Smash Facts

How much of a Hulk fan are you!? Here are One Dozen Hulk Facts!

1. When first created in 1962 by Stan Lee and Jack Kirby, Bruce Banner would turn into The Hulk only during a full moon and The Hulk was colored gray. Due to inking issues the gray would always be a different shade. In one instance he was mistakenly colored green, however after seeing The Hulk green Stan decided to keep that shade of green instead. By that point his transformation was then tied to his anger and his Hulk form had become less smart and more savage to capitalize on the difference between Bruce Banner and The Hulk.

2. Banner has had several name changes over the years. Originally he was Bruce Banner as it followed Stan's alliteration strategy. By using alliterative names he could remember character's names better (Reed Richards, Peter Parker, Scott Summers). In one issue Stan mistakenly called him "Bob Banner" throughout the issue. Rather than ignoring the mistake, Stan-one issue later-established that Banner's full name was "Robert Bruce Banner". In the 1977 "The Incredible Hulk" TV show the character was renamed David Banner, apparently because "David" was a more masculine name. Commonly he is referred to as Bruce Banner.

3. One of The Hulk's more obscure abilities is being able to home in on the place of his birth. The location in New Mexico where the Gamma Bomb had turned Bruce into The Hulk. Wherever he is, The Hulk can detect where that location is.

4. Bruce's multiple identity disorder has ranged further than just The Hulk. The Gray Hulk isn't as strong as other Hulks, but is intelligent. Gray Hulk further developed into Joe Fixit, a mob enforcer in Las Vegas who ran with criminals. Doc Green is another intelligent Hulk who aimed to remove all other Hulks from the Earth by curing them. Doc Green is suspected to be the early version of The Maestro, an alternate future version of The Hulk who had become the power-hungry ruler of a post-apocalyptic city. Most recently there was Kluh, "The Hulk's Hulk". Kluh was a giant, black Hulk who was conceived from The Hulk being betrayed by his friends during the event "AXIS". Because The Hulk had developed an affection for fellow Avengers by then, the anger over their actions had caused a new threshold of rage to emerge.

5. Bruce's father Brian Banner had abused both Bruce and Bruce's mother Rebecca. It is this traumatic experience that led to Bruce's anger being the source of The Hulk's power. It was also implied in "Planet Hulk" that The Hulk had been within Banner since Banner was a child and that the abuse from Banner's father created the Hulk. The Gamme Bomb was simply The Hulk's chance to break free from Banner's mind.

6. The development of the Gamma Bomb that turned Bruce into The Hulk had actually been co-manufactured by Tony Stark.

7. Bruce's love interest Betty Ross is the daughter of The Hulk's reappearing foe General Thunderbolt Ross. Ross had been on the Gamma Bomb project as well and hated Bruce because the squeamish scientist had been dating Betty. When Bruce became The Hulk, Ross saw it as an opportunity to create super-soldiers and/or kill Bruce. Ironically, Ross would go on to become The Red Hulk to battle The Hulk. Double irony, Betty would become The Red She-Hulk as well.

8. Hawkeye is the only person who has legitimately killed The Hulk.

9. Bruce was once at risk of dying from Lou Gehrig's Disease. During his condition, a merging of three Hulks called "The Devil" had been trying to break through Bruce's mind and cause bloodshed. It was thanks to Hulk's villain The Leader and the use of Brian Banner's corpse that Banner survived his condition.

10. The Hulk had once married an alien gladiator during "Planet Hulk". Though she had died, she still gave birth to Skaar, The Son of Hulk. Skaar had taken the mantle of "The Hulk" on Norman Osborn's Dark Avengers.

11. While there is no limit The Hulk's strength-just as there is no limit to his anger-the strongest we have seen The Hulk was at the end of "World War Hulk". The Hulk discovers one of his trusted allies had killed his wife and tricked him into attacking superheroes and had become so full of rage that he entered a state referred to as "World Breaker Hulk". In this state, The Hulk's strength and rage were so powerful a mere step on concrete created earthquakes. Simply by existing The Hulk was destroying the Earth and-if he was not stopped-he very well could have.

12. In a tie-in to 2015's "Secret Wars" we are shown an alternate universe where everyone on Earth is a Hulk. On this Earth the one person in control of himself is a psychiatrist named Doc Sampson. Sampson has been a regular Hulk character since the 1970's. In this world, Doc Sampson provided therapy to many people to help them manage their Hulk forms. One case was when he treated this world's Peter Parker who was trapped in his Hulk form. It was only after Sampson convinced Peter that his Uncle Ben was at peace that Peter was able to stop being angry over his death and return to his human form.
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