From cinemablend, With Joss Whedon's The Avengers still two years away, we already know most of the prime-time players. There's Robert Downey Jr. as Tony Stark/Iron Man, Chris Hemsworth as Donald Blake/Thor, Chris Evans as Steve Rogers/Captain America, Samuel L. Jackson as Nick Fury and Scarlett Johansson as Natalia Romanova/The Black Widow. The one position that has never been secure, however, has been Bruce Banner/The Hulk. Played by Edward Norton in the 2008 film The Incredible Hulk, most have assumed that Marvel would pursue the actor to return for their massive superhero team-up film. Turns out that it isn't going to happen.
HitFlix is reporting that Marvel has officially stated that they will not be bringing back Norton for the role and instead will be casting an unknown. The article says that Norton recently met with Whedon to discuss The Avengers and while both left the meeting with enthusiasm about the project, Marvel has apparently decided to go in another direction. To put it succinctly, "it sounds like a deal could be made here, and simply wasn't."
This is, of course, a huge blow to both the film and Marvel fans in general. While it certainly wasn't the greatest superhero movie ever made, The Incredible Hulk was solid and Norton made for a great Banner. With Comic Con less than two weeks away and everyone involved with the film almost guaranteed to be present, the question will be asked and hopefully we'll be able to get some answers. Until then, all we can do is question aloud "why?"
5 comments:
After they went to all the trouble of putting Downey and Jackson into the Hulk movie....
Everything I've heard including stories, DVD commentaries etc.) reveal Norton to be an unnelievably pompous jerk.
"Everything I've heard including stories, DVD commentaries etc.) reveal Norton to be an unnelievably pompous jerk."
I've heard exactly the same thing. Narcissists are the worst people to work with.
Narcissistic, yes. No doubt. But, I, for one, thought Norton was really good in his role in the Hulk movie, and was really looking forward to him in the Avengers. sigh.
Call Eric Bana! Ha ha, no.
That is sort of too bad, but I'll admit I wasn't really thinking about it. Robert Downey Jr. dropping out would be far more detrimental.
"it sounds like a deal could be made here, and simply wasn't." There's clearly a piece missing, and it's probably about money, pomposity or both.
Octo, yeah, because the fucking superhero is somebody else, which has always made the whole Hulk concept very weird. When the big action sequences start, Norton/Bana are like, "See you later" and they just disappear for ten minutes.
Similar problems with Iron Man and Spider-Man (both of whom become CGI characters during the action sequences) (although Iron Man is a much more effective one, since it's ILM) are avoided by constantly cutting in facial closeups. You can't do that with the Hulk. It would be great if you suddenly saw Norton in the background eating a sandwich or something.
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