Bruce Banner - The Hulk Appreciation 2021

[Cth]

Can we really differ "Hulk fans" from "comic book fans" in general? Batman fans were pretty vocal about Tom King's run, Spider-Man fans went all out on Dan Slott after "Dying Wish" storyline. Rarely, very rarely do I see someone like YellowFlash openly hating on Ewing's book, for the most part all I see is praise or "this book is just not for me" level of criticism.

Yes and no.

Hulk fans as you know are different from comic book fans. Specifically when walls of text are flooded on a creators channel, multiple confrontational posts and challenges mades, etc go FAR beyond a usual "comic fan".

Those Hulk fans are inevitably never happy. They want Pak back, they trash him. They want PAD back, they trash him. They don't want Waid, they trash him.

There's liking the character, and there's being overly protective to the point of parody that gives other fans a bad name.

No fandom is perfect and i wont say that some Hulk fans didn't say some nasty stuff to him, but at the same time Waid never wanted to admit making errors regarding Hulk, which annoyed people even more.

But regardless of that the biggest problem is the editors who put Waid on a book he never wanted to write... you can't force someone to write something, his lack of research on the character, understanding the character as well as having any kind of direction/plan was pretty evident.

I agree.. Waid should not have been on the title, but at that point NO ONE wanted to. Fans were not happy with anyone at that point. Ewing has been welcomed so far, but I guarantee if he came back there'd be fan backlash like always.

Editorial has always been a part of the problem, but to be fair, editorial has changed from what it used to be in the 80s/90s and hasn't looked back. In some ways it works, it others not so much.

The biggest problem at Marvel is editorial is largely talent coordination, not continuity or background checker. Look at all the mistakes that slip in, etc. Marvel rose to popularity by ignoring things that were popular during Gruenwald/Shooter/etc years.. the Jemas/Bendis/Quesada years focused more on stories and things were in fife

[Intothevoid]

Yes and no.

Hulk fans as you know are different from comic book fans. Specifically when walls of text are flooded on a creators channel, multiple confrontational posts and challenges mades, etc go FAR beyond a usual "comic fan".

Those Hulk fans are inevitably never happy. They want Pak back, they trash him. They want PAD back, they trash him. They don't want Waid, they trash him.

There's liking the character, and there's being overly protective to the point of parody that gives other fans a bad name.

This is extremely weird, Hulk fans are not uniquely cruel or crazy to any other fanbase, they aren't even the most vocal fanbase out there, for the sheer fact that Hulk is not the most popular character out there. Also i specifically remember Waids twitter back then(he even put one of the scenes from Indestructible Hulk #16 as his twitter banner), the people he argued with the most were actually polite to him but they pissed him off the most because he knew they were right and he was wrong, which was the obvious outcome when you put a guy that doesn't have much knowledge or interest on the character, writing that character.

I agree.. Waid should not have been on the title, but at that point NO ONE wanted to. Fans were not happy with anyone at that point. Ewing has been welcomed so far, but I guarantee if he came back there'd be fan backlash like always.

Editorial has always been a part of the problem, but to be fair, editorial has changed from what it used to be in the 80s/90s and hasn't looked back. In some ways it works, it others not so much.

The biggest problem at Marvel is editorial is largely talent coordination, not continuity or background checker. Look at all the mistakes that slip in, etc. Marvel rose to popularity by ignoring things that were popular during Gruenwald/Shooter/etc years.. the Jemas/Bendis/Quesada years focused more on stories and things were in fife

Then they should have shelved Hulk for a while, I much rather the character have a pause than to put a writer with no interest in the character. The problem with Marvel editors is laziness and overall unprofessional behavior, which is why things like the recent Joe Bennett debacle slipped past everyone and almost cost us the entire series.

[PlatinumThorns]

Should I save my money and wait for an eventually omnibus or should I restart collecting the IH trades again?

[ChrisIII]

I think Hickman did some good work with Banner in Avengers at the time although he was dealing with Waid's Hulk which was pretty much just MCU Hulk with armor for some reason.

He definitely did great with Doc Green, having him be part of the Illuminati trying to work out the Incursion problem.

[Cth]

This is extremely weird, Hulk fans are not uniquely cruel or crazy to any other fanbase, they aren't even the most vocal fanbase out there, for the sheer fact that Hulk is not the most popular character out there. Also i specifically remember Waids twitter back then(he even put one of the scenes from Indestructible Hulk #16 as his twitter banner), the people he argued with the most were actually polite to him but they pissed him off the most because he knew they were right and he was wrong, which was the obvious outcome when you put a guy that doesn't have much knowledge or interest on the character, writing that character.

