Viewer Log: She-Hulk ep 9

 Jen faces off against her most powerful foe, a producer. 

Last time on She-Hulk: Attorney at Law, Jen went up against her greatest opponent yet. She was forced to represent “Leapfrog” aka Eugene Patililo against Luke Jacobson. Eugene burned himself badly using the suit’s rocket boosters. Luke cuts ties with Jen when she tries to get him to settle out of court. In court, she meets Luke’s lawyer, Matt Murdock. The New York lawyer quickly deduced via smell that Eugene used jet fuel in the boosters, which went against the manufacturer’s instructions. At the bar, Jen and Matt meet and bond a little about both being lawyers. She’s called to help Eugene while he’s being attacked by a mysterious man. She dons her super suit and faces off against Daredevil. She catches him and learns he’s Matt. Matt tells her that Eugene is the villain here and he’d kidnapped Luke to make him a new suit. The two team up and attack the “Lilypad,” Eugene’s super obvious hidden base. They defeat Eugene’s goons, and Eugene breaks his legs in his attempted escape. Jen gets back into Luke’s not-the-worst graces, and he’ll restart Jen’s dress for a big gala. Jen and Matt “celebrate” back at her place. The next day, Jen goes to her big gala and is one of several winners of Female Lawyer of the year. Her win is ruined by the HulkKing and Intelligencia whom post all the info stolen from her phone and leak a sex tape that Josh secretly made with Jen. Jen freaks out and smashes up the place. She grabs a mysterious figure she thinks is involved but stopped and seemingly arrested by Damage Control. Damn. Enough recap. Let’s get to it.

 

Episode 9: Whose Show is This?

 

Well, this is awkward.

         We open with a weird opener that explains the premise of the show, but in the style of the 70s Incredible Hulk show. There’s a bit that made me guffaw where Jen is arguing with online trolls but on a super old and clunky 70s computer. We learn that she’s been arrested after her outburst. We just to the real world, where Jen is visited in Blonsky’s old cell by Pug, Nikki, and Mallory. Pug has tried getting in contact with Bruce but he’s still off planet. Jen wants to start suing the people that leaked her info, but Mallory says the need to focus on her own case. While Jen’s reaction was 100% understandable, witnesses are just focusing on the “she hulked out and wrecked the place,” so they have to deal with this. Mallory got her a plea deal, but it requires her to wear an inhibitor ankle bracelet like Blonsky’s. Jen is released, and clears out her office, with some help from Nikki and Pug, since no She-Hulk means no GLK&H job.

 

Jen’s story is all over the news cycle. Reporters are camped outside her apartment. Her parents are trying to put a good spin on things, but ya know, there’s no good way to live with your parents in your 30s. She is forced to move back in with them, though as she can’t find a job. There’s a good bit where her dad scares off reporters with his hose when they try to swarm her. Later, Jen has a whole cork conspiracy board thing set up and Nikki comes by to help her. She can’t find much on these guy’s, though, because their faceless internet trolls. Jen has investigated the Intelligencia site itself and it’s run by shell companies outside the US. Nikki says that it’s a group of dumb dudes, so one of them is going to slip up and gives them what they need. Elaine comes in with snacks and derails the conversation with an old dance video Jen did back in law school. She’s shoved out of the living room, but then Nikki gets an alert that Dennis Bukowski is on a news show called the Conversation and trying to get his 20 minutes of fame out of this.

 

Jen flops onto her bed, and muses how this feels all wrong. She breaks the fourth wall and points out that this isn’t really a reluctant superhero story, she’s just getting screwed over. The dramatic 70s Hulk narration kicks up again but Jen cuts him up. Jen tries to text Bruce but gets nothing. Jen then tries to text Blonsky, but his phone is also out of service. Deciding that anytime includes ‘now’ Jen decides to head up there anyway, as a mental health break.

 

Nikki, back at the office, uses the video that Elaine gave her and posts it on Intelligencia using the dummy account she set up with Mallory. She prays to Jen to forgive her for this transgression as she does. 15 seconds later she gets a message from HulkKing telling her about a private meeting he’s setting up that she’s now invited to. She accepts, but then realizes that she’d either presented as, or HulkKing assumed she was a dude. She runs off to see if Pug is still at the office and willing to do her a favor.

