You may think that Bruce Banner was the first Hulk, but now Marvel Comics has revealed there was another.
In May 19's Immortal Hulk: Time of Monsters, a flashback story to 8000 B.C. reveals a young boy who becomes the Hulk - a character Marvel is calling "The Original Hulk."
"10,000 years ago, something green and glowing comes to poison the ancient ground of the Fertile Crescent — and the hearts of its people," reads Marvel's description of this one-shot from its just-released May 2021 schedule. "One boy is left to bear the consequences — and, for the first time...to open THE GREEN DOOR."
The Green Door is a metaphysical gateway into a dimension called the Below-Place - introduced in the current Immortal Hulk run by writer Al Ewing. It is a version of Hell for those with gamma abilities, but with the ability to come and go from it - i.e. be resurrected - under certain circumstances. In Bruce Banner's origin story, it was retconned that he died during the Gamma Bomb test but was resurrected as the Hulk. All of Hulk's various personas - and any creature associated with gamma energy - is connected to the Green Door dimension.
This lead story in Immortal Hulk: Time of Monsters #1 is by writer Alex Paknadel (co-plotted with Ewing), with art by Juan Ferreyra.
This 40-page one-shot will come with a back-up story by new Marvel writer David Vaughan and an unannounced artist. "Bruce Banner faces a challenge unlike any he’s seen before" in their story, according to Marvel.
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