| “ | That's my secret Cap, I'm always angry. | „ |
| ~ Bruce before turning into Hulk during the Battle of New York, his most famous quote |
| “ | For years, I've been treating the Hulk like he's some kind of disease... something to get rid of. But then, I start looking at him as the cure. Eighteen months in a gamma lab, I put the brains and the brawn together. And now, look at me. Best of both worlds. | „ |
| ~ Bruce on his temporary merge with the Hulk |
| “ | I spent a lifetime running from this aspect of myself. Denying half of your being is no way to live, trust me. | „ |
| ~ Bruce trying to mentor Jennifer Walters |
Doctor Robert Bruce Banner, also known as the Hulk, is one of the main protagonists of the Marvel Cinematic Universe.
He is a scientist who has the ability to transform into the Hulk whenever he gets angry. He eventually became one of the original founding members of a famous superhero team known as the Avengers. Eventually, he and Hulk became combined as one, with Banner having complete control of the Hulk.
He was portrayed by Edward Norton in The Incredible Hulk and by Mark Ruffalo onwards.
What Makes Him Pure Good?[]
In General[]
- While the MCU's admirable standard is astronomical and many of it's most admirable heroes are very hard to compete with, Bruce is one of it's most admirable heroes and while most of his acts where shared with Hulk, there is one thing that allows Banner to stand out on his own: The Blip. It was Bruce who bore the Nano Gauntlet despite the chance that he could die and gravely injured his left arm in order to bring the trillions of people that Thanos had killed back to life, including several of the Avengers' allies and close friends, many of which later participated in the Battle of Earth against Thanos.
- While Bruce was initially reluctant to actually help at any point and wished to get rid of the Hulk, as the franchise continues, Bruce eventually fully embraces his role as a hero and accepts the Hulk as part of him. By the time of the Multiverse Saga, he doesn't show any traits of arrogance, recklessness, and often tries to keep his anger under control, not to mention all his interactions with Jen are justified since he was trying to teach her to control her new powers and she just kept snapping at him and overlooking his trauma with the Hulk as well as not thinking much of the inevitable problems that will follow her as She-Hulk.
The Incredible Hulk[]
- He is first presented as a the lead in a scientific effort to recreate the serum that was once used in Captain America.
- He successfully created a serum though he had used gamma radiation as an activator and stabilizer as opposed to vita radiation, and decided to test the serum on himself in order to show its results as Thaddeus Ross was putting immense pressure on him and the project's budget was already low and could be cut at any point.
- Even though Hulk went on a rampage where he injured Betty and several others, killed two scientists and an officer, and breaking Ross' arm, however Bruce himself cannot be blamed for this or any of the Hulk's future rampages as it's not something he does himself willingly and is always shown to be horrified and disturbed by the destruction caused by the green titan.
- After reverting to his human self, Bruce tried to visit Betty in the hospital but was denied access by Ross who also informed him that due to the project's military intent, he would have his men hunt Bruce down if he didn't agree to let the Hulk be used as a weapon. Ross later offered him a workplace in Maryland to perfect the serum, though he refused as he felt extremely guilty for all the people Hulk hurt and chose to run away to not let his green counterpart hurt anyone, becoming a fugitive of the law.
- While on the run he kept in contact with Rick Jones and saved him from a dangerous situation by throwing him off a trench, he also wished to contact Betty one last time but his message was intercepted by the military.
- He later chose to dedicate himself to helping poor people by providing medical assistance. He eventually settled in Rio de Janeiro where he worked as a handyman while looking for a possible cure with the help of an internet friend. In order to help control his emotions and repress his rage, he also studied martial arts and meditative breathing techniques with a Brazilian Jiu-jitsu expert and succeeded in not suffering a transformation for 158 days.
- During the lessons, he would allow his sensei to slap him if he was losing control so that he could learn to keep himself in check in harsh environments.
- After cutting his finger and dropping a drop of gamma infected blood into the bottles of Pingo Doce below, he asked the manager to stop everything while he found the blood and cleaned it up.
- When he found the Tough Guy Leader threatening Martina and though he tried to walk away at first, he chose to intervene and take Martina out to dinner while also trying to warn the leader to not make him angry.
- While looking for a cure, he began studying the Casablanca flower in hopes of getting rid of his situation and tried to make an antidote with the help of Mr. Blue, but sadly failed.
- After being located again, he kept running while also trying to control his heart rate in order to not transform, though he was forced to do so after being ambushed by the tough guy leader while being chased by Blonsky.
