The Incredible Hulk TV show

[Guest AG/DC]

Judge this thing, if you will, on a continuum of other drama/action shows.

[Benjamin Grimm]

I gave it 2 stars.

I watched it for a while, out of loyalty and affection for the character, but it didn't hold my interest and I bailed on it long before it went off the air.

The Hulk looked silly. He didn't talk. He just stood there and growled and threw things. (At least, that's how I remember it.)

I know that there are a bunch of people who love the Hulk because of this series, but I already had my own notions about the character and this series didn't live up to them.

I was asked to rate it in relation to other action shows, which is why I gave it the two stars. Had I been asked to rate it compared to the comic books, I would have given it one star.

[Guest John Cougar Lunchbucket]

I used to watch it.

It was way too formulaic, but I kinda liked the overarching theme of lonely-antihero-on-the-run. He shows up in a new town at the begiining of the ep and hoofs it out of there at the end. In between I don't remember any "plot" expept him turning into the hulk usually 2X a show, and then stealing clothes from a clothesline.

I also liked the beginning. "Don't make me angry. You wouldn't like me when I'm angry..."

[TransMonk]

I miss the formula of late 70s early 80s hour long adventure shows. Every week would be a new story that was usually unrelated to last week or next week.

These days, if you miss an episode of an hour long TV series, you might as well stop watching for the season and rent the DVD for a weekend 6 months later.

Way too much of a commitment for me. Give me The Hulk, Dukes of Hazard, The A Team and The Fall Guy.

[Guest AG/DC]

The overarching plot was him staying one step ahead of an investigative reporter ("Mr. McGee," who was the one that shouldn't make David angry), working for a National Enquirer-type paper, because no other paper would indulge his pursuit of a fantastical story that's widely considered urban myth. Banner tried to find jobs that would get him access to bio labs so he could sneak in at night and do research to cure him of Type A Hulkism. One week he would be an NFL assistant trainer. Another he would be a zoo mainenance officer.

The plot that defined each episode is what made it good. It had all the elements of The Fugiitve before it: handsome troubled hero, pursued by a booze-faced antagonist with bad hair who isn't evil but just trying to do his job, wandering from town to town across the American landscape as a doctor in vagobond clothes, fixing the ruptures in the Amerian fabric one troubled family at a time.

Like the fugitive (Dr. Richard Kimball), Bruce was the ideal man to the cast of sad women on the show --- troubled but unattainable, handsome but dangerous, his lostness and squareness triggering maternal instincts, but his doctorness showing he could be the ideal protector and provider in a world of brute cruelty and hard realities. And he was the real brute!

When he stuck a thumb out to go on to the next town and breathed in a heavy desperate breath (as a sad poigniant theme played), he often left behind a young woman with a broken heart, but a family ready to go on, thanks to the intervention of that brown-haired wanderer they leased their extra room to for a few weeks.

Edited June 16, 2008 by Guest

[metirish]

I remember loving it and I think I was pretty sure that there were people like him in America.

[Guest AG/DC]

Dr. David Banner, Physician/Scientist, searching for a way to tap into the hidden strengths that all humans have. Then an accidental overdose of gamma radiation interacts with his unique body chemistry. And now, when David Banner grows angry or outraged, a startling metamorphasis occurs.

The creature is driven by rage and pursued by an investigative reporter.

"Mr. McGee, don't make me angry. You wouldn't like me when I'm angry."

An accidental explosion took the life of a fellow scientist and supposedly David Banner as well. The reporter thinks the creature was responsible.

"I gave a description to all the law enforcement agencies. They got a warrant for murder out of it."

A murder which David Banner can never prove he or the creature didn't commit. So he must let the world go on thinking that he too is dead, until he can find a way to control the raging spirit that dwells within him.

http://www.comicbookmovie.com/images/news/hulk-2/Lou%20Ferrigno%20as%20Incredible%20Hulk.jpg

[Benjamin Grimm]

See what I mean about how silly he looks?

[Guest AG/DC]

I like that he didn't talk. His level of mental ability was an ongoing theme. Could Banner control the beast? Was that his mind in there at all?

Of course he looked ridiculous.

[RealityChuck]

It was par for the course for TV superhero shows at the time, all of which had a long way to go to be mediocre. There really wasn't a particularly good TV superhero until Lois and Clark.

[Vic Sage]

A brief history of live superhero (ie, non-animated) TV series:

Adventures of Superman (1952-1958 / 104 episodes) - George Reeves survived the awful scripts, terrible ensemble acting and low budget production values to singlehandedly kept the superhero genre alive through the 1950s.

Batman (1966-1968 / 120 episodes) - the unfairly maligned tv series was over-the-top camp, but was a cultural touchstone in its day. The spinoff of The Green Hornet as a secondary series only lasted 1 season, but debuted Bruce Lee to American audiences.

Wonder Woman (1976-1979 / 60 episodes [60m]) - Lynda Carter defied gravity in more ways than one in this cherished series that delivered many young boys to manhood.

Incredible Hulk (1978-1982 / 87 episodes [60m]) - Bill Bixby gave a superhero protagonist significant gravitas, somewhat emeliorating the silliness of the rest of the proceedings.

Amazing Spider-man (1978-79 / 15 episodes [60m]) - short-lived and unmemorable

Superboy (1988-92 / 100 episodes) - mediocre

Flash (1990-91 / 21 episodes [60m]) - underrated tv series, with good effects.

Lois & Clark (1993-97 / 88 episodes [60m]) - this hour long romantic comedy/drama was more "moonlighting" than "superman", but was surprisingly successful thanks to the chemistry of the leads, until it jumped the shark with a wedding.

Smallville (2001-present / 152 episodes [60m]) - the most successful tv adaptation of a superhero ever, its basically "Smallville 90210".

