The Mid-1970s Hulk, Redux

 

Nestled in between the second volume of Incredible Hulk and its 1999 successor, Hulk (renamed in 2000 after eleven issues to Incredible Hulk), was the six-issue series Rampaging Hulk published during 1998-99, recycling the title of the late '70s magazine and promising a depiction of the Hulk "as you've never seen him before!"

Yet, as this first issue's introductory info has alluded to, this Hulk in fact will ring very familiar to those readers of his prior series who well remember the "Hulk smash!" behemoth who leaped around the New Mexico desert and clashed with the military forces stationed at Gamma Base. Nor does that base's C.O., Gen. Thaddeus "Thunderbolt" Ross, seem all that different to us as he and his second-in-command, Maj. Glenn Talbot, prep what we presume to be a number of new base recruits on their installation's mission, so like that of the original Project Greenskin.

Though with his antipathy toward Bruce Banner, Talbot clearly isn't interested in following the General's lead and highlighting the Hulk as an opportunity for scientific advancement but, rather, a dangerous creature and threat to the human race that must be dealt with.

We learn on the splash page(s) that what we're seeing occurred almost six years prior, which would have been in the early '90s (our time) when Peter David was writing the book. But given that the issue establishes a marker of sorts that indicates the recent marriage of Talbot and the General's daughter, Betty, that would normally put us circa 1973--except for the fact that the General is referring to his military installation as Gamma Base, which wasn't officially commissioned as such until 1976.

And since the General's mission statement at that time about the base's purpose mirrors his words from his briefing, we're left to assume that this series takes place sometime after Talbot's comatose mind (courtesy of the Gremlin) was returned to consciousness in issue #200 in mid-'76--a prelude, unfortunately, to sadder days, since Talbot and Betty were headed for divorce three years later.

As for Betty, it's difficult to say here whether Talbot's fears about his wife's true feelings are justified. Regardless, we're perhaps seeing signs of the man that Colonel Talbot will eventually become when he would later take control of Gamma Base and go after the Hulk in earnest, in part due to regarding his past with Betty as "a life of loneliness and wasted memories" thanks to Bruce Banner.

And what of Banner? Taking a janitorial position at the Brand Corporation (you sure can pick 'em, Doc), he once again works toward a possible cure for himself, even as it's clear he fumes at Talbot in much the same way as the Major does toward himself, though with the difference that Betty is now Talbot's wife. But all of that takes a back seat when the procedure he conducts on himself takes a turn for the worse. (And boy, we can say that about Bruce Banner a lot. There's a post in there somewhere.)

The scene carries disturbing undertones of a 1985 story by Bill Mantlo and Mike Mignola which detailed Banner's pent-up anger as a child due to his treatment by his father--here, seeming to make clear that their relationship, and Banner's helplessness throughout, remains the reason that the Hulk "hates Banner."

Here and now, though, Banner realizes that he has the chance to make a stand of a different sort--a chance to finally seize control, assuming his physical body can stand the strain of such an inner battle. To those on the outside, such a struggle is touch and go, by all appearances--while for Banner, who seemed so optimistic, it becomes clear that the rage of the Hulk, as in the waking world, cannot be denied, or contained.

With the Hulk's ascendance, Ross remains defiant in the face of his captive's rage, telling the monster in no uncertain terms that this time there will be no escape for him from the state-of-the-art containment cell he's imprisoned in--another example of Ross's steadfast belief in the military's superior might over that of the Hulk, an obsessive state of mind which is part of what makes Ross such a flawed yet compelling character, even though in hindsight we know it will lead to him committing treason down the road.

Once again, however, the Hulk's jailers reckon without his prodigious strength in relation to his growing anger. In response, Ross's reaction is sadly predictable--but for the Hulk, and especially for the trapped Bruce Banner, writer Glenn Greenberg ends the issue more poignantly.

With this being before the time when Marvel would think nothing of limiting a new series to a set number of issues before pulling the plug and beginning another such run with only a tweak to the masthead, it was reasonable to believe that Rampaging Hulk would have some measure of success on the comics stands, even constricted to being "stuck in the past" as the saying goes--yet in its sixth issue, only a cover caption and an unceremonious blurb in the issue's letters page marked the fact that the series had ended. The release of the new Hulk series three months after Rampaging's cancellation, however, made it clear that this man-monster, even in print, was indeed unstoppable.