 

Jen makes it to Blonsky’s retreat and meets Dirk. And by Dirk I mean Wrecker, I don’t think they’ve used his real name yet… Anyway, he says it’s perfectly okay for her to show up to get away from things and will set up a guest room for her. Jen spends some time reading Blonsky’s book, Deep Haiku’s, but she shuts it saying it sucks.

 

Nikki and Pug arrive at the meeting. Nikki is forcing him to go in despite his discomfort because Jen’s life is on the line. There’s another laugh out loud moment when Nikki reminds him to only refer to women as females while in the meeting and Pug groans like he’d just been told to kick a puppy or something equally distasteful. She has him wear an earbud and will be talking with him via the phone. Pug walks around, but Nikki is forced to get in close because the reception is real bad. Pug gets into a conversation with some dudes complaining about both She-Hulk and Mighty Thor. Pug initially can’t participate, but he pulls back and tells himself “Be gross,” before getting back in there with a “Females” line that instantly earns all their respect. Turns out, Todd Phelps is there (Nikki: Todd? Oh, wait, that tracks). He hugs Pug and then goes into a She-Hulk hate rant. Nikki keeps giving Pug what to say and learns that Todd made Intelligencia and is in fact HulkKing. Nikki loses the call at this point, say’s it’ll be fine and Pug can improvise, remembers she’s talking about Pug and runs to try to find someway to help him. In the meeting, Todd starts a big speech about how proud he is of his troll collective for hacking Jen’s phone and ruining her life.

 

Jen, meanwhile, is getting tea with Dirk. He says that Saracen turned him onto this tea, but she should be careful if he makes it for her, as he likes to slip chicken blood in it. Jen wants to talk to Blonsky, as he went through a similar character assassination as this. Dirk tells her he’s at some meeting out at the lodge. Jen goes to find him, and Dirk muses that he kind of misses the chicken blood in his tea.

 

Ohhhh, I see where this is going.

 

Et tu, Emil?

Todd introduces his guest speaker, the Abomination. Blonsky comes out and he’s in full Abomination form. He starts his speech as Jen starts walking toward the meeting. She comes in and sees him. Blonsky hulk’s down and explains that he does speaking engagements but for money, he doesn’t believe it. Nikki comes in and she and Pug explain about Todd being the HulkKing. Todd, super proud of being a toxic asshole, reveals that the bit of his plan where Josh also stole her blood. He reveals that his team synthesized a means to give him her powers and injects himself with it. Jen asks him, and the camera, if we’re actually doing this. Todd starts transforming as Jen objects to this being where the seasons was going. Titania bursts in, Jenn commenting that isn’t the scene messy enough? Blonsky hulk’s up again and saves Jen from Todd’s charge, but then Bruce bursts in, sees Blonsky holding Jen and attacks him. Blonsky objecting as they do.

 

Seeing a character in real life has gotta be weird.

Jen breaks her inhibitor and breaks the fourth wall. She breaks into the Disney+ menu and goes into her own Marvel Assemble to get answers. Jen slips into the office of the She-Hulk writing staff and demands to know what’s happening. She yells at them for doing the “villain steals my blood to give himself powers” cliché, and asks why can’t they do the story their own way. They say this is the story that Kevin wants, and Jen then wants to talk to Kevin. The writers laugh at the idea, one of them saying they’d murder her to protect Kevin, and Jen storms off to talk to Kevin. She has to sign an NDA, but the guy up front pushes the security button anyway. Jen beats her way through some guards and then meets Kevin. Not Kevin Feige, though, KEVIN. Knowledge Enhanced Visual Interconnectivity Nexus is what his acronym means. He looks a lot like OTTO from WALLE but wearing a baseball hat. He promises to answer her questions, but only if she de=hulks. Why? Because she’s very expensive to animate. She does, off screen because the visual effects team is working on another project, and he begins explaining.

 

KEVIN is all powerful!

He makes all the decisions and uses the most advanced algorithm to make nearly perfect product. When Jen asks about “nearly perfect” the robot shrugs and says some are better than other but he leaves the debating up to the internet. Jen says she’s not happy with her show, but KEVIN says that doesn’t matter. Jen wants to focus on this being a legal comedy and asks to make her closing statement to fit that mold. She talks about how the MCU is a bit formulaic, and that doing the formula distracts from Jen’s stakes. Jen’s stakes being her life falling apart just as she was figuring out how to be Jen and She-Hulk. KEVIN is interested by her point and asks what sort of ending she’s proposing. She begins by asking to erase the Todd gets Hulk powers part, as he is the villain, not the powers. Then, cut Bruce swooping in and saving the day in her story. KEVIN says that was going to introduce some stuff, but Jen says save it for the movies. He then asks about Blonsky, and Jen says she just wants him to hold himself accountable. She asks for the climax to be in the daylight, to which KEVIN acquiesces. Jen asks if she can see Daredevil again, because a woman has her needs and sits to asks about the plethora of daddy issues in the MCU and when we’re getting the X-Men. KEVIN says their done, and that She-Hulk won’t get access to KEVIN again. They fixed the glitch that let her break reality. He sends her back to her show.

 

She-Hulk returns to her story, Titania is streaming everything that’s happening, cops are arriving and she’s looking pissed. She de-hulks and tells Todd that she’ll see him in court. Daredevil leaps in out of nowhere looking to help and seems kind of bummed he missed everything. Pug’s mind is blown that his friend clearly has a thing with Daredevil. She goes to talk to Blonsky, who is signing a confession to his actions. He’s going back to jail for 10 years for violating parole, and he’s happy to do it to earn back some good karma for his actions.

 

Jen and Matt have a nice outdoor dinner with her family. Matt getting grilled about what he does by Aunt Rebecca. The family seems to like him, though, so that’s a win. Bruce then shows up, and introduces his son to them, Skaar. Oh neat. … Time moves differently on Skaar, and aliens are often shown to mature faster than humans, so Skaar being a teenager despite him being what… 10 is doable. Good on the Walters/Banners for just rolling with this. I suppose after two scions of your family become hulks, there’s very little that will surprise you.

 

She-Hulk a few days later heads into court and says that she’s going to hold people like Todd and Intelligencia accountable for their actions. When the reporter she’s talking to asks if she means in court or as a superhero, she says both. And the credit’s roll.

 

Damnit, Wong, we talked about this.

In an after-credit’s scene, Blonsky is in prison again. Wong opens a portal into his cell and breaks him out again. Oh my, I wonder what this is building to.

 

Well, that was certainly a bonkers ride. I’ll get to the fourth wall break in a second. I liked the set up here, with Jen hitting the most rock bottom she could and then going to Blonsky because they’ve both been through this only to find out his affiliation with HulkKing was well done. Like, her reaction to having her private information put on display and seeing an extremely personal moment put on display, yeah, I’d start breaking stuff too. Unfortunately, the legal reaction also makes sense. When you have as much power as She-Hulk has, she had to have been making people nervous from minute one. Nikki and Pug were great in this episode, too. I appreciated that Pug was getting visibly ill and uncomfortable with every word he’d make to seem like an Intelligencia Proud Boy. “Come on, Pug. Get Gross” being a major standout. Nikki was also brilliant. Yeah, kind of scummy to post a video of your friend embarrassing themselves, but that was key to getting in to the Intelligencia convention. Okay, now onto the fourth wall break. … I’ll be honest, I loved it. Seeing Jen get meta about the formulaic nature of the MCU and advocating for her show to do something different was fun. I also loved that KEVIN, much like Kevin Feige, was wearing a baseball cap. I much prefer the ‘corrected’ version of Jen’s finale overall… but I do have one complaint. That Jen was dropped in once everything was sorted out. I would have preferred them restarting from when Jen walked in and going from there. The arrest and Jen’s “I’ll see you in court” were perfect, I just wish she hadn’t marched in like that. Also, why was Titania there? I can accept Matt appearing because KEVIN respected Jen’s libido, but not even a “Nikki texted her and she hates Intelligencia too,” explanation? Okay… I’ll be curious to see where the post credit scene goes. Wong seems to imply he’s been busy, and I wonder if Blonsky is going to be involved now. Or if Jen is going to have to go Abomination hunting in season 2. So… yeah, I enjoyed the show, liked the finale overall, I just wished they’d made it more diegetic when Jen reappears. Oh, and I hope Dirk keeps up the retreat even with Blonsky gone. It was weird to see Wrecker with any personality traits beyond “yell at his subordinates and break things,” but I enjoyed this guru in training. And the guys need someone who can help them, or else Man-Bull and El Aguila will never get over their codependency issues. Yeah, fun show. Tomorrow, for Halloween, it seems only fair to talk about Marvel’s special. See you then. Ahrooooooo!

Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/posts/74000737?pr=true

Twitter: @BasicsSuperhero