Marvel kills off Hulk alter ego Bruce Banner

They went with the Totally Awesome Hulk which is easily the cringiest thing in the history of comic books, and now this. Marvel's creative director deserves a slap in the face

With Betty now depowered, the only Banner with an alter-ego is Jen Walters right?

i've given up on Marvel and DC years ago. Plenty of back issues from the good times I have not read yet.

Ummmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm well if what i've read on MH game Social Chat few days ago Ms. Walters was killed as well on a Civil War II latest issues. Not sure if true or lie but is what some other players told...

While they are at it, I wonder if Jane Foster is dead from Thor lightning yet? </ eye roll>

This is a side effect of wanting a "big crossover event". When you do that, you want to have high stakes and "things happen!".

Now, sometimes those things have been in motion for a long time. Recent examples are Thor becoming unworthy in Original Sin and Tony Stark's announced retirement as iron Man. Both of these things had a few years or story behind them, and weren't things cooked up simply for the event, it was just a good time for things to come out. Tony Stark's problems are so profound that Civil War II is merely a part of why he's stopping (when you are almost loosing your company AGAIN, and it's in the shitter AGAIN for the nth time, and you realize that you've screwed up your best personal/professional relationships by being an irresponsible baby -- there is a good chance a recovering addict in those circumstances might view the problems in his life and realize that he's using Iron Man as a drug to escape his problems) It doesn't help that Rodney just died too. And then add in the other Civil War stuff -- especially since Tony handled the problem in exactly the wrong way, making everything WORSE. He hasn't realized that yet, but he's pretty close. He just got Banner killed, and right now only sees the Captain Marvel side of the blame (and they do have blame), but he doesn't see HIS side yet. But it's coming (or at least I hope it is). If he pulls out the magical explanation that justifies what he's doing and he's "right", the story is shit. Because even if he does that, he's STILL to blame.

OTH, I'd be surprised if Silk wasn't cooked up just for Original Sin. Ditto for Banner dying. And that's why Banner dying is likely going to be a shit show.

It was also set up for the stupid writing reason as the "anti" side (as yet) and pretty much nothing going for them. It _was_ inevitable that things would go wrong, given humans and the premise. Doubly so that NOBODY was actually sitting down to talk about what they should do/how they should proceed. That's why Tony's wrong, because he just runs off on his own, does things, and yells at people, instead of going rationally, "Look, we need to test this, and figure out if there are biases and parameters to how this works. Also, We need to set down some protocols on how we should morally respond to this info." ALL these things were things Captain Marvel was willing to do -- and indeed she set off to figure that out only w/o Tony's help/input.

Instead Tony was (again) being a baby and acting impulsively and blathering on how brilliant he is. So they need a "shocker" to make the "it's ok to use this guy to see the future" side look wrong. And (of course) a setup to make Hawkeye not look like a bad guy, even though he just killed someone. (They also had a smaller event in Ms. Marvel.)

And how does the hulk come back? He was killed with tech invented by Banner and given to Hawkeye to do the job ... so do the math. Most probably the tech does something more than kill Banner, and enables a way for him to come back.

Next issue we find out the caveat to the "see the future" power. Though, how they did it makes me want to punch things. (I don't think powers like this should be easily sussed out with a brain scan.)

But I agree that the Totally Awesome Hulk is a bit cringy. He makes sense in context -- but sheesh. I love how it's been "a year". It hasn't been a year in REAL TIME, let alone comic book time!! Totally Awesome Hulk is only on #8 and that's when the change happened. Also, as far as Banner could tell at the time, he was _cured_ and now his experiments "have kept the hulk from appearing for a year". So, overstating things to make everything higher stakes, it's writing designed to force the story along, rather that let the story flow along. I love how Tony and McCoy can't figure out why Banner doesn't trust them (or Cho). (he wouldn't trust Reed or Pym, even if they were available either.) Still the entire premise is like something sat around and over-engineered the setup.

I'm liking Civil War II a lot more than Civil War .. as the writing isn't as horrible, but they're now showing signs of trying to push things along, when just letting things happen would be enough. There's too much of "if people just talked for five minutes" and "but... wait .. you are upset that they stopped a guy before he committed Crime B, when he just STOLE A TANK." Arrest him for stealing a damn tank and take the "didn't destroy the city" as a win. When smart people make stupid reactions like that, and no one bothers to go "uh, hey!". It's ok to over-react and be stupid. It's not ok for no one to point it out and people to not think things over later.

But they NEEDED that to happen, otherwise then the step for CW II #3, and Banner getting killed, would be harder to do as people would have been talking about things BEFOREHAND, and therefore making it harder for things to go off the rails. And that's why I'm starting to get upset at the writing, but it's still at least 10x better than what they did in Civil War. Some of this would be ok if they all happened in a day or two. It's not all in a few days, it's a much longer time span.

Albais wrote: Ummmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm well if what i've read on MH game Social Chat few days ago Ms. Walters was killed as well on a Civil War II latest issues. Not sure if true or lie but is what some other players told...

She was just injured heavily by Thanos. She's not dead. Rodney (War machine) died.

Agent00Soul wrote: With Betty now depowered, the only Banner with an alter-ego is Jen Walters right?

