Entertainment in a Glance

Directors:Sam Liu, Frank Paur
Writers:Craig Kyle (written by), Christopher Yost (written by)
Release Date:27 January 2009 (USA)
Genre:Animation | Action

Hulk Vs. is exactly what you would think it would be just from the title. It’s comprised of two short features (both in total have the DVD at around 80 minutes), Hulk vs. Wolverine and Hulk vs. Thor.

The Hulk vs. Wolverine story, essentially, follows the story of Wolverine’s introduction into the Marvel Universe (The Incredible Hulk Vol. 1, #181). In a nut shell, Wolverine is hired to find the Hulk and possibly kill him for decimating a small town. While tracking Hulk, Wolverine runs into Bruce Banner (says one of the dumbest lines I’ve heard in a while) and starts tossing Banner around a bit. This, of course, isn’t a smart idea as Banner turns into the Hulk and the two get into a pretty violent brawl. Unfortunately, members of Weapon X (Sabertooth, Lady Deathstrike, Omega Red and the always awesome Deadpool) intervene, tranquilize the two and bring them back to the Weapon X base. From there on out, after we find out that the heads of Weapon X want to use Hulk as a weapon, the movie is all about Wolverine and Banner having to fight their way out of the facility.

Hulk vs. Thor, which is the longer of the two, has a simple plot. Every year, for one week, the Lord of Asgard, Odin, must rest (what is called Odinsleep) to replenish his power. During this time, all the evil beings of the realm try to conquer Asgard but all are thwarted by Thor and other Gods (Sif, Volstagg, Fandral, Balder etc.). That is until Loki, Thor’s brother (who really isn’t his brother), decides to bring the Hulk to Asgard. Loki, with the help of Enchantress, manages to separate the Hulk from Banner and give Loki control over the Hulk. Everything goes according to plan until Loki loses control of the Hulk, which leads to Hulk going on a rampage through Asgard and beating the shit out of anything in his way (horses, fat guys and chicks included), and is forced to work with his brother to stop the Hulk.

The movies aren’t that bad. Actually, if you read comic books, it’s quite entertaining. The stories, written by Craig Kyle and Christopher Yost, are pretty nicely done but are hurt by a few things (that will be addressed later). There are some moments in each that, even though they are changed a bit to fit the story, pay tribute to different comics throughout Marvel’s history that comic book readers might be able to pick out (i.e. in Hulk vs. Thor Loki takes control of the Hulk like he took control of the Destroyer armor at one point in the comics and when Thor says, “Loki, I would have words with thee” is a little tribute to the Busiek/Perez Ultron Unlimited storyline when the Avengers bust in and Thor says, “Ultron, we would have words with thee”). One of the best things about this project, besides Deadpool in the Hulk vs. Wolverine, comes from the Hulk’s rampages and the ensuing fights. Watching Hulk take on all the Gods of Asgard is pretty hilarious because he’s hitting everything that comes at him and beats the shit out of Thor and the fights in Hulk vs. Wolverine are actually pretty bloody and brutal which is nice to see coming out of that story. But this isn’t saying that Hulk Vs. doesn’t have its flaws.

One of the major flaws, which stems from two areas, with Hulk Vs. comes from its inconsistency. The first area comes from the fights. In Hulk vs. Wolverine the fighting sequences are brutal and have a good amount of blood, but in Hulk vs. Thor, for some reason, they seem to have pussified the movie and cut out the brutality and most of the blood. The other area of inconsistency comes from the animation. With Hulk vs. Thor they decided to go with a cleaner, almost regal look to it (probably because they were dealing with Gods). Whereas Hulk vs. Wolverine looks like they wanted to go with a Saturday morning cartoon type of a feel… Sabertooth and Omega Red alone look horrible. The last flaw comes from the dialogue. In both there are moments where some of the dumbest lines known to man are just randomly tossed in. I can understand that if Deadpool is saying the line, since he is an awesome moron, but when a character like Wolverine or Loki is saying the line, it only seems to tarnish the character.