The Hulk is not a superhero

These days many believe the Hulk is a superhero.

It is obvious that his first series had no clear direction. But the Hulk was never supposed to be a superhero. The unexpected success of Fantastic Four, which mashed up super-powers, adventure stories and monsters, must have led Marvel executives to wonder what element was responsible.
Marvel was having success with monsters and that's what they went for. The series starts as a horror story where the character is a mix of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde, the Frankenstein Monster from the movies, a werewolf (changing at night), Godzilla (born of an atomic explosion) and the Heap (having a young sidekick called Rick). Absolutely none of that denotes a superhero influence.

In those days when the Comics Code Authority forbid the use of the word "horror" on covers, publishers used "fantasy" whenever they wanted to inform readers of supernatural or horror content, and this is what you can see on the cover of Hulk #1 "Fantasy as you like it," which will make more sense if read as "Horror as you like it."

The second issue has him facing an alien invasion and Banner is branded a traitor. Banner goes missing, but at the end Lee claims he's rehabilitated though no picture actually shows that. Kirby must have written something else originally because in issue 4 Banner is still missing. We even read in Avengers 5 that Banner has been missing since the gamma explosion!

Another instance of Lee and Kirby being on wildly different tracks is when the Hulk gains superpowers in issue 3 after being bathed in cosmic radiation (like the famous quartet), including the power to fly. Lee didn't like that and added walls of text to explain we were seeing the Hulk jump instead. But apparently he never told Kirby who kept having the Hulk flying for several issues, even in Avengers 1. Lee needed to add dialogue and captions every time to explain this was not flying even though the Hulk's trails and other clues told the tale.


Kirby kept turning characters into flying characters: the Human Torch, the Hulk, Thor, Iron Man, Magneto, Marvel Girl. Stan, who wanted more realistic characters, had to restrain that impulse.

In issue 4 it is noted Banner has been missing. He has not been shown with Ross or the military since he was arrested as a traitor in issue 2.

In FF 12 another traitor is found.

By issue 5 the Hulk becomes more heroic and acts as savior of Betty Ross. Maybe by then Lee and Kirby had figured that it was more the superhero aspect of Fantastic Four than the adventurers/monster hunters which had the favor of the public.

Given these discrepancies, which show Kirby was plotting the stories and Lee was heavily editing them in the scripting stage, I doubt Lee even plotted Hulk 6. In this story the Hulk retains Banner's head and needs to wear a Hulk mask. The mask thing is a typical Ditko device.

The Hulk will not become a succesful character until the 1970s when horror becomes popular again. Herb Trimpe's knack for drawing monsters and military action will drive the character to popular heights. Later other artists will return to the horror well--Jim Starlin in Hulk 222, Mantlo, Buscema, Mignola and Talaoc in the early 80s, then Peter David and Todd McFarlane, to Bruce Jones before the current series by Al Ewing.

In his postface to the first issue of Immortal Hulk, Ewing dispels his childhood notion that the Hulk is a superhero. "It was a horror book to begin with." Although Ewing tried to drive the point home early in his run that the Hulk is not a superhero by having the same story told in four different genres, far from everybody has clicked to the fact. But with the popular and critical success of his series, one can suppose the identification of The Hulk as a horror series will only grow.