‘She-Hulk’ Creator Jessica Gao Explains the Real Reason Behind Hulk’s Predicament in Episode 2
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“She-Hulk: Attorney at Law” Episode 2 just smashed onto Disney+ and with it came a titillating new mystery to go along with the already-thrilling adventures of Jennifer Walters (Tatiana Maslany), our favorite super-powered attorney.
As we found out in the first episode, Jen is Bruce Banner’s (Mark Ruffalo) cousin and as such can handle extreme amounts of gamma radiation, even after being infected with her cousin’s blood following a car accident. (More on that accident in a minute.) And Episode 2 further explored this dynamic, in a fun and surprising way. When chatting with Jessica Gao, the head writer and executive producer of “She-Hulk: Attorney at Law,” we had to find out more.
But to get into the aforementioned mystery, we need to go into spoilers. If you haven’t watched this week’s episode, turn back now! Major spoilers ahead!
In the first episode we see that the car crash that ultimately led to the creation of She-Hulk was caused by a spaceship crashing into Jen’s stylish-yet-affordable automobile. From the brief glimpse of the ship, it looked like something out of “Thor: Ragnarok.” Later in the episode, Smart Hulk (Mark Ruffalo) confirms that it was indeed of Sakaarian origin. End of mystery? Not so fast!
In Episode 2, Jen checks in with Bruce. At first it looks like he’s just communicating to her from his underground Mexican bunker, which he and Tony designed and built during the Blip. But the camera pulls back and you see that Smart Hulk is, in fact, not on his bunker. He’s not even on Earth at all! He’s on a spaceship, the same kind of spaceship that ran into their car.
Fan theories are abuzz that this will be the formal introduction of a variation on the “Planet Hulk” storyline from the comics, which immediately followed the events of “Civil War” and which led to the crossover series “World War Hulk,” with Hulk returning from outer space and kicking everyone’s ass. What this specific moment is tied to is a plotline from the “Planet Hulk” series wherein Hulk takes a lover who gives birth to two children – Skaar and Hiro-Kala. While it’s unclear where a “Planet Hulk” event film or series would even take place in the Marvel Cinematic Universe continuity, especially since they’ve just laid out their plans for the next two phases and because rights to a solo Hulk movie are tied up with Universal Pictures, fans are speculating that Smart Hulk could be returning to everyone’s favorite trash planet to meet his bouncing bundles of joy.
When we asked Gao about the moment, though, she had a much more practical reason for putting Hulk on a spaceship and hurdling him through the cosmos – she just needed to get him out of the show.
“Well, I will say this, it’s basically a big indication to the audience that this is definitely She-Hulk’s show and to not expect it to be Hulk’s show,” Gao explained. “However, you do get a tiny bit of a couple of maybe one or two questions answered, but don’t expect this to suddenly become a two-hander with Hulk.”
While mystery twins definitely seems like something that could be introduced into a show as agreeably bonkers as “She-Hulk: Attorney at Law,” our guess is that Hulk is out for the rest of the season and when (and if) this plotline is picked back up, it’ll be in some other venue. Besides, Jen doesn’t have time to worry about this nonsense. She’s got lawyer stuff to do.
