The Incredible Hulk assumes that audiences already know the character and his back-story: following an accident involving gamma rays, scientist Bruce Banner becomes the raging super-powered, green-skinned monster The Hulk whenever he gets angry. Of course the U.S. military in the guise of the corrupt General Ross (William Hurt) - who also happens to be the father of Banner’s girlfriend, Betty - is interested in getting their hands on the Hulk and using his blood to manufacture a new breed of super-powered soldiers. Banner becomes a fugitive, hoping to find a cure for his condition before Ross and the U.S. military industrial complex can get their hands on him. In that sense it is more of a sequel than a remake than some of the “let’s give it another shot” talk may have let on.
The story kicks off in Brazil where Banner works as a manual laborer at a bottling plant, trying to find a cure and learn Portuguese in his spare time. Soon however crack U.S. commandos led by Tim Roth with a permanent five o’clock shadow are on Banner’s case. He escapes – narrowly – in an exciting foot chase on top of rooftops in a densely populated Brazilian slum, an interesting and exotic choice that makes a change from your standard Hollywood action movie locales.
Things must come to a head however. Banner must find a cure and he soon finds himself back in the States where the Hulk faces off against the U.S. military in a thrilling show-off on a university campus that may lack the scope of a similar fight in the first movie, but which is emotionally more involving.
This time Roth’s character has however been injected by super-soldier juice and is well on his way to becoming The Abomination, an over-sized monster against which the Hulk faces off in a no-holds barred epic battle at the movie’s climax.
