In the aftermath of Joss Whedon’s Avengers, all signs pointed to Marvel acquiring the license for Mark Ruffalo’s Hulk character outright and placing Bruce Banner front and center for his own standalone movie. But wary of the rage monster’s previous solo movies, there’s been little development on that front over the past three years, despite numerous rumors seemingly teeing up a Planet Hulk movie or something of that calibre.
It was a question that returned to the fore not so long ago when Marvel slated a trio of yet-to-be-titled movies for a release in 2020, with many fans holding out hope that a solo Hulk film was finally brewing in development within the overarching Marvel Cinematic Universe. However, there’s still no tangible sign of that pipe dream becoming a reality, and Ruffalo himself even went so far as to say that a standalone feature for his towering green behemoth feels “even further away” than it ever has before.
That’s despite a confirmed appearance in 2017’s Thor: Ragnarok film, where the actor will join the galactic standalone feature as an ally to Chris Hemsworth’s God of Thunder. In an interview with USA Today, Ruffalo touched based on the question at hand, revealing that “…it feels even further away. It’s not Marvel’s property, it’s Universal’s property. I don’t know. It seems really problematic.”
Could this all be smoke and mirrors to draw attention away from those aforementioned three untitled films? It’s possible. For now, though, the focus is firmly on Ragnarok, considering that neither Hulk nor Thor will appear in next year’s Civil War – that we know of. Here’s what Ruffalo had to say about the space-faring threequel.
“I don’t know what the story is yet, but it’ll be (Loki) and Thor, and then I’ll be in there here and there. But I don’t know any of the particulars quite yet. I’ve talked to Taika a little bit and I like where it’s headed. … Chris (Hemsworth) and I have a really good time together, we goof off and play around when Tom Hiddleston is around. So it’ll be a lot of funny back-and-forth, especially with Taika, he does that really well. It’ll have that kind of antagonistic Odd Couple-thing going on.”
Mark Ruffalo will reprise his role as the towering green rage monster when Thor: Ragnarok touches down in theaters on June 28, 2017.
