This summer marks the ten-year anniversary of Mark Ruffalo’s Marvel Cinematic Universe debut in The Avengers, and he’s long since been established as one of the franchise’s most pivotal and popular supporting characters.
Unfortunately, the legal and contractual issues regarding Universal’s stranglehold on the distribution rights for any solo project involving the Hulk have kept him relegated to a background player, but it hasn’t been that much of a hindrance in the grand scheme of things.
On the plus side, upcoming streaming series She-Hulk will introduce a gamma-radiated character that’s free to lead as many seasons of television or feature films as Kevin Feige sees fit, with Tatiana Maslany’s Jennifer Walter’s expected to become a key part of the MCU moving forward.
Speaking to Access Hollywood at the red carpet premiere of Netflix’s The Adam Project, Ruffalo dropped a very on-brand pun when addressing how he factors into Maslany’s debut as the lawyer-turned-superhero.
“Tatiana Maslany is freaking legendary as the She-Hulk. I’m passing the banner onto her. Yeah, there’s some really good, funny, cool, long, long scenes between the Professor and her. We’ve never really seen the Hulk interact with people the way he does in that show. It will be really interesting.”
If She-Hulk runs for multiple seasons, then you’d imagine Ruffalo would remain part of the ensemble, unless of cours he’s shockingly killed off. Then again, the MCU has been cycling out some of its elder statesmen recently so his time my be drawing to a natural conclusion, but it would be an understatement to say that Maslany is a perfectly acceptable substitute.