Today my daughter invited me to go to dinner and to the movies as a way of celebrating "Father's Day". We ate a nice meal at a Thai restaurant in Northampton, and then headed to Hadley to catch the new "Incredible Hulk" movie at Cinemark.
I really enjoyed it -- almost as much as the recent "Iron Man" movie. The Hulk has never been my favorite comic book character, but I always enjoyed his appearances in the "Avengers" and "Defenders" comics, as well as his occasional battles with the Thing in various comics. I also watched every episode of the old "Incredible Hulk" TV show staring Bill Bixby and Lou Ferrigno. And although I enjoyed the first "Hulk" movie, it didn't really thrill me.
This one, though, really rocked. The Hulk looked like he should, the action was incredible (no pun intended), and I just loved the little references inserted at various points for the geeks in the audience. And Robert Downey Jr.'s cameo at the end as Tony Stark was great. Well done! -- PL
All artwork, photos and text © 2010 Peter Laird, unless otherwise noted.
20 comments:
Happy Fathers Day Peter not only as a human father but as that of many characters :)
That's great you enjoyed the hulk movie, I was a bit worried about it as I thought the first one looked bad.
I know mirage doesn't have the piles of cash that Marvel does but do you ever think we'll see a TMNT movie as great as all these new Marvel movies?
Belated Happy Father's Day, and glad to hear that you had a great time with your daughter.
-->> Thought this was appropriate for Mikey's TMNT News blog for the day.
(( Wanted to see Hulk just cuz Ed Norton is one of my fave actors. Guess i got more incentive to see it now .. ))
>v<
Even though Hulk has never a huge favorite character of mine, I was a big fan of Peter Alan David's run on the Hulk comics, what type of relationship existed between you and PAD while he was writing the 2K3 TMNT adaption for Dreamwave?
-Daniel D. Lewis
Whenever I watch these Marvel movies which are absolutely... incredible, I can't help but wishing TMNT could do the same again. Live action with CG turtles would be so awesome. Not that the new CG movie was bad or anything, but the original movie struck a chord with me that it'll be hard to ever top it.
The original Turtles movie is quite possibly my favorite movie of all time.
-Paul
PS: Mr. Laird have you seen Kung Fu Panda? What do you think of that "property"? Seems sort of like a rip off of TMNT.
"Dragon Turtle said...
Even though Hulk has never a huge favorite character of mine, I was a big fan of Peter Alan David's run on the Hulk comics, what type of relationship existed between you and PAD while he was writing the 2K3 TMNT adaption for Dreamwave?
-Daniel D. Lewis"
Daniel, I didn't have much to do with PAD, as I recall. I think it was mostly reviewing and commenting on his plots and scripts. -- PL
Hey Pete, did you know Captain America was supposed to make a cameo in a deleted scene as well? I'm not sure if you noticed, but Doc Sampson was in Bruce's computer contact list as well!
Just on the PAD TMNT thing too, I had the opportunity to talk to the dude at San Diego last year, about a bunch of things (including Turtles). He'd said he really enjoyed writing the characters, but wasn't sure of Dreamwave as a company. He was really looking forward to being able to deviate from the cartoon plots, but the book was, as we all know, canceled just as things were going in that direction.
"Tristan Jones said...
Hey Pete, did you know Captain America was supposed to make a cameo in a deleted scene as well? I'm not sure if you noticed, but Doc Sampson was in Bruce's computer contact list as well!
Just on the PAD TMNT thing too, I had the opportunity to talk to the dude at San Diego last year, about a bunch of things (including Turtles). He'd said he really enjoyed writing the characters, but wasn't sure of Dreamwave as a company. He was really looking forward to being able to deviate from the cartoon plots, but the book was, as we all know, canceled just as things were going in that direction."
Hey Trist! No, I didn't see the Doc Sampson thing, nor did I know about the supposed Cap cameo... that would have been cool. (I did wonder about that scientist who tries to "cure" Banner, whose head starts pulsating in the last shot of his last scene... could he be "The Leader" in a future movie?)
I also felt that PAD was just getting into some interesting stuff when that series was cancelled. Too bad, really. -- PL
-->> David was startin' to expand into things we hadn't seen before, lie the kid from April's neiborhood.. and Baxter's Turtle Bot.
That story i especially wanted to see, involving the T- 4 or ( whatever hell it's name was ) interacting with April.. and actually becoming somewhat sentient and confused.