I'm not saying ALL Hulk fans are like this, but there is a specific segment, who OBSESS over showings, getting overly defensive posting walls of text, pages upon pages of battleboard fodder.

In the Waid case, the main offender actually posts here. And yes, he attacked Waid first.

When you take a job as a favor to the editor when no one wants to write the character and then get attacked daily by a crazed fan, yeah, he had every right to hit back with the vitrol he received.

Disagree, think he's a shitty writer, etc.. attacking the writer does no good. It's the cliched angry fanboy stereotype, of which there's a subspecies of Crazed Hulk Fan. Even Batgod fans don't post walls of text -- they'll still say with prep he can beat everyone but they don't post 25 pages with thumbnails to correct a writer who got something wrong.

Then they should have shelved Hulk for a while, I much rather the character have a pause than to put a writer with no interest in the character. The problem with Marvel editors is laziness and overall unprofessional behavior, which is why things like the recent Joe Bennett debacle slipped past everyone and almost cost us the entire series.

I agree, but do you really think Marvel is going to do that?

Do you think the fans will understand or do you think they'd bitch incessantly online?

I don't disagree with the editorial blame, I've been beating that drum for decades now when fans were going after writers. I mean anyone can see most of the problems with the Hulk comic have been self inflicted by editorial. But to be fair, mercurial fans aren't exactly making their jobs easy either.

[Rzerox21xx]

I guess chances are that Waid is gonna write Savage Hulk instead of the more accurate pantheon era Professor Hulk fighting jim lee era wolverine

[Intothevoid]

I guess chances are that Waid is gonna write Savage Hulk instead of the more accurate pantheon era Professor Hulk fighting jim lee era wolverine

Mark Waid isn't consistent with the Hulks character and representing the character of that era... I am shocked honestly.

Joking aside i am not sure Waid is even aware Professor Hulk is a thing.

[nj06]

I think Hickman did some good work with Banner in Avengers at the time although he was dealing with Waid's Hulk which was pretty much just MCU Hulk with armor for some reason.

He definitely did great with Doc Green, having him be part of the Illuminati trying to work out the Incursion problem.

I liked the Doc Green personality and feel like there was a lot pf potential with him. While I like the current Immortal Hulk series and the Devil Hulk personality as well, I would have been ok with Doc Green sticking around a little longer.

[ChrisIII]

I think the Doc Green persona was sort of an anomaly, the interpetation of it (and Kluh from Axis) was that he was the Savage Hulk persona enhanced by Extremis, and that it would wear off and he'd be back to his normal Savage persona.

Doc Green lasts pretty much until Secret Wars and we don't really know which Hulk persona was the one early on in Totally Awesome (Could've been Green scar considering Pak was writing), but he's definetly back to normal savage (although with the "big guy" nickname) in IH.

[Dinosaur Hulk]

Early review for Flatline: http://weirdsciencemarvelcomics.com/...line-1-review/
Damn 9.2... I hope it's really that good. I never read anything written by Shalvey though I really liked his art on Moon Knight.

[FrazettaHulk]

I'm not saying ALL Hulk fans are like this, but there is a specific segment, who OBSESS over showings, getting overly defensive posting walls of text, pages upon pages of battleboard fodder.

In the Waid case, the main offender actually posts here. And yes, he attacked Waid first.

When you take a job as a favor to the editor when no one wants to write the character and then get attacked daily by a crazed fan, yeah, he had every right to hit back with the vitrol he received.

Disagree, think he's a shitty writer, etc.. attacking the writer does no good. It's the cliched angry fanboy stereotype, of which there's a subspecies of Crazed Hulk Fan. Even Batgod fans don't post walls of text -- they'll still say with prep he can beat everyone but they don't post 25 pages with thumbnails to correct a writer who got something wrong.



I agree, but do you really think Marvel is going to do that?

Do you think the fans will understand or do you think they'd bitch incessantly online?

I don't disagree with the editorial blame, I've been beating that drum for decades now when fans were going after writers. I mean anyone can see most of the problems with the Hulk comic have been self inflicted by editorial. But to be fair, mercurial fans aren't exactly making their jobs easy either.

