Avengers: Endgame directors Anthony and Joe Russo continue the running joke that Mark Ruffalo has been fired with a new message warning the star not to get too comfortable.
The incident comes as the latest development in a saga that started last year when Ruffalo seemingly dropped the official title for the Avengers: Infinity War sequel while appearing on The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon. Though it soon became clear that the name Ruffalo blurted out wasn’t the real thing, the actor’s slip up still prompted the Russo Brothers to take to Twitter with the message, “Mark, you’re fired.”
With the release of the latest Endgame trailer and poster, however, Ruffalo saw that he was still part of the movie. Thinking he may finally be in clear, the Hulk actor shared a message of cautious optimism via Instagram:
“So I wasn’t fired???”
Nonetheless, in the comments to the post, you’ll find that Anthony and Joe Russo have offered one more ominous reminder for the star to watch what he says:
“Don’t push your luck…”
It looks like Ruffalo has kept his job for at least one more MCU movie, though the fans are beginning to suspect that he may not come back after the Phase 3 finale. It’s even become a popular theory that Bruce Banner will resolve his arc by blending his two conflicting sides into the Professor Hulk persona.
The idea sounds plausible enough, though the movie’s promotional footage isn’t offering a lot of evidence to support or refute the theory. In the two Avengers: Endgame trailers, Bruce gets the shortest amount of screen time out of the six Phase 1 Avengers, and Hulk has been absent entirely. Clearly Marvel Studios is trying to hide something, and we’ll find out just what once the film hits theaters on April 26th.