- After waking up in Guatemala, he began studying his own transformations to find a cure more easily. he then became a beggar and eventually mad enough money to travel back to Culver University.
- He visited Stanley Lieber and cleared up the truth regarding what Ross had said about him, working with Lieber to enter Culver University undercover as a pizza delivery man so he could recover his research.
- He bribed Roger Harrington with some pizza to enter the computer but discovered that the data he needed had been deleted.
- Later when Betty saw him, he tried to hide as he still believed that bringing her into his situation would put her in grave danger. However Betty tracked him down and brought him to her house where they caught up.
- He later returned to Culver University intending to leave but was suddenly surrounded by the military, as Leonard Samson (Betty's lover) had called them out of envy. Bruce then tried to run and worrying that the memory stick with all the information on his project and a possible cure would be destroyed or lost, he swallowed it.
- He tried to leave peacefully before being cornered at an outpass and eventually transformed after seeing Betty get hurt.
- He stopped himself and Betty when they nearly had sex as he noticed his heart rate was rising which might lead to another transformation.
- He then made a plan to get to NYC and tried to stop Betty from selling her mother's necklace to make money.
- Eventually they arrived at Harlem to meet with Mr. Blue A.K.A. Samuel Sterns who had created a possible antidote. Despite being warned that he might not survive the procedure, Bruce still chose to take it and for a moment had control of Hulk.
- When he found out that Sterns had duplicated his blood and used several others as test subjects who hadn't survived, the horrified Bruce tried to convince him to destroy the blood supply, fearing what could happen if the power of the Hulk was in the wrong hands, however he was then shot by Emil Blonsky with a tranquilizer.
- Later when Abomination began attacking Harlem, Bruce realizing that only Hulk could stop it decided to trust his counterpart and try to redirect his anger to Blonsky, he then ordered Betty and Thaddeus to stay with the soldiers in the helicopter as they would be safer on the air.
- He then kissed Betty goodbye and fell on purpose, using his fear of death to trigger the Hulk.
- He later repurchased Betty's necklace and sent it to her.
- Choosing to learn to control the Hulk instead of suppressing it, he chose to live in isolation before eventually moving to India.
The Avengers[]
- He stayed in India where he acted as a doctor in a village to cure people. He even gained a reputation as a doctor and had several ill patients.
- When he was approached by a pleading girl whose parents were ill and followed her to the end of town to help, only to discover it was a set up on S.H.I.E.L.D.'s part with Natasha Romanoff requesting his help to find the Tesseract. Though Banner was at first reluctant, he eventually chose to help and apologized to Nat for snapping at her.
- Arriving at the Helicarrier and befriending Steve, he suggested Fury to use gamma radiation to track down the Tesseract.
- After Loki was captured, Bruce began studying the scepter to try to use it to locate the Tesseract and worked together with Tony Stark to speed up the process.
- He shows no anger at Tony for poking him with a prod, as he still remains friendly towards him.
- When Steve and Tony began arguing about Fury's secretive behavior, he remained passive and neutral while also giving his opinion on the matter. He and Stark then discussed the Hulk and Stark suggested that he learn to work as one with the beast.
- The team then had a fall out after the Avengers discovered that S.H.I.E.L.D. would use the Tesseract to create weapons, during this an agitated Bruce would be influenced by the scepter and like all the others would enter the argument and angrily snap at Fury knowing the cage Loki was in was for him, however not only was this under the scepter's influence but he also subverts his anger towards the Avengers and accepts them as teammates and friends by the end of the film.
- He then managed to detect the Tesseract and located it in Stark Tower, but before he could relay the information, one of the engines was blown up by the brainwashed Hawkeye.
- After he and Nat to fell into the weapons cache room, where Bruce began to transform into Hulk, he tried to repress it and upon realizing he couldn't, he tried to run away from Nat to avoid hurting her.
- He found a motorcycle and began searching for the other Avengers, eventually finding the gathered team right as Stark was asking for him. In that moment, Iron Man led a Chitauri Leviathan to the team and Steve asked Bruce how to anger him, to which he replied he was always angry and transformed into Hulk to stop the Leviathan.
- Later, Bruce and the others oversaw Loki's transport to Asgard in central park and then he left with Tony to move into Stark Tower.
Iron Man 3[]
- He would later try to help Tony overcome his trauma by acting as a therapist and listening to his stories regarding Aldrich Killian (though he fell asleep at the beginning).
