The Incredible Hulk (2008) - 4K Review

Review:

*Originally written September 1st, 2018*

I know The Incredible Hulk gets a lot of flack for its quality and it has more or less been forgotten in the overall run of the MCU and it's not hard to see why, but in all honesty, it's just a remarkably okay entry. It's no less aggressively mediocre than the first Avengers film, Ant-Man and the Wasp and Iron Man 2 or a bunch of the other 3 star entries of the MCU. 

It's all just by the numbers and competent. It's a huge step down from the first Iron Man in terms of freshness, but it still has its merits. Edward Norton makes for a great Bruce Banner, he lacks the goofy charm Ruffalo later brings to the role, but Norton goes for something different and a bit more serious and I was okay with that.

My biggest gripe is that studios don't seem to know what to do with The Hulk in his own film. I have very little memory of Ang Lee's Hulk, but I remember that being truly awful. This reboot covers a lot of ground we already know and have seen in countless other comic-book  films. Guy with powers is on the run from the government while not being being to be with the woman he loves, while ironically her father is the man hunting him. It's all just fine. 

It's always fun to see the Hulk smash shit up and while the CGI on The Hulk himself hasn't aged massively well, it's still enjoyable chaos with some memorable bursts of action. One could argue Hulk looks too much like Daddy Shrek, but this is definitely not a problem for me.

There's also the annoying superhero film trope of the villain having the same powers as the hero and using them for evil, which is exactly what happens here. Tim Roth is a fine actor, highly underrated even and while it was somewhat of a joy to see him ham it up outrageously, when he actually turns into abomination, I had unfortunate flashbacks to Doomsday in Batman vs Superman. Which is also an ugly, cave troll looking piece of CGI. That said, I wish they would have brought Roth back in the MCU at some point, but I can confidently assume that will never happen now.

Some of more minor things I liked here are a few little moments. There were some nice moments between Banner and Betty Rose, even if she is another one of the MCU's disposable love interests that are nothing less than an afterthought. They really need to work on that. Then there's the heart rate monitor watch that Banner uses to stop himself becoming the Hulk. It might be a bit of a cheap move that maybe simplifies his change a bit much, but I don't know, I thought it was a nice touch.


There's not really a lot else to say here, The Incredible Hulk probably deserves the hate it receives, but I kinda like it, it's remarkably watchable and does very little in the way of interesting, but in terms of the MCU, it's just another watchable, if forgettable entry. Universal and Disney need to sort out the rights issues so at least one of them can make another solo Hulk film again.

6/10 Dans

The Incredible Hulk is out now on 4K UHD, Blu-ray and DVD now in the UK
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Avengers: Infinity War (2018) - Film Review

*Originally written May 3rd, 2018*

Review:

Avengers: Infinity War had a lot to live up to. It's the culmination of an insane 18 films of hit-or-miss quality and 10 years of build up. I had my worries about Infinity War. Packing all these characters into such a huge film. Would it work? I wasn't sure. While it is far from perfect, this is a fun, effective, ambitious and surprisingly emotional epic that spells the beginning of the end for a decade worth of superhero films.

The structure is more in line with Guardians of the Galaxy Volume 2, while the characters never all meet up in one huge scene (And a couple are curiously absent), everyone has their moment to shine and a part to play. A lot of the team-ups were unexpected, but mostly work. It's hard to talk about without spoiling, which I will not do.

Marvel has always had a villain problem, 90% of them are bland and throwaway fodder just to fill the space of a bad without any real character. Thanos, on the other-hand is a completely different beast. Josh Brolin delivers an extremely developed and compelling villain. It's so rare that a villain comes along where you completely agree with his motivation and why he does what he does. Despite being the bad guy, he has genuine heart and emotion behind him, leading to a moment of surprisingly brutality that I didn't think the MCU had in it. It really helped that Brolin is given such a huge amount of screen-time, possibly more than the heroes themselves.

Much like the Guardians films, this is an extremely gorgeous film to look at, filled with mostly impressive CG (Aside from a couple of Thanos' throwaway goons). It's not just the CGI too, the cinematographer is top notch too, there's so many bright and beautiful locations, a far cry from the ugly and televisual Age of Ultron.  Alan Silvestri's score was also fantastic. Again, scores are something the MCU seem to overlook, so it was great to hear a memorable orchestral score in a Marvel films.

Like I said, it's not all perfect though. A big problem I have had with the MCU is the lame humour and while there is quite a bit of eye-rollingly embarrassing comedy here, it's not as intrusive as it has been in the past. It's much more in line with Civil War, where they let moments of emotion breathe rather than throw in some stupid joke and remove any kind of tension. That said, there are some moments that are genuinely funny, it's not massively hilarious, but I do have to remember these kids films, despite how dark and mature Infinity War gets.

And Infinity War does get dark. A lot of people die, some long running, some not. While some of the deaths will be impossible for the MCU to commit to, it didn't make the ending scenes any less haunting or unsettling. There were one or two deaths that just got a collective shrug from me though, particularly the ones early on.

Infinity War really is a hard film to talk about, it's half a film, despite losing the "Part 1" in the title, this really feels like the first part of a film, and luckily we only have a year to see the resolution to the Empire Strikes Back style ending, but based on this, I'm sure it'll be worth the wait.


Superhero fatigue might be slowly kicking in, but Infinity War manages to be an ambitious and devastating entry into the now 19th film MCU that are slowly learning from their mistakes. I don't know what more I could have wanted from this film.

8/10 Dans

Avengers: Infinity War is out now in cinemas in the UK
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