Mark Ruffalo has now played Bruce Banner in four movies (counting his cameo in Iron Man 3), yet none have been a full-on Hulk standalone – and that doesn’t look like it’ll change in future. The problem isn’t really story, but practical: Marvel can’t make a Hulk solo film.

It’s been a staggering nine years since The Incredible Hulk and despite talk of a direct follow-up or tangential solo outing for Bruce Banner and his enraged alter ego, none have come to pass; it’s been proven that supposed leaks suggesting development were false and Marvel Studios has repeatedly said it’s off the cards, with Thor: Ragnarok even delivering on long-desired standalone outing Planet Hulk. But why? It really all comes down to contracts.

It’s well known that characters’ movie rights have a big influence on the Marvel films made. Daredevil (and by extension the entire Netflix Defenders franchise) exists only because Marvel wasn’t able to wrangle Galactus and the Silver Surfer back from Fox, and just this summer we got Sony/Marvel co-production Spider-Man: Homecoming where the web-slinger joined the franchise while being made by a different company. But Hulk is, shockingly, even more complex than that.

WHY THERE AREN’T ANY MORE HULK STANDALONE MOVIES

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Although his comics have never really sold well – the original run was canceled after only six issues, with the character only surviving thanks to his Avengers association – Hulk is one Marvel’s biggest icons, thanks in no small part to the Bill Bixby/Lou Ferrigno The Incredible Hulk TV series. Running from 1977 to 1982 (with three TV movies that joined David Banner with Thor and Daredevil), it reshaped how wider culture viewed the Green Goliath, popularising many essential elements (not least “don’t make me angry, you won’t like me when I’m angry“). This is important because it made Hulk a multimedia star at a time when Marvel was cautious of the big screen.

A film starring Hulk was first floated in 1990, with Universal having bought the movie rights. This took a very meandering route to Ang Lee’s Hulk in 2003, a film whose mixed reaction led to a muted sequel development period that ultimately saw the rights revert to Marvel in 2006, just as the studio was setting up the MCU. However, unlike most other reacquisitions where the creator gets the character back outright, with Hulk Universal still has a clause – seemingly in perpetuity – of first refusal on distributing any Hulk films.

This is why The Incredible Hulk, the character’s only solo outing in the MCU, was distributed by Universal. Back then, Marvel Entertainment were an independent company and so the Studios operated as just production, working with outside distributors. This was typically Paramount, who released every film except Hulk up until The Avengers, by which point Disney had bought Marvel and set about distributing themselves.

However, even under the Mouse House, Universal still has that “first refusal” clause. So, while they can’t do anything active with the rights, should Marvel decide to make a Hulk movie Universal must be approached first. This was fine in the freewheeling 2000s when Marvel stood as its own thing, but now under Disney creates a conflict – they would be loaning out an IP so another company can make money off it. While something vaguely similar happened with Spider-Man, there was a much clearer balance of rewards to either side. Here Universal’s the only ones who win.

There may be a more antagonistic side to this as well. The last we heard on the matter came from Mark Ruffalo, who pointed the finger squarely at Universal not playing nice with Marvel. Now, it could be simply the company wasn’t going to give up their ability to call on the powerful clause rather than actual disagreement, but it’s clear the whole situation comes down to that.



However, it’s not like there’s no Hulk in the MCU. After being recast as Mark Ruffalo (a choice unrelated to rights issues – it was the result of Norton not wanting to return), Hulk’s appeared in The Avengers, Iron Man 3‘s post-credits scene, Avengers: Age of Ultron, Thor: Ragnarok and will return in Avengers: Infinity War and Avengers 4. This is because Universal’s option only relates to explicit Hulk films and, as Bruce Banner is clearly part of an ensemble in these cases, they have no say in them.

Just because he’s a supporting character, though, doesn’t mean Hulk is being underserved. Per Ruffalo and Kevin Feige, Ragnarok is the start of a three-movie arc that will act as some approximation of a standalone story, delving into what makes Hulk, Hulk. It’s Marvel working around the restriction and. based on the reaction to the character since The Avengers, it’s working.

So from all this, there’s no official barrier to another MCU Hulk movie. The situation is more of a standoff between Disney and Universal where neither wants to give, and so Marvel are just dealing with it. Like with Spider-Man, there is scope for some agreement, although the current terms don’t leave much room for negotiation.

Could this change? Post-Homecoming, anything’s possible. After all, Ruffalo’s contract originally ran for six movies, so assuming that hasn’t changed he still has one more to go (Iron Man 3 is unlikely to have counted); rounding things off with a Hulk movie would a fitting finale to the character’s time in the MCU. However, also working against that are creative reasons as well as contractual.

THE CREATIVE REASON – HULK MOVIES ARE HARD

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As we said at the start, Hulk isn’t the most popular of the main Avengers. And this is true of both in the 1960s and the 2000s. Ang Lee’s Hulk made $245M at the worldwide box office, a fair enough sum for the time that saw it pretty much break even, but considerably lower than X-Men 2‘s $407M that same summer and well below Spider-Man‘s $821M a year earlier. The Incredible Hulk barely improved on that half a decade later, making $263M in a year when Iron Man brought in $585M and The Dark Knight topped $1B (this was when hitting that mark was a major achievement). Neither of the films got great attention either; The Incredible Hulk is one of the worst reviewed of the entire MCU and is often forgotten when it comes to full-franchise assessment.

Hulk movies are not proven at best, unpopular at worst. Part of this comes from a tricky balance within the character’s concept; while you have a big green monster for thrills, he only exists in a gulf of our actual protagonist. This is why the one truly successful outing for Hulk is the TV series, which by its nature focused on Banner’s conflict and internal drama – things that are great for episodic TV but not really a big blockbuster movie. Hulk is Jekyll and Hyde where Hyde is typically mindless. Of course, the comics moved beyond this in the 1960s, but culturally that is where Hulk’s been, and it’s only really in Ragnarok where his autonomy is presented.

All of that makes a Hulk movie a tricky prospect. It requires going against an ingrained idea and barreling into something more psychological than the MCU structure allows. Marvel can’t make a Hulk standalone, but they probably wouldn’t want to even if they could.