Synopsis / Summary / Plot
Meet Colonel Bruce Banner, creator of the gamma bomb. On the day of the first test of his new creation, a young man is spotted on the test site just minutes before the bomb is to hit. Col. Banner races out to save the boy, and hopefully still save his reputation in the process (if the young man is on the device when it goes off, all of Banner's readings will be in error). He reaches the boy, but unfortunately is too late. The young man (we're to assume it's Rick Jones) is incinerated instantly, and Col. Banner is changed forever. In this version of the origin of the Hulk, the story is more about domestic violence and how power corrupts Banner. His alter ego is more of a scared child trapped in a powerful creature's body. His cover-ups of his experiment gone wrong are truly evil, even going as far as to cause a war with the Middle East by blowing up a US submarine and blaming it on the creature (who is really Banner himself). Banner's treatment of his wife, Betty, is even more sadistic (after one of their fights, she awakens in a hospital to find that her jaw has been wired shut). In the end, Betty is placed into a mental institution by Doc Samson, because of a threat from Banner of being placed on the front lines of the war he created.