Jen's joining the family business, whether she likes it or not.
Alright, we’re finally here! She-Hulk:
Attorney at Law is Marvel’s latest Disney+ show that features the
shenanigans of Jennifer Walters, Bruce Banner’s cousin. Jen has been a staple
of Marvel comics for years, serving as legal counsel for other heroes much like
Matt Murdock. At the time of writing, I’ve only seen one episode, but I enjoyed
it. I will say that I was a little disappointed with their design for her She-Hulk
form. I just can’t believe that there’s enough power in her green tube arms for
her more impressive superstrength feats. All I’m saying. Enough recap. Let’s
get to it.
Episode 1: A Normal Amount of Rage
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| This is gonna be weird and I love that. |
We jump back several months with
Jen going on a road trip with her cousin Bruce Banner. He’s in human form again
thanks to a device he built that’s draining his excess Gama radiation and just
looking to have a good time with his cousin. It’s not said out lout, but it’s
implied they haven’t seen each other in years at minimum. They have fun
chatting as Jen drives, Jen has a “theory” that she explains to Bruce. Basically,
she’s asking Bruce if his friend and coworker Steven Grant Rogers is a virgin.
Her theory basically being that he was too busy to get some after his big transformation.
Bruce is clearly uncomfortable with the conversation, and probably is thankful
that an alien ship flew down, cut off talk but also caused them to crash. It’s
a very bad wreck, the cousins rolling down a hill and getting real banged up
along the way. Jen cuts her arm getting out of the car, stumbles around, and
pulls Bruce out too. Unfortunately, he’s also bleeding, and his inhibitor broke
in the crash. After having her blood exposed to Bruce’s, Jen immediately
transforms into a Hulk and runs off and Bruce begins to change as well.
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I mean... imagine if they didn't have the same blood
type to boot.
We cut to several hours later where
Jen wakes up just outside a bar. She looks like she’s just been in a car accident
but seems otherwise fine. She sneaks in the back and tries to clean herself up
in the ladies’ room but is interrupted by a quartet of bar gals. They are
immediately concerned with her wellbeing and do their best to help get her
looking presentable. They had a spare coat, shoes, and makeup. They look like
they’d give her a full makeover, but she says she’s good and just needs a phone
to call her cousin. Later, Jen is waiting for Bruce to arrive when some guys
start trying to get her attention. Jen isn’t interested, they won’t take a hint,
and so she transforms and roars at them. She’s stopped before she can attack
them by a flying Hulk tackle.
She wakes up sometime later in a
room somewhere, Lead Zeppelin T-shirt and other clothes waiting for her. She
wanders around for a bit and discovers she’s in a beach house of some kind, a
burnt out and busted Iron Man helmet is laying out like tasteful art or something.
She hears music playing from a lower level and goes to investigate, finding Bruce
working on something. He’s re-Hulked. He introduces his “Smart Hulk” Form. He
explains that he called Jen’s parents to let them know they’re okay, and that they’re
in Mexico. Tony lent him the Beach house during the Blip, it’s where he integrated
his personalities so he can still be intelligent in his Hulk form. He explains
that the ship that hit them was Sakaarian messenger ship, Sakaar being the
place where he was a Gladiator, and that he’ll figure that out, but first he
needs to help Jen. He tells her about the blood mixing, freaking her out a little,
but explains that she has a rare genetic condition, like Bruce, can absorb Gama
radiation and Hulk out. Her blood is more efficient that Bruce’s, and he used
it to help heal his arm up again. He dramatically destroys the blood in front
of her, having finished his tests, telling Jen that they must be careful as
even if there’s only a millionth of a percent chance their blood could make another
Hulk, it’s too risky. Jen wants to go back to normal, but this isn’t something
that can be fixed. He wants to help Jen get control of her powers, but Jen just
wants to be done. She has a freak out… but it turns out to be hunger, so they
break for pancakes.
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Given what we've seen of their relationship thus far,
you can't tell me Bruce isn't enjoying making Jen
look stupid just a little.
Bruce tells her that she’ll need to
stay at the beach house until she can control her powers, but even then, she’ll
probably have to completely reorganize her life to live with it. He gets a
binder for her to help. It’s a “multi-year” process. They go back into the lab and
Bruce puts her into a chamber to test what triggers her transformation. He
tells her that anger and fear are the baselines that usually trigger a
transformation, to which Jen scoffs and says those two emotions are just everyday
for being a woman. He flips on the machine, which includes a wall of buzzsaw blades.
Jen freaks out, transforms, and then immediately throws the door at Bruce.
Bruce talks to her like she’s a panicky animal… only to discover that Jen is
still in control of herself. Huh, weird. Bruce is happy that it seems that Jen
won’t have to fight with another personality, happy but also a little annoyed.