I was told that some of the artwork from that story was in the recent collected D.W. TMNT books.
LESean is such a wonderful, "ANIMATED " illustrator ..i bought some work from him. He also made me a SHREDDER.
Dammit i miss that book.
Just dammit .. >;{
>v<
Happy Late Father's Day to you, Pete! Glad to hear you had a nice day with your daughter! Not so sure if I'll be catching this film at all, but it's good to know it was very enjoyable. I'll be going to see the X-Files film with my friends during San D Con.
You're spot on about The Leader Pete! It was kind of funny actually, a group of us saw the movie last week, and one of them said "I loved the bit with Dr. Samuel Sterns!"
I knew I'd heard the name bandied about before, but I couldn't place where so I was like "Who is Samuel Sterns?", to which my friend responded: "The Leader, y'know -- big head? Hulk villain?"
It clicks. "Aaaah yeah! I remember him!"
I go home that night and reread some recent Avengers issues, only to find pretty much exactly the same situation happen between Iron Fist and the other New Avengers!
Tokka - The recent Titan reprints of the Dreamwave stuff have the script for the T-4 issue, along with some concept art and penciled pages.
"The Hulk looked like he should, the action was incredible (no pun intended), and I just loved the little references inserted at various points for the geeks in the audience. And Robert Downey Jr.'s cameo at the end as Tony Stark was great."
I couldn't agree more. The new movie was everything the 2003 film should have been, and then some.
I liked the actors from the first film in their roles more than I did this one. I was discussing this with Malpractice on another blog -- I think the actors of this Hulk lacked the chemistry of the original. Norton, Tyler and Hurt were all good, but I think if the actors of the original film had've been in this one, I would've given it a perfect grade.
It seems to be the popular thing to hate on the original, but I went into the first Hulk knowing it wasn't going to be a conventional comic book movie, and I really liked it.
All that said, I still really liked this one, but an interesting comment was made afterwards -- with all the Marvel movies being tied to each other now, would you rather see another Hulk movie, or another Marvel movie with the Hulk in it?
Peter,
This bring up what I think might be an interesting question. And it goes out to any Mirage dudes reading as well.
If given the chance, which other property would you love to write an in cannon story for, and what would it be about?
Star Wars, Ghostbusters, Thundercats, Transformers..etc...
" Tristan Jones said... All that said, I still really liked this one, but an interesting comment was made afterwards -- with all the Marvel movies being tied to each other now, would you rather see another Hulk movie, or another Marvel movie with the Hulk in it?"
I appreciated the SLIGHT moves they made in this new movie towards making the Hulk be able to think and speak, but I don't think they went far enough to make an appearance by him in another Marvel movie -- say, the proposed "Avengers" film -- really work. For him to be part of a team, he needs, at least, the ability to communicate. For a brief cameo appearance in, say, a Spider-Man or Thor or X-Men movie, the simple Hulk would probably work well. -- PL
Yeah, I'm with you there. Personally I wouldn't mind seeing an out of control Hulk being tackled by the Avengers. I always found the dynamic Bruce Banner, being a friend to all these top heroes, becoming their biggest problem as the Hulk interesting, and I think it would play well into a movie, even if only briefly. You're on the mark though, they'd need to advance his control over Hulk to put him on a team like that, but Hulk as a villain could work...
For those interested in the Hulk Blu-Ray DVD, It will come with 70 minutes of additional footage.
Info from:
http://www.collider.com
Daniel D. Lewis
my father is a HUGE marvel fan, (he showed me his Spidey collection when I started collecting TMNT books) and I too, took my father to Hulk for father's day, and he was truly overjoyed, and felt the same way you did, Mr. Laird.
My question is, specially being a fan of classic marvel, as my dad thought this, the lightning strike was a small nod to Thor, hence their somewhat quarling(sp?) personalites with each other, hence why Hulk got defensive against Betty...
Personally, I always felt it was just a random act, but after re-reading some of the old Avenger's issues, (Hulk trying to pick up thor's hammer and he can not, spurring more hulk-ish rage to thor's delight/humor) it does make one wonder, especially with the Thor moving coming out soon.
your thoughts?
--Nick Nitro
I loved the sonic boom clap that put out the helicopter fire.
Belated happy Father's day too! Hulk will always be my favorite dvds collection
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