Planet Hulk

In a world that don’t understand and hates him, the Hulk has been exiled from Earth by some of the other superheroes in the belief that this the best for both the Hulk and Earth. While the ship the Hulk has been placed on travels to a new world the Hulk makes a few adjustments to the ship causing it to go off course and crash into the planet Sakaar. Shortly after this crash landing Hulk is taken and turned into a slave to fight as a gladiator for the Red King. While being a enslaved gladiator Hulk finds unlikely friends that become a war bound group in a fight for survival in the gladiator arena of the Red King.

Ok, being a comic book fan and a fan of the Hulk, I was excited about this movie. Here’s the main reason I was excited is that Planet Hulk is based of the story line Planet Hulk that ran in the Hulk comic titles and is one of the best story lines that I’ve read for the character Hulk. Because I have read the comic version of this I couldn’t wait to see the motion picture version of it. Now that I have I’m both happy and a little let down with the movie.

Here’s the reasons why I’m both happy and let down, I’ll start with happy. The action. Because this is a cartoon anything can be done with it with no bars to hold back anything. So, in Planet Hulk there are fight scenes that had me actually yelling at the tv and nearly jumping out of my seat to be there in that arena with the Hulk to help out. The story is another reason why I liked Planet Hulk. If follows the story that was in the comics and it has the characters that were in the comics, and it has voices for the characters that make them seem alive. The artwork is amazing and even the opening and closing sequences of Planet Hulk impressed me.

Now, the disappointment that I got from Planet Hulk, yep, I said there was a down side. What I didn’t like is that it had to end at a point that was basically the middle of the story that happened in the comics. Now typically I’m complaining that with these cartoon movies based off a comic story is too short and they try to pack the whole story line in a hour and half so it begins and ends way too fast. This time however it’s not that way. Planet Hulk flows nearly like the comic story did and by the time it’s over the whole story is not told. Now being that I read the comics of Planet Hulk I know there is a lot more to tell of this story but if you haven’t read them then the ending will be just fine. Though the story did a little sooner than I wanted it to, I have hopes that because of this being the best Hulk story I’ve read and now seen, that Animated Marvel Features will produce the rest of the story of Planet Hulk.

There are a lot of little things in Planet Hulk that will make the comic book fanboy happy as well as keeping the non-fanboy enjoying the movie. I would have liked to have seen the Silver Surfer appear in the movie like he did in the comic story but having the one that did appear was really good. Though during the movie there is a scene when the other enslaved gladiators are talking about their past and how they became enslaved. During this talk though it reached the character of Elloe Kaifi (voiced by Advah Soudack) where her story is not told and the movie cuts to a new scene that takes place later on. What happened here I don’t know, it’s as if I had hit fast forward by accident and for a second I thought I did and even went so far as to rewind the movie to see. However I didn’t, and the scene does just that leaving me wanting to know how she got there and why it was just cut off like that. This though, is my main down side to the movie Planet Hulk, for the rest of the movie, it’s great, it’s fun to watch, and it’s violent enough to be a good Hulk story.