Marvel’sWhat If…?has license to create chaos without having to answer to anyone in future, and while that has allowed them to do some outright bizarre things, it could have really gone weird if head writer A.C. Bradley had gone through with something that was joked about during the making of the latest episode: Bringing back Edward Norton asThe Incredible Hulk. The new episode asks the question “What If… The world Lost its Mightiest Heroes?” and contains the events of “Fury’s Big Week”,Iron Man 2,ThorandThe Incredible Hulk, meaning they got to go back to the movie that is very rarely referenced in the grand scheme of theMCU.
In the episode, Mark Ruffalo has the chance to play Bruce Banner in the scenario that he wasn’t around for in the live action movie, but theWhat If…?episode has its own what if question as there was a very short lived idea to haveEdward Nortoncome back to play the character again, but it seems that Ruffalo was already on board at that point so joke or not, the possibility never took flight.
“It wasn’t much of a difference for me, I love allMarvel movies,” head writer A.C. Bradley told Discussing Film in relation to the second movie of theMCU. “I’ve seenThe Incredible Hulkprobably three or four times. I love the bottle chase sequence in the beginning. We wanted to ensure that with all three movies we pulled iconic moments that people would recognize. So forThe Incredible Hulk, it was the Culver University fight scene. We wanted to use, if possible, the fight in Harlem. But the Culver one lends itself better to the story, so we went there. I did joke early on, ‘If we can’t get Ruffalo back are we going to ask Norton?’ And I was told that Mark Ruffalo already agreed to do the show. He’s a very lovely human being, and he was great. He came in, had fun, and you really can’t get a better Hulk than Mark Ruffalo.”
Something else that Bradley revealed was “Fury’s Big Week” was always something that was going to be part of the show, and the concept was one that everyone wanted to explore in the context of the series. However, it seems that while theMCUis noted for having its frequent moments of comical banter between characters and scenes that invoke audience laughter every time, the pitched episode was originally “almost a French farce”, which they decided was a bit too far out, even for aWhat If…?scenario.
While Mark Ruffalo may have now technically played Banner in all of theHulkappearances now, it is certainly not the last we have seen of him, as he will be reprising his role again in theShe-Hulkseries, which is set to arrive on Disney+ next year, and who knows where else he could show up in future.What If…?episodes arrive on Disney+ each Wednesday. This news originated atComicBook.com.
