“I’ve Written a Series of Haikus.” “Oh Boy.”
I’ve been finding the Marvel TV shows to be a mixed bag. (And I really need to get back to the movies at some point.) But I keep watching them because when they are good, they are very good. Unfortunately, She-Hulk: Attorney at Law’s first season didn’t quite work for me.
When we meet Jennifer Walters (Tatiana Maslany), she is a successful attorney with the district attorney’s office in Los Angeles. But a trip with her cousin Bruce Banner (guest star Mark Ruffalo) changes all of that. The two get in a car accident, and Jennifer gets infected with a little of Bruce’s blood, making her into a She-Hulk.
This change impacts Jenn’s work life, where she finds herself out of the DA’s office and working for a private lawyer firm as the head of their meta human division. But as she struggles to be taken seriously as a lawyer and not just a spectacle because of her new powers, can she find a way to balance everything?
Unlike most of the Marvel shows, this one was intended as a comedy. Most of the episodes clocked in around the 30-minute mark, and you’ll want to pay attention to the credits since about half of them have a mid-credits scene. Most of the time, we had a cliffhanger at the end of the episode that propelled us into the next episode as well.
Being a comedy, they didn’t have the end of the world stakes that most Marvel shows have. However, we get quite a few cameos from other Marvel movies and shows, which was fun. Surprisingly for me, the one I enjoyed the most was Charlie Cox as Matt Murdock, aka Daredevil. Since I haven’t watched that show, I wasn’t expecting to connect with his character as much as I did.
Anyway, the show dealt with what life would be like for someone trying to live a normal life but everyone wanting your alternate personality instead. We got storylines about Jenn and her clients, her struggles to date, and what her transformations did for her wardrobe budget. As a comedy, the show usually gave me a couple of good laughs an episode, but other than that, it wasn’t that funny. Still, usually something happened as we neared the end of an episode that would make me want to keep going.
Then there’s the first episode. I get it, they needed to get Jenn back to LA, so they couldn’t spend a lot of time with her training with Bruce. But it was still rather unbelievable to watch her not only match but surpass Bruce after very little training when he’s been living with this for years. Sorry, not buying it. Fortunately, that was toned down once we got back to LA.
What else I didn’t buy was the CGI. When Jenn was in She-Hulk form, she was all CGI, and it looked rather fake. Her hair alone looked slicked into place in a plasticky fake way. I couldn’t take my eyes off her, and in a bad way.
And don’t even get me started on She-Hulk twerking in one episode. (Or the fact that I had to include twerking in a review.)
The humor I did enjoy was when Jenn broke the fourth wall. She only did it a couple of times an episode, but it was usually pretty funny. They really went overboard with that in the season finale, however. Part of me enjoyed it, but part of me was frustrated since it did away with so much of the ongoing threads they had actually had in the season.
I also completely enjoyed Tatiana Maslany as Jenn. She was warm and charming, and that did carry over to what they captured for She-Hulk. The rest of the cast was good, although they didn’t really get much of a chance to build characters.
The episodes were short, and there were moments that I enjoyed as I was watching. Overall, however, She-Hulk: Attorney at Law’s first season was a disappointment.
Nice honest review. So, why is she a "she-hulk" and Hulk, is just Hulk? LOL. I would not enjoy the twerking either.
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