Witchblade (2001-02 / 23 episodes [60m]) - Didn't make it

The Tick (2001-02 / 9 episodes) - one of my favorites, i must've been the only one watching.

Birds of Prey (2002-03 / 13 episodes [60m]) - Bad adaptation; just an excuse to get some hot women into latex.... not that there's anything wrong with that...

Blade (2006 / 12 episodes [60m]) - Really bad adaptation of good movie adaptation of minor comicbook character.

[Guest AG/DC]

Try and rank those in any way that doesn't include Hulkster in the top three or four. It can't be done!

[Guest AG/DC]

Wow, Vic forgot his new favoritest show ever, Heroes.

Others that come to mind: Dataman and Holmes and Yo-Yo.

Max Headroom was a quasi-superhero show also.

[stevejrogers]

Wow, Vic forgot his new favoritest show ever, Heroes. Others that come to mind: Dataman and Holmes and Yo-Yo. Max Headroom was a quasi-superhero show also.

I think Vic was going for adaptations of comic book characters, rather than newly constructed characters for a TV program.

Otherwise Buffy The Vampire Slayer and Angel should be on the top of the list as well.

[Guest AG/DC]

You're right.

[nymr83]

Gave it a 2. its higher if you're only comparing it to other comic book based shows. it gets scored with a negative number when compared to something like the A-team.

[Guest AG/DC]

The A-Team didn't have a protagonist with significant gravitas.

[Guest cooby]

I liked the show a lot; my husband and I watched it together when we were young...

How funny was it that a guy that hitchhikes from town to town with one shirt and pants (obviously mended over and over and over) can just walk into a medical position without any references?

[RealityChuck]

I actually was going to mention The Flash, which was pretty good.

The George Reeves Superman was good, if somewhat one-dimensional. Batman was a comedy about a superhero show, not really a superhero show.

You also forgot The Green Hornet.

The Tick (2001-02 / 9 episodes) - one of my favorites, i must've been the only one watching.

You can still watch: http://www.hulu.com/the-tick (Yes, it's legal). I've been catching up, but it's funnier in concept than when it's played out on screen.

And you've forgotten the best superhero show of them all: Buffy the Vampire Slayer

[Guest AG/DC]

He didn't forget Green Hornet. It's in his Batman synopsis. Rogers covers Buffy.

You spend a week watching Superman, and I'll spend one watching The Incredible, and we'll see who goes nuts first.

[Benjamin Grimm]

I'll spend my week watching Flash. That, for me, was the most enjoyable show on the list.

[batmagadanleadoff]

I never watched Shazam! or the Shazam!/Isis Hour, but I remember them.

[Benjamin Grimm]

I remember them too.

That show may belong in a different category, since it was a Saturday morning kids show, and wasn't made for prime time.

[Guest AG/DC]

Shazam! also had themes, like The Fugitive and The Incredible Hulk, of traveling across the American landscape, repairing the social fabric.

Two odd things about Shazam!

1) Billy Batson bounced across the southwest in an RV with Captain Marvel's lightning bolt painted on the front. How did people not figure out his was the Cap?

2) His lone companion was a white-haired guy wearing neck scarves. Even in my innocent childhood, I sensed something odd about their arrangement. A Marlon Perkins-looking pensioner and a Native American-looking skinny teenage longhair, bouncing across the countryside in an RV with no explanation of their relationship? bound to raise some eyebrows.

Edited June 18, 2008 by Guest

[Guest John Cougar Lunchbucket]

It was a joke that Shazam wasn't actually the name of the superhero, but Captain Marvel. And it was very dumb that they had different actors playing Shazam and his alter-ego.

[Guest AG/DC]

I think that was the concept of the comics, that Billy and the Captain weren't actually the same guy, but two guys who swapped places or something.

They did switch the actors who played Captain Marvel part-way through the series. As typical, I would accept no substitutes.

That narrator voice is familiar. Is that the Batman narrator, or maybe Adam West himsself?

[Benjamin Grimm]

John Cougar Lunchbucket wrote: It was a joke that Shazam wasn't actually the name of the superhero, but Captain Marvel. And it was very dumb that they had different actors playing Shazam and his alter-ego.

In the comics, Billy Batson is a kid, a paperboy, whose alter-ego is the big grown-up superhero Captain Marvel.

If they stayed true to that, then they'd pretty much have to have two actors.

I don't remember, though, was Billy Batson a kid in that series?

[Guest AG/DC]

Look at the (great) clip of the opening. He's teenager who appears to be Native American.

[Vic Sage]

i didn't include "fictional" superhero shows, only adaptations of pre-existing comic book characters.

Once you go down the road of defining the superhero genre more broadly, things get very subjective. But of course HEROES and BUFFY would be on the list, as well as 60s relics like CAPTAIN NICE and MR. TERRIFIC; 70s shows like ELCTRA WOMAN & DYNA GIRL, MAN FROM ATLANTIS, the BIONIC WOMAN, and SIX MILLION DOLLAR MAN; 80s shows like GREATEST AMERICAN HERO, MISFITS OF SCIENCE, MY SECRET IDENTITY and KNIGHT RIDER; 90s shows like SUPERFORCE, ADVENTURES OF PETE & PETE and MUTANT X.

I did miss SHAZAM (1974-76 / 28 episodes), as well as:
*NIGHTMAN (97-98 / 44 episodes)
*SABLE (1987 / 7 episdodes)
*SWAMPTHING (1990-93/ 72 episodes)

Shazam was pretty awful, even for a saturday morning kids show.

[nymr83]

of course once you are including those shows i think "Hercules: The Legendary Journeys ('95-99)" is included as well and is in my mind at the front of the pack.