World War Hulk

Remember when I said I might read this three years ago? Good times. Anyway, I'm of two minds when it comes to World War Hulk. On one hand, it's pretty darn entertaining to read for the most part, with some cool situations and good action carried by John Romita Jr.'s pencil work and some great coloring. The art is definitely the book's strongest asset. On the other hand, the story's a bit too intellectually vacant to recommend it wholeheartedly. I know it's sort of the Hulk's thing that he's completely blinded by rage, but it's hard to take him seriously when there's holes in his motivations this gaping.

Anyway, before this book, and before Civil War, some heroes tricked Hulk and sent him into space, because he was causing too much trouble on Earth. In Planet Hulk, he lands on an alien world, is forced to become a gladiator, does pretty well for himself, beats the bad guys, and basically becomes the new ruler. But remnants of the old regime blow up the ship he came on, killing tons of people including his pregnant wife. Reasonably peeved, he... decides to blame it on the heroes who sent him there in the first place, and returns to Earth to make war. Come on, Hulk. For one thing, if you ended up happy with your new life on this other planet, why are you still angry at the heroes for sending you away in the first place? And how can you seriously blame the explosion on them? Do you think they programmed the ship to fly you far away, and then blow up quite a length of time later? Does that sound like something they would do, even if they wanted you dead? Could you at least try thinking for a minute? The comic tries to be ambiguous about who should be rooted for, but I found it impossible to be on Hulk's side with the idiocy of his whole quest. Still a fun book, but not a very good one.