Hulk Vs. (2009)

Original Theatrical Release: January 27, 2009
Director: Sam Liu, Frank Paur

The Incredible Hulk (Fred Tatasciore) is one of Marvel Comics’ most powerful and dangerous characters. In this animated double feature, the Hulk goes up against The Mighty Thor (Matt Wolf) and Wolverine (Steve Blum) in two separate vignettes.

In the first, Hulk is transported to Asgard by the mischievous Loki (Graham McTavish), Thor’s jealous brother, and placed under a spell with the help of Enchantress/Amora (Kari Wahlgren). With Bruce Banner (Bryce Johnson) separated from his monstrous other half, the Hulk, he can only watch as Loki uses Hulk to smash his way through Asgard with only Thor and his Asgardian friends to stand in the way.

In the second, the Canadian military is after the Hulk when he is suspected of making attacks on defenseless wilderness homesteads. They call in Wolverine, who uses his superior senses to track Hulk down. However, as the two rage away at each other in the forest they are both attacked by members of the Weapon X program which created Wolverine’s adamantium-laced bones and claws and Wolverine is left to fight Sabretooth (Mark Acheson), Lady Deathstrike (Janyse Jaud), Omega Red (Colin Murdock) and Deadpool (Nolan North) all at the same time, with Hulk as the wild card.

It was an interesting choice to package this as a double feature. The whole thing, with both movies, runs to about an hour and a half.

I found the first story with Thor to be a little underwhelming. It’s always cool to see Thor go up against Hulk, but this one wasn’t as exciting as I thought it was going to be. There were a few instances in which Thor really went to town on Hulk, but overall, to create more drama, the writers sort of overpowered Hulk a little bit. I felt like with these two titans beating on each other, there should’ve been more destruction, more action.

Luckily, the second story redeemed the entire movie.

Wolverine versus Hulk, to me, is always really great…and this one tried to re-create, at least a little bit, the fight they had in Incredible Hulk #180, which was Wolverine’s first appearance in 1974. Notable differences being the involvement of Omega Red, Lady Deathstrike, Sabretooth and Deadpool. For the movie version, it worked however because a fight between Hulk and Wolverine would be pretty brutal but also pretty short, so having the villains show up enabled the pacing to be the way it was.

Overall, it was a fun watch. I just wish they had tweaked the Thor section a little bit more.

JOE Rating: ★★★★

Also, just a side note: If you’re interested in all-things-Hulk….check out The Collectionary, which features tons of Hulk-related merchandise to peruse and consider purchasing for gifts or for yourself.

Trailer For Hulk Vs.

Tatsunoko vs Capcom: Ultimate All-Stars (2010 – Wii)

Release Date: December 11, 2008
Developer: Eighting
Publisher: Capcom

I finally got my hands on my cousin’s Wii (insert joke here) and was the most excited about this game.

Fighting games are one of my favorite things to play, even though I’m not the best at them (except for Killer Instinct (SNES). I was pretty darn good at that one). Marvel vs Capcom is one of my favorite series and I do love me some Gatchaman (an anime superhero team from Tatsunoku) so I really had some high hopes for it.

My hopes didn’t die, at least not completely.

Originally only released in Japan due to a fall in popularity of fighting games a few years back, there was finally enough interest garnered by the community that they decided to give it a shot over here and it was a Wii exclusive and ended up being commercially successful.

The fighting system is simplistic (three buttons) and easily-accessible to noobs like myself. The graphics were decent, even though this was their first shot at rendering fully in 3D. The characters and their animations were really neat, as can be expected from these newer incarnations of the Capcom vs series.

The one thing that prevented this game from being really great was that there is no real storyline or story mode. There is an arcade mode, but there’s not a ton of replayability in that.

It’s a really fun game to play with your friends, locally, or the online variety (it has a decent online mode) but for Forever-Alone gamers like myself, the fun doesn’t last forever.

It’s definitely worth playing if you’re a fan of Tatsunoko, though, because there aren’t that many games featuring their characters. (And who doesn’t want to play as Jun, The Swan at least once? She’s hawt!)

JOE Rating: ★★★★

Game Trailer for Tatsunoko VS Capcom: Ultimate All Stars