, we all know that Marvel and Disney are spending a lot of time and money in building characters and showing their strengths. But why not for Hulk? It is because, unlike Sony, Universal Pictures is not so co-operative with Disney and Marvel. Universal Pictures is just like the Fox Studios, that hasn’t released all of the rights of Hulk after The Incredible Hulk movie.

And this is the sole reason why MCU’s Hulk doesn’t have a standalone movie yet. And this copyright issue is what forces the writers to go easy on Hulk’s part while framing the entire plot. But, we might see an end to this injustice for the Hulk’s character. It is because the rights owned by Universal Pictures on Hulk’s character will be revoked in June, 2023. And then, we might get to see the Hulk, back in form.

The plot of 2023 or any future story has been set in the second episode of She-Hulk. We saw Hulk leaving the planet to go to Sakaar. Hence, we might expect a solo movie focusing on him battling the biggest of villains and winning the Hulk reputation back.

The story might go like, Smart Hulk is not able to do good to the world for saving it. It is because Bruce’s consciousness might be interfering to let him put out his complete strength.

Bruce has emotion, care, love and empathy towards his surrounding, and even towards the villains. We saw how Smart Hulk says he has forgiven Emil Blonsky, a.k.a Abomination. If the 2008’s Hulk would have been questioned or brought face to face with Abomination even today, he would have beaten the shit out of him to make him beg to stay in the prison without a parole.

Smart Hulk will soon realise that with Bruce’s consciousness and 7 PHDs is not going to help him win battles. He will realise that he totally engrossed in finding the solution to control his alter-ego. In that path, he forgot to spend time and assess the amount of power the Green Guy possesses.

Every research and experiment he did was to control the Green Guy. But not one of his experiments was ever directed to unleash the true powers of the Hulk. Now, he might just do that! And in the quest, we might get to see the ruthless Hulk with ability to distinguish between a friend and a foe.

Marvel has got to do something with Hulk’s character, even not for their satisfaction but for the fans’ interest.