He rips out a few pages of the binder. Now that they know she can transform,
they’ll focus on getting control of the shifting. He warns her that once people
start seeing you as a monster, it never stops, to convince her.
They start with yoga. She jokes,
making Bruce feel annoyed, so he tells her to get some sleep and they’ll start
the next day. They open the next day with Bruce using an airhorn to wake her,
she shifts into She-Hulk, and they get to work on the basics of being a Hulk. There’s
a funny montage as they do training exercises, Hulk tips, and Yoga. Some highlights
of advice include don’t move into a place with ten-foot ceilings, that spandex
is her best friend and their ability to metabolize alcohol is insane. That
night, they go through a lot of liquor and Bruce reminisces about hanging
out with Steve and Tony. We linger on a shot of Tony and Bruce’s initial’s
carved into the bar. They toast to a good time during a hard time.
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Woo, good to see the Thunderclap in action.
The next day, they get back to
yoga. Jen is incredibly anxious to get back home, but Bruce keeps telling her
that they need to take it day by day, as being a superhero is a trial by fire.
Jen says she’s not interested in the hero thing and just wants to get back to
being a lawyer. He gets annoyed and tells her that she needs this, especially
learning to control her anger, to survive. Jen then goes on her own mini tirade
on how she’s an expert at controlling anger because that’s what being a woman
is like. She gets angry and transforms, but then pulls back, returning to
normal. Deciding that she can change back and forth, she storms off. Bruce
follows. Jen wants to take his jeep and head back to LA. Bruce tries to
convince her to stay, but she’s not interested. He tries to tell her about how
when you have the power to help people, you should use it. Jen counters by pointing
out that trying to be a hero cost Bruce his dreams, his career, most of his
friends and his relationship with his family, so why would she want that? Solid
points. He stands in front of the jeep and tries to stop her. She drives into
him, knocking him into a rock pile. She gets out, hulks up and they hulk fight.
She knocks Bruce around a bit, but then Bruce knocks her back with one of his
thunderclaps. Jen tries to do it too but can’t get the level of force that he
does. But discovers she can clap incredibly fast, and the sonic vibrations can
stun him. She turns to walk away, but Bruce recovers and tackles her again.
Bruce’s glasses get broken as they continue to tussle, and they end up
destroying his bar. They stop and rebuild the Bar, Bruce telling her that he
does respect her decision to go back, and Jen adding her initials to the bar. Later,
he gives her his blessing and tells her to call him if she needs him. And they
part on good terms.
We return to Jen in her office, her
jinxing herself by saying that she proved Bruce wrong, and one doesn’t have to
be a hulk despite having the powers. And tells us that, at the moment, the people
who know she’s a hulk are Bruce, Nikki, and her folks. She goes to finish her case,
whisper “Lawyer show” to us as she closes the door. We jump to the closing arguments
of her case. The defending lawyer finishes her arguments and Jen steps up to
speak. She’s stopped by a large woman bursting in and attacking people. She
hulks out and introduces herself as Jennifer Walters, attorney at law. The two
have a quick brawl, Jen knocking her to ground and seeing her arrested. She changes
back and says she’s ready to give her closing arguments.
In a post credit scene, Jen and
Bruce are having a drink at his bar again. She’s sad drinking at thinking about
Steve dying a virgin. Bruce, fed up with it, says that Steve lost his virginity
to a USO show girl in 1943. Jen, revealing that she is in fact sober, says that
she “knew it,” and then loudly announces that “Captain America Fu-” before we
go to the credit-credits.
Alright, so that was a solid start
to She-Hulk. We got to know Jennifer
Walters both pre and post transformation, got an understanding of her relationship
with Bruce, and her views on Superheroing. I really enjoy Tatiana Maslany as
Jen. She’s got good comedic timing, a lot of confidence, and can do the
dramatic parts like her speech about anger incredibly well. She also has great
chemistry with Mark Ruffalo. They really captured the vibe that they’re two people
that care about each other and have history but haven’t talked in a while and
aren’t sure how to act around each other anymore. She clearly respects Bruce,
but also knows his method isn’t working for her and isn’t willing to lie to placate
him. I also liked how they characterize Bruce in this. He’s clearly lonely, and
hurting, after the events of Endgame and isn’t sure how to process it.
Lingering on the initials in the bar and his anecdotes about Tony are pitch
perfect talking about someone you’ve lost and are still grappling with not
being able to see them again. I say this about 3 weeks after the passing of my
Grandpa, so I’ve got fresh knowledge. RIP Jack Arland, I love and miss you. And
that’s basically it for the episode. Hard to believe that they’d originally had
this slated for toward the end of the season, to explain Jen’s powers. This was
a great start and I hope the following episodes keep up the energy. Good night,
everyone.
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