The MCU kicked off in 2008 with the release of Iron Man and The Incredible Hulk. Iron Man was a surprise hit with critics and audiences and became a box office hit that summer which was an impressive accomplishment for a movie based on a lesser-known character. The Incredible Hulk was released a month after Iron Man and despite being a more popular character, the movie earned half of what Iron Man did. To this day it is still the lowest-grossing film in the MCU.

Due to the lead character of Bruce Banner being recast from Edward Norton to Mark Ruffalo in The Avengers, The Incredible Hulk was positioned as a minor footnote. With Universal Pictures owning the film distribution rights to the Hulk character, Disney and Marvel Studios instead opted to continue the Hulk’s story as a supporting player in other movies like the four Avengers films and Thor: Ragnarok, which meant there was no room for the supporting cast of The Incredible Hulk. While there were off-hand references to the movie in The Avengers, as the MCU went on it felt like a forgotten piece of the larger franchise and one people would recommend skipping in an MCU rewatch, as it was deemed unimportant.

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Yet over the past few years, Marvel Studios has been sprinkling more elements from The Incredible Hulk into the MCU and Phase 4 has seen those seeds that were planted all those years ago about to take root. This is how the overlooked MCU film has now become an important installment in the future of the franchise.

First Hints of The Incredible Hulk in the MCU

     Walt Disney Studios Motion Pictures

In 2016, eight years after the release of The Incredible Hulk, the first cast member from the film returned when the great William Hurt reprised his role as General Ross in Captain America: Civil War. The film established Ross has since gone on to Secretary of Defense and would reappear in Avengers: Infinity War, Avengers: Endgame, and Black Widow. Interesting, Ross never does share the screen with Bruce Banner or the Hulk again, and with the passing of William Hurt, it appears they never will.

Then in 2017, Martin Starr appeared as Peter Parker’s teacher Mr. Harrington in Spider-Man: Homecoming. Starr had previously had a cameo in The Incredible Hulk as a student in the computer lab who Bruce Banner bribes with pizza. Marvel Studios retroactively made that character a younger version of Mr. Harrington, who would later go on to appear in Spider-Man: Far From Home and Spider-Man: No Way Home as someone who has a bad habit of appearing in the middle of superhero conflicts.

The Abomination Has A New Lease On Life

     Disney Platform Distribution

A week after the What If…? episode aired, Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings opened in theaters, and audiences saw the return of Emil Blonsky aka The Abomination (Tim Roth) fighting Wong. Abomination showing up in a Shang-Chi movie, a character Abomination has never been associated with, was a surprise for fans and the combination of the Ten Rings connection from Iron Man firmly linked the newest Marvel hero with the studio’s origins.

Fans were also aware that Abomination would return in She-Hulk: Attorney at Law, and the Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings sequence, was an indicator to audiences of how connected these disparate properties were and offered a hint at what would come. Many expected Abomination to be a hardened criminal, or that the series would involve Jennifer Walters working to free him so that he could join the planned Thunderbolts movie, the series revealed a surprise. Blonsky and Abomination is changed and reformed, a more mellow person who wants to enjoy his life with his seven soulmates on a property he owns. What Abomination’s future in the MCU after his parole in She-Hulk: Attorney at Law is unclear. Possibly he is lying about being reformed, or maybe he truly is, but it is great to see Marvel Studios return to this character and not only give him a new spin but also a possible resolution.

The Leader Makes His Long Awaited Return in the MCU

     Universal Pictures

One of the last dangling plot threads for The Incredible Hulk was the fate of Samuel Sterns (Tim Blake Nelson). The Incredible Hulk saw a sample of Bruce Banner’s blood fall into a cut on Stern’s head and start to grow, hinting at his transformation into the iconic Hulk villain The Leader. However since no sequel to The Incredible Hulk has been made, this felt like a great potential villain that would be forgotten.

Yet just as Avengers: Infinity War finally brought back the Red Skull after a long absence, Marvel Studios is bringing back the Leader. It was recently confirmed that The Leader will be the villain in Captain America: New World Order set for release on May 3, 2024, with Nelson reprising his role. By the time Captain America: New World Order hits theaters it will have been 16 years since the release of The Incredible Hulk, and shows that even when it appears a plot line has been forgotten, there might be something in the works it just takes time.

Betty Ross and Doc Samson Left Unaccounted For

Bruce Banner, Thunderbolt Ross, Abomination, and The Leader are all set to return to the MCU yet two characters remain unaccounted for: Betty Ross (Live Tyler) and Doctor Leonard Samson (Ty Burrell).

Betty Ross is Bruce Banner’s primary love interest in the comics and has been notably missing in the MCU particularly after Bruce started a romantic relationship with Black Widow in Avengers: Age of Ultron. So far the only appearance of the character was in the previously mentioned episode of What If…? yet Tyler did not reprise her voice. In the comics, Betty has a habit of turning into superpowered characters including an alias known as Harpy and recently the Red She-Hulk. With She-Hulk’s newfound popularity in the MCU, it might be time for Betty Ross to make her return.

Leonard Samson, in the comics, is a superpowered psychiatrist who after gamma irradiation has super strength that is proportionate to the length of his hair. The character appeared in The Incredible Hulk, with no superpowers, and was the boyfriend of Betty Ross and was played by Ty Burrell a year before he would be cast in Modern Family. With so many of the MCU Phase 4 stories like WandaVision, The Falcon and the Winter Soldier, and Moon Knight so focused on trauma and mental health, it feels like the perfect time to bring Doc Samson into the MCU. With the Thunderbolts, he might be the ideal consoler for the team of supervillains who need someone to talk to.

She-Hulk: Attorney at Law Is Marvel’s Hulk 2

     Marvel StudiosDisney

While Marvel Studios has not released a sequel to The Incredible Hulk, (perhaps due to a combination of both Hulk movie’s poor box office returns and Universal Studios owning first-look rights on solo films), Marvel Studios has instead decided to shift the focus to a new character: She-Hulk.

She-Hulk: Attorney at Law in many ways acts as The Incredible Hulk sequel. The series has allowed audiences to get more Bruce Banner, and he has taken on a mentor role for his cousin Jennifer Walters. With the focus now on Jennifer Walters and the She-Hulk persona, audiences are getting a better look at both her and Bruce’s family life and explore storylines from the Hulk comics, particularly the importance of people trying to get a sample of their blood to make more Hulks.

The Hulk was last seen on a ship heading into space and will likely reappear in a cosmic adventure, be it in another Guardians of the Galaxy movie, an Eternals sequel, or another Thor movie, but She-Hulk now appears to be the character filling the Hulk role in the MCU for a potential new Avengers lineup. It is unclear now if the return of the Leader and Abomination, along with She-Hulk’s debut, are signs Marvel is setting up for a new Hulk event; it may just be a way to wrap up these storylines before the big events of the Multiverse Saga accumulate in Avengers: The Kang Dynasty and Avengers: Secret Wars. However, it does go to show the strength of the MCU, allowing characters from one film to spin off into various corners of the MCU and provide fresh new spins on these concepts and that these storylines do not need to be wrapped up immediately. For a Hulk fan, it sure is a nice treat and that patience does pay off.