Well Jen's not a Banner, she's a cousin.

The Hulks that are left:

Totally Awesome Hulk (Cho)
Jennifer Walters (She-Hulk) (she's not dead, she's just injured! Though how a Hulk remains injured for a long time is unclear to me, since they heal super-fast.)
Lyra (Hulk and Thundra's daughter)

The Red Hulk was depowered, but he's showing up in U.S. Avengers, so he seems to be back (with mustache). I mean he's on a team with Squirrel Girl, and a "from the future" Cage/Jones daughter (who Squirrel Girl baby sits in our time, so that's going to be .. odd. Imagine hanging out with your old baby sitter WHILE she's still babysitting you...

I *think* everyone else was de-powered, but I might have missed one. OTH, if Red Hulk can come back, so can Red She-Hulk....

Agent00Soul wrote: While they are at it, I wonder if Jane Foster is dead from Thor lightning yet? </ eye roll>

Is your eyeball from experience (reading the comic), or just in general?

I actually LIKE Jane Foster Thor. Her comic has been pretty fun, and she's been OK guest staring in other books too. It sells well also (in the top 20 comics).

But, she's got an expiration date, so, we all know it'll be undone. Though I expect someone to cure her cancer and get her a new hammer at some point (re: Beta Ray Bill). Or perhaps, getting the original Thor a new hammer. mew mew seems to like Jane.

Thor is getting a comic, "The Unworthy Thor", and it'll be about his path to redemption. There doesn't seem to be enough time to tell Jane and his story in Mighty Thor. I've was hoping they'd figure out what to do, so that's a good sign ... It's a tale as old as time, the fall and redemption of a hero. It can be one of the best stories ... or one of the worst. It's a good creative team so, hopefully it'll be good.

In the Unworthy Thor covers, it looks like he might get the Ultimate Thor's Axe/Hammer thingy.

OTH, I'm putting 70/30 odds that I won't like the reason Thor became unworthy ... ditto for Mjolnir being at least semi-sentiment and liking Jane. In the meantime, I am enjoying the story.

I like Jane Foster's Thor! But I was referring to the need to kill her, since they have already set that up with the cancer, only to bring her back in a few years like they always do.

Agent00Soul wrote: I like Jane Foster's Thor! But I was referring to the need to kill her, since they have already set that up with the cancer, only to bring her back in a few years like they always do.

Like Tony, she's pretty much killing herself. Magic does have a "price" (as she likes to say), but it DOES work, especially when the people using it know what they are doing (i.e. Asgardian Healers), and it's almost just like advanced science in some cases. Also, it helps if you actually show up for your Chemo regularly. (nor is she visiting people like McCoy who makes the normal medical establishment look simplistic.)

But, she's in denial, and you can see that in her actions, it's part of why I like the book.

As I said, I expect this to change at some point, it's part of the arc. And we're all so cynical that we know it's coming. Honestly, the only question was "do people like Foster-Thor." If they do, She won't die (or stay dead for long).

Marvel is werid these days guys.

When Disney Bought Marvel, make no mistake they where buying the movies-their is money in comics but its strange.

There was the story about Marvel Stoping the Fantastic Four cause well diffrent studio-but they also did the same thing With Antman(they brought it back but the month the movie came out there was not an antman comic on the shelves). They produce a lot of movies and obviously sure the comics aren't going to be the same...or in the same conceptual idea...but its werid.

Going to go on a bit of a rant here

First let me start off with this About 10 years ago i got a trade paperback of Hulk comics from the early 80s. They where repetitive yes, but they weren't bad. That got me for fun to go to the library and read more of these paperbcks-libraries are good for that, and some where Great-Thorcan be a lot of fun good(moon knight is pretty weridly fun ripoff of batman) some where bad (middle period X men wasn't great and felt like it was missing the premise) and i got to say the first 10 or so issues of Dardevil are just offensivly terrible. but i also go more Hulk and saw trends, and ideas.... but they had tones. Diffrent tones. Kinda of complex ideas and storyies and diffrent ways of telling them. Hulk is a diffrent book then say Antman or Ghost Rider or any of it.

When ever i read a modern Marvel comic-it a lot of the same tone.

and it all feels a lot like Spiderman

Same-hey heres the 4th wall, same everyones kind of snarky, same soap opera that they do and don't care about . Its variations and ideas from it-but its there. And its very samey.

Now i kinda like Squirrel girl -which is that to 11-but that kinda works for it. Its a comedy book of a character that was created as a parody of Spiderman. Not so much with X Men.

Which is not to say that X men can't be funny, or you can't tell jokes-but figure out how to tell it thats not a copy of something else. You need a mix.

And with the way you write books as mentioned-Death is stupid. you have done it so much its lost all meaning, and your characters with the 4th wall stuff in all the books aknowledge that at this point.

And i realize the World changing events sell. Great. But weridly kinda making money isn't your big goal. i think honestly as a brand your focus should be on making books even small ones and keeping audience-stunts don't do that in the long term.

There are good ideas here. i do like the idea that there kinda doing more with representation and making more female lead books, and characters of diffrent races and sexualities. Thats fine-but at times it feels a diservese to them-what does it matter if they have an asian guy as hulk-if hes not really an incredible hulk book.