Captain America: The Winter Soldier[]
- In the following years, Bruce developed several new technologies to aid mankind, which had HYDRA's Project Insight label him as a potential threat.
Avengers: Age of Ultron[]
- He would continue to go on several missions with the Avengers as Hulk, and he and Nat created a method to calm Hulk down and reverse him into Banner by using a lullaby.
- After retrieving the scepter, Banner and Stark began to analyze it and try to decode it's secrets.
- When Tony asked him to help create Ultron, though Banner was hesitant, he ultimately agreed under the idea that this could bring peace to their time.
- When Ultron used the Iron Legion to attack the Avengers, he hid behind the bar in order to not transform and tackled Nat into safety as well.
- After Ultron cut the internet off, the team began looking for answers in non-digital records, with Bruce discovering Ultron's target to be vibranium that he could obtain from Ulysses Klaue. The team then flew to South Africa to find Klaue, though Bruce remained in the quinjet as to not cause damage as Hulk.
- Later, Wanda Maximoff brainwashed the Hulk into causing a mass rampage in Johannesburg and forcing Iron Man to use the Hulkbuster armor to fight him into submission. After being snapped out of Maximoff's control, both Banner and Hulk were shown horrified by the destruction around them, which they had been forced to cause.
- The Avengers then went on the run to cope with their losses, while a guilt-ridden Bruce tried to calm himself and remain passive.
- While they were laying low, he sadly told Nat that they couldn't be together as he was a potential threat to her and any future family, before Romanoff revealed she couldn't have children because of the Red Room.
- After Natasha was given a butterfly drawing by Lila Barton, he realized that Ultron's goal was to evolve and that he would use Helen Cho to create the ultimate body for himself.
- He was then dropped off at Avengers Tower while the rest went to confront Ultron, not wanting to have another accidental rampage or face Maximoff again. Stark and Barton then returned with Ultron's ideal body, and Stark asked Bruce to help him install J.A.R.V.I.S. into said body to create a final defense mechanism against Ultron. While Bruce was understandably hesitant and refused to, he agreed to take the risk as it was the only way to stop Ultron's goal of genocide.
- He and Tony then built the body of the Vision, when Rogers arrived with the Maximoff twins who had defected from Ultron.
- While he did threaten Wanda and assured her that he would kill her himself without turning into Hulk, this was justified as she had forced him to transform into the Hulk and then forced the green giant into a rampage that destroyed several buildings, hurt hundreds of people and possibly kill multiple innocent civilians and police officers, and even then, by the end of the film and in further installments, Bruce is never shown to be aggressive towards Wanda or to still have negative feelings about her.
- He sneaked into Ultron's lair to free Natasha and then tried to have the two of them run away, not wishing to turn into Hulk ever again, though Romanoff pushed him off a cliff and forced him into transforming, acknowledging that they needed Hulk to beat Ultron.
Thor: Ragnarok[]
- After waking up, he asked Thor if they had managed to defeat Ultron and was shocked by the revelation that it had been two years since the battle.
- Though Bruce was very snappy and annoyed at his current predicament. and didn't wish to help Thor fight Hela, he ultimately decided to help his friend. His initial refusal to turn into The Hulk was also understandable, as he doesn’t want to be trapped inside The Hulk, nor does he want to cause harm or destruction since he no longer has control over The Hulk.
- After meeting with Valkyrie and heading to her home where Loki was held as prisoner, Bruce tried to have a normal conversation with him despite everything he had done.
- He then discussed possible ways to leave Sakaar with Thor and Valkyrie, ultimately deciding to steal the Commedore ship and start a revolution to distract the Grandmaster's forces.
- He stayed with Valkyrie while Thor and Loki retrieved the ship, and he was then forced to pilot it while Thor and Valkyrie teared down the chasing ships from the outside.
- He tried to search for weapons in the ship and accidentally activated birthday fireworks which distracted Topaz and caused her to crash, allowing them to escape. While Bruce's actions led to Topaz's death, not only was it an accident, but it was also justified as she was chasing them down with the intention to kill while they were trying to leave and save all of Asgard.
- He handed the controls to Valkyrie who flew them to Asgard. Once there, he and Valkyrie stayed behind in the ship while Thor fought Hela.
- He then prepared to assist Heimdall with the evacuation of all the surviving Asgardians, but they were interrupted by the arrival of Fenris Wolf and Hela's Berserkers.
- Noticing the danger, Bruce jumped out of the ship to transform into Hulk and save the Asgