If Hulk was a bomb, why are people calling The Incredible Hulk a success five years later?
The lead from the AP story:
“The Incredible Hulk was a box-office bruiser, yanking in $54.5 million over opening weekend and laying to rest the stigma of his unappreciated big-screen adventure five years ago.”
Really?
Hulk
Release date: June 20, 2003
Domestic opening-weekend box office: $62.1 million
Number of opening-weekend theaters: 3,674
Production budget: $137 million
Rating: PG-13
Running time: 135 minutes
The Incredible Hulk
Release date: June 13, 2008
Domestic opening-weekend box office: $54.5 million
Number of opening-weekend theaters: 3,505
Production budget: $150 million
Rating: PG-13
Running time: 114 minutes
(All figures from Box Office Mojo.)
I didn’t much care for Ang Lee’s Hulk. That is until I saw The Incredible Hulk. Then I really liked it.
Everyone in Hollywood is so desperate to praise mediocrity.
The original was psychoanalytic melodrama at its most colorful and playful. In my estimation, the original will age well and be widely considered a subversive masterpiece. Lee was able to play to the genre’s strengths whilst offering a blistering insight into repression, trauma and rage. Lettelier’s (sp) offal was an offense to the retina, a true steaming pile of puke.