Having been the one who compiled the tweets of that poster and posted them over on the other board way back then. I dont think “attack” is the correct term. I just reread their entire exchange. It was an excessive amount of examples of past Hulk moments in an effort to show Waid what Hulk was capable of. While Waid couldnt grasp writing Hulk that powerful back then, perhaps ironically, Waid had no problem writing that kind of powerhouse of a Hulk in No Surrender and No Road Home, when he was co-writing with Zub and Ewing. So thank you GreenScar1990. Your interaction with Waid likely stuck in his head the way it has Cth’s 8 yrs later.

[Intothevoid]

I'm not saying ALL Hulk fans are like this, but there is a specific segment, who OBSESS over showings, getting overly defensive posting walls of text, pages upon pages of battleboard fodder.

In the Waid case, the main offender actually posts here. And yes, he attacked Waid first.

When you take a job as a favor to the editor when no one wants to write the character and then get attacked daily by a crazed fan, yeah, he had every right to hit back with the vitrol he received.

Disagree, think he's a shitty writer, etc.. attacking the writer does no good. It's the cliched angry fanboy stereotype, of which there's a subspecies of Crazed Hulk Fan. Even Batgod fans don't post walls of text -- they'll still say with prep he can beat everyone but they don't post 25 pages with thumbnails to correct a writer who got something wrong.

Oh yea there are, those people annoy me greatly, but trust me it's much more worse for other fanbases. KMC website for instance has completely been taken over by Superman fans, even including the mods and all they talk about is who beats who and who can lift more and they also allow for the most vile crap to be said to other users, including slurs that the mods not only do nothing about but use themselves, it's a complete crapfest there. I think you are mistaken about a few things, i have been on Comicvine for 7 years now and i know very well the kind of fanbases there are, Hulks fanbases actually rates as one of the most reasonable over there.

Is that the GreenScar guy? I saw him LONG time ago attack Jason Aaron on some forum over his portrayal of Hulk, but he is kinda the exception, he doesn't represent the entire fanbase it's just 1 guy that obsesses over that stuff. He isn't even the worst fanboy trust me, there are Superman fans on instagram of all places that have actually doxxed writers and sent them death threats over stuff it's wild.

This once again isn't unique to any fanbase, you can even ask writers like Kurt Busiek, when the Marvel vs DC crossover happened and they had Thor lose to Superman a bunch of writers/editors got death threats from Thor fans back then via mail, Dan Slott has openly talked about the threats he has received over Spider-man, so has Joe Quesada, Tom King has talked about how nasty some Batman fans have been to him over his recent Batman stuff, etc..

I agree, but do you really think Marvel is going to do that?

Do you think the fans will understand or do you think they'd bitch incessantly online?

I don't disagree with the editorial blame, I've been beating that drum for decades now when fans were going after writers. I mean anyone can see most of the problems with the Hulk comic have been self inflicted by editorial. But to be fair, mercurial fans aren't exactly making their jobs easy either.

They could have honestly, they shelved Wolverine for a couple of years, fans are always gonna bitch, no matter what you do, you can't change that. Fans have bitched when they killed Banner and replaced him with Cho, they still did it, i don't think they care about if the fans "bitched" about these things or not.

I think editors should worry more about their jobs or what some unstable fans think about their jobs, is my personal take on that, they can't change the fans but they can do a better job themselves.

[ChrisIII]

Hulk's kind of interesting in that in many senses, he's his own replacement hero from time to time, switching personalities instead of having a sidekick or clone take over (Although it has happened a few times-Rick, Cho, Red Hulk, Jen etc). Even the main constant, Banner, has been gone for fairly long portions of the book (Crossroads, Merged era)

[Rzerox21xx]

yeah read Marvel 5 the short WOlverine vs Hulk story that supposely takes place around the time of X-MEN 1-3 Jim Lee relaunch before issue 4 where Logan switch to his original yellow and blues. I was very disappointed that they used the typical Savage Hulk which is not accurate since at this point. we had Merged Professor Hulk who was working with the Pantheon. yeah art was great but yeah inaccurate.

[ChrisIII]

Maybe it was set a few months earlier? For a short time before he became merged/professor he was kind of alternating between Banner/Fixit/Savage. (Kind of like he is now, minus the Banner, and Joe and Savage were not on the best terms back then)-hence the need for merged/professor to be a kind of 'band aid' for a while (As Samson kind of states during the Jenkins run).