She-Hulk vol. 1: Law & Disorder
The last “She-Hulk” series we got was over decade ago and is still fondly remembered. One of Dan Slott’s earliest gigs at Marvel, it showed him to be a writer who could channel the classic vibe of the company in a fun way that still felt modern. We also got some great stories about the intricacies of how the law works for superheroes in the Marvel Universe, gently poking but never puncturing the suspension of disbelief required to make such a fictional construct work. Now we’ve got another new writer to Marvel, Charles Soule, offering his take on the character and her extracurricular activities. He’s no Slott — Soule is an actual lawyer — and his storytelling may lack the unpredictable fun of the previous series, but the end result is that this first volume winds up being an enjoyably professional piece of work.
When she’s not fighting alongside her fellow superheroes for the fate of the world, Jennifer Walters practices law with the best of them. However, her latest employers are unhappy with the fact that having a superhero on the payroll has not gotten them any work from the likes of Tony Stark or Danny Rand. After being denied a bonus because of this, Jen quits the firm and goes into business for herself. First order of business: Finding out whether Stark stole the idea behind the tech of one of his enemies.
Because this is the Marvel Universe, Jen’s pursuit of this claim involves a soulless man on the eighteenth floor of Stark Towers who can sling legalese and paperwork as if it were a superpower and killer robots. It’s a fun outing that quickly establishes the quirky tone Soule is going for with this title while thoroughly grounding it in its settings. The writer clearly knows his way around the Marvel Universe — as seen in the verbose history of Stark Enterprises we get from legal — and he uses it to good comedic and dramatic effect here.
That continues through the subsequent stories as Jen sets up shop in a warehouse full of the kind of nutty inventors you’d expect to see in the Marvel Universe and goes out for a night on the town with Patsy Walker, Hellcat, that turns into a takedown of an A.I.M. cell. There’s also a two-part story involving Kristoff Vernard, heir to Victor Von Doom’s legacy, seeking asylum from his father. It’s an agreeably nutty escapade, filled with more Doombots than you can shake a stick at, and I’m willing to cut Soule some slack with his arrogant, eurotrashy take on Kristoff. I’m not aware of the character being written like this before, but what I’ve read from his appearances in “Fantastic Four” it seems pretty clear that he doesn’t have much of a personality beyond “Doom’s Heir.”
Last up is another two-parter that focuses on the book’s ongoing plot thread: the Blue File. As it turns out, Jen and a couple other superpowered individuals were part of a lawsuit a while back. The thing is that none of them can remember anything about it. Complicating matters even more is that bringing the matter up to one of the involved parties may bring on bouts of craziness and suicidality. It’s clear that this will be the crux of Soule’s run on the book and it’s somewhat distressing to see how things fall a bit flat when this thread is thrust into the spotlight. I’ll admit that it’s an interesting hook for a mystery, it’s just that things wrap up with a very rushed “We’re done here” mindset from Jen. Granted, this could be setup for a revelation of brainwashing on the part of the defendants, but it just reads really awkwardly here.
Shortcomings with the Blue File aside, Soule’s “She-Hulk” has the feeling of consummately polished product. While the execution is (mostly) top-notch, the stories feel just a little too calculated and familiar to be truly memorable. The characters also fall within familiar types as well. Jen’s independent streak nets her as many wins as it does losses (with a lot of collateral damage on both sides). Patsy’s got the “wacky best friend” role down pat, while new addition Angie Huang has the super-capable yet hiding a super-power act down pat. None of this makes the book bad, per se. It’s just that the end result leaves this feeling like a particularly clever take on a TV legal drama. The series would make for a great TV show, probably one more entertaining than “Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.”
Art duties are split between Javier Pulido, who I really like, and Ron Wimberly, who… leaves something to be desired. While I’ve associated Pulido most with his work on Vertigo titles like “Human Target,” the man knows how to turn in some stylish superhero work as well. Not only is his spare style instantly distinctive, he’s got a way with framing panels for maximum effect. The two-page spread of Jen’s arrival at the legal floor in Stark Towers is a perfect example in the way he makes the empty halls appropriately overbearing. There are some problems with following the progression of his other double-page spreads, but Pulido asserts himself as the defining artist of this title in the four issues he illustrates here.
Wimberly, on the other hand, illustrates the “Blue File” two-parter and his style is much more unrefined and chaotic. I can understand that a title like this requires an artist with a unique approach, and what we get here didn’t really work for me. Granted, Wimberly was tasked with illustrating the least successful part of this book, yet he doesn’t do anything to really elevate it.
If you’ve read Slott’s “She-Hulk,” then this series won’t make you forget it. Reading this has actually given me the urge to go back and take another look at that series to consider how it has held up after all these years. Soule and Pulido do offer their own distinct take on the character and her life that stands apart from that earlier version and they deserve some respect for that. Ultimately, they’ve created something that reads like a TV show, but a pretty decent one at the least.