Greg Pak's Hulk: The Incredible Hulk #100
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scans_dailyPreviously in Planet Hulk
The Incredible Hulk #100 is a massive issue that reprints many different Hulk issues, including one where the Hulk was on trial and Reed Richards wound up freeing him rather than letting Bruce Banner be sentenced for the crimes of the Hulk. Since I’m focusing on Greg Pak’s run on the Hulk, I’ll stick to just his stories.
(11 pages from two stories in The Incredible Hulk #100)
The first part of the issue kicks off Planet Hulk: Allegiance, where the Hulk moves from just trying to survive to actively seeking the death of the Red King. The Hulk has a big supporting cast by now, and they all get some page time. However, when it comes to escaping the Spikes, it is the Hulk who shatters the ground and creates a river of lava to defeat them.
Before we get into the serious stuff in the issue, we get to see the Hulk flirting with Caiera:
They’re so cute together.
Things go bad for Miek and the remainder of his hive when the last queen, who the Hulk and company saved last issue, becomes infected with Spikes. It turns out that the infection ran deeper than they thought, and she starts to transform, threatening everybody.
This action is one of the things that will eventually convince Miek’s hive that he, not the Hulk, is the Sakaarson. He does what must be done, even though it also means that his people are seemingly now incapable of procreating.
The Hulk and his allies travel into the desert to meet with the Shadow Elders, who have long held a pact of non-interference with the Red King. While hunkering down in a sandstorm, we get some background about Hiroim, who has been the quiet one of the group so far.
There’s a lot made throughout Planet Hulk of the Hulk possibly being the messianic Sakaarson, the apocalyptic Worldbreaker, or both. Hiroim takes the stance here that it is folly to believe the Hulk to be a messiah, even though he himself is hoping for that to be the case. The Shadow Elders plan to put the Hulk through some tests to find out the answer, which gets explored next issue.
Meanwhile, back on Earth, we get a short tale called “Planet Cho.” This deals with Amadeus Cho, who is a character of Greg Pak’s own invention and the supposed seventh smartest person in the world. I’m not a big fan of Cho’s early appearances, because he’s very obviously a massive nerd fantasy created by Pak. He does get a lot of character development, though, and eventually becomes interesting in his own right.
Part of Cho’s development is his belief that the Hulk is a hero rather than a monster. In this issue, he breaks into one of Bruce Banner’s old hideouts, hacks into Reed Richards’ files, finds out about the Illuminati’s decision to exile the Hulk, and learns that the Hulk’s shuttle (which the Illuminati never checked up on) went off course. He then gets into a debate with Richards which has gone on since the Hulk’s introduction as a character: is he a hero or a monster?
Richards opens up with a discussion about all the harm that has been done by the Hulk:
Cho counters with a listing of all the good the Hulk has done:
It’s an interesting little back and forth. Canonically, the Hulk has never been a killer. Even his biggest rampages caused a lot of property damage but no actual deaths. He has killed from time to time, but never an innocent. At the same time, he’s a creature made of rage who has often been manipulated into situations where he puts people in danger. The Illuminati’s problem is that they only see a monster, while Cho’s problem is that he only sees a hero. As we will see in World War Hulk, the answer is somewhere in between.
After the meeting, Richards meets with Iron Man:
This whole thing takes place during the Civil War event, so Reed and Tony aren’t exactly in the best place when it comes to judging others. In fact, when Cho first called in, Reed was performing an autopsy on Bill Foster, a hero who got killed when Richards’ own clone of Thor went berserk. Canonically, the final battle in Civil War causes more deaths than any rampage the Hulk has ever been on. All of this, naturally, builds up to many people being on the Hulk’s side when he returns to Earth – which also happens to be the wrong side in its own way.
The Incredible Hulk #100 is a massive issue that reprints many different Hulk issues, including one where the Hulk was on trial and Reed Richards wound up freeing him rather than letting Bruce Banner be sentenced for the crimes of the Hulk. Since I’m focusing on Greg Pak’s run on the Hulk, I’ll stick to just his stories.
(11 pages from two stories in The Incredible Hulk #100)
The first part of the issue kicks off Planet Hulk: Allegiance, where the Hulk moves from just trying to survive to actively seeking the death of the Red King. The Hulk has a big supporting cast by now, and they all get some page time. However, when it comes to escaping the Spikes, it is the Hulk who shatters the ground and creates a river of lava to defeat them.
Before we get into the serious stuff in the issue, we get to see the Hulk flirting with Caiera:
They’re so cute together.
Things go bad for Miek and the remainder of his hive when the last queen, who the Hulk and company saved last issue, becomes infected with Spikes. It turns out that the infection ran deeper than they thought, and she starts to transform, threatening everybody.
This action is one of the things that will eventually convince Miek’s hive that he, not the Hulk, is the Sakaarson. He does what must be done, even though it also means that his people are seemingly now incapable of procreating.
The Hulk and his allies travel into the desert to meet with the Shadow Elders, who have long held a pact of non-interference with the Red King. While hunkering down in a sandstorm, we get some background about Hiroim, who has been the quiet one of the group so far.
There’s a lot made throughout Planet Hulk of the Hulk possibly being the messianic Sakaarson, the apocalyptic Worldbreaker, or both. Hiroim takes the stance here that it is folly to believe the Hulk to be a messiah, even though he himself is hoping for that to be the case. The Shadow Elders plan to put the Hulk through some tests to find out the answer, which gets explored next issue.
Meanwhile, back on Earth, we get a short tale called “Planet Cho.” This deals with Amadeus Cho, who is a character of Greg Pak’s own invention and the supposed seventh smartest person in the world. I’m not a big fan of Cho’s early appearances, because he’s very obviously a massive nerd fantasy created by Pak. He does get a lot of character development, though, and eventually becomes interesting in his own right.
Part of Cho’s development is his belief that the Hulk is a hero rather than a monster. In this issue, he breaks into one of Bruce Banner’s old hideouts, hacks into Reed Richards’ files, finds out about the Illuminati’s decision to exile the Hulk, and learns that the Hulk’s shuttle (which the Illuminati never checked up on) went off course. He then gets into a debate with Richards which has gone on since the Hulk’s introduction as a character: is he a hero or a monster?
Richards opens up with a discussion about all the harm that has been done by the Hulk:
Cho counters with a listing of all the good the Hulk has done:
It’s an interesting little back and forth. Canonically, the Hulk has never been a killer. Even his biggest rampages caused a lot of property damage but no actual deaths. He has killed from time to time, but never an innocent. At the same time, he’s a creature made of rage who has often been manipulated into situations where he puts people in danger. The Illuminati’s problem is that they only see a monster, while Cho’s problem is that he only sees a hero. As we will see in World War Hulk, the answer is somewhere in between.
After the meeting, Richards meets with Iron Man:
This whole thing takes place during the Civil War event, so Reed and Tony aren’t exactly in the best place when it comes to judging others. In fact, when Cho first called in, Reed was performing an autopsy on Bill Foster, a hero who got killed when Richards’ own clone of Thor went berserk. Canonically, the final battle in Civil War causes more deaths than any rampage the Hulk has ever been on. All of this, naturally, builds up to many people being on the Hulk’s side when he returns to Earth – which also happens to be the wrong side in its own way.
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