The Hulk: Not as Bad as I Thought it Would Be, But Not as Great as Other Reviews are Making it Seem

First off, I hope all of the baby daddies out there had a nice Father's Day. Did you hear that Kevin Federline won the "Father of the Year" award?!? The rest of you best start stepping it up, because that's a disgrace. (OK, so the honor was given by Privé nightclub in Vegas... probably not the best judge of moral character in the world. But still, he won.)

After toasting K-Fed's victory, I decided to go see The Incredible Hulk, having heard and read surprisingly positive reviews. As always, I'm not going to give anything away, but I will say that I don't think the film is as, uh, incredible as critics are making it out to be.

The good news is that Ed Norton is excellent. I'm not sure if you all know about my not-so-secret crush on Ed, but now you do. I was therefore much more interested in the parts where he looked like himself as "Bruce Banner"--on the run from the authorities and trying to figure out how to "cure" himself--than when he was The Hulk. Tim Roth, playing one of the military baddies after Bruce, was good as well. The effects were fine... nothing looked outright fake, but in general it's still a little hard (at least for me) to see this big green freak running around and not find it at least a little unbelievable. Which I admit is strange, because I had no problem with, say, the monster in Cloverfield.

Thankfully, the vast majority of the movie didn't feature The Hulk, which left me with an overall favorable impression of the movie. But the climactic ending was all about the green guy, and therefore I was disappointed when the credits rolled. I personally felt like the ending fell flat and was extremely confusing because it didn't wrap things up clearly at all... and not just for purposes of a potential sequel. It was kind of like all of a sudden things just stopped. If you have seen the movie and want to discuss the details, leave a comment and I'll expound upon my bitterness at the final scenes.

The main thing that didn't work for me was Liv Tyler. First off, her lips are freaking distracting. Angelina Jolie has nothing on Liv Tyler in the lip department, I have decided. Secondly, she has that lispy voice that just keeps making me think that she should really only play elves. I could deal with her as Arwen in LOTR, and that's about it. Lastly, she just did not physically look like a good match for Ed Norton. As much as I love him, I will admit that he is kind of a scrawny, scrappy guy. I think Liv could've easily beat him down if she wanted to, maybe even when he was The Hulk. So that bad stroke of casting took a little shine off of the overall movie for me.

All in all, though, both my husband and I did like The Incredible Hulk... I just don't think it deserves the glowing reviews I've seen floating around. If you actually like the monster stuff, then you will enjoy the movie much more than I did. If you are like me and just want to see Ed, then you'll be fine with about 80% of it.

As a side note, it will be interesting to see how they handle a potential sequel to the movie. Liv Tyler and a few others from this initial installment have already signed on for a second and third go-round, but the ever-fickle Mr. Norton hasn't. Nor has he done any publicity for the movie because of "creative differences" (which he seems to have with every movie he's done).

I think I know who they're going to get for the sequel... he's scrappy and scrawny and looks just like Ed does in a tank top: Kevin Federline. You heard it here first!

- e