The Incredible Hulk #4 Review

Hulk vs an island of gamma irradiated animals, and an insane Bruce Banner. Let the smashing begin. Today I will be reviewing The Incredible Hulk #4. Please leave a comment to let me know what you think.

The Incredible Hulk #4

So let’s talk about the book. Hulk, Amanda Von Doom (no relation), and her army of hunters arrive at Banner’s island. Her purpose, to find Banner and kill him. Upon their arrival, they are assaulted by an army of hulked out animals. Still, considering how angry Hulk is, he makes short work of them, tearing them to pieces. He then leaps away to find Banner. Scouring the island, Hulk finally finds him in his lab. Banner has built another Gamma bomb. The two have a quick conversation until an enraged Hulk grabs Banner by the throat. Sill, for some reason, he cannot bring himself to kill Banner. Using this moment of hesitation, Banner smashes Hulk with some sort of Gamma powered glove he invented. The force of the punch is so powerful that the Hulk is propelled halfway across the island and knocked unconscious. Banner then goes out to finish the job. And that’s the book.

So let’s talk opinions. Honestly, I’m not exactly sure how I felt about this issue. First off, the writing felt off to me. There actually wasn’t too much story. Basically, Hulk shows up, kills some monsters, finds Banner, and gets bitch slapped. That’s about it. Pretty hollow if you ask me. Usually, with a weak story like this, we supplement it with awesome art or incredible action. Unfortunately, that wasn’t the case here either. I love Silvestri and the way he did the Hulk in the first few issues. In this issue, however, he was off. The Hulk is looking more and more cro magnon. His jaw and forehead are getting more apish looking. His overall posture, hair and face are looking more gorillaish. In addition, there are way too many lines on everyone’s face. No one has that many wrinkles. At least his action layouts were slamming. Great to see the Hulk cut loose and bash up something. I just wish the story had some of the depth that last issue had. It really was non-existent. I did like seeing Banner further deteriorate into insanity. Also, the mentioning of the separation mystery was good since it kept me wanting to read for more clues. Hopefully, as promised by the last page caption, we will get a full disclosure next issue and see who was behind the split. I’m leaning towards the Leader for some reason. I also really hope that next issue we get a little bit more supporting cast interaction. Amanda needs to be written more into the story so we can get some sort of connection to her. I cared for about two issues. Now I’m losing all interest in her as a character. In general, the story has to pick up, or this might not be as successful a renumbering gimmick as everyone hoped. That’s my opinion folks. Take it or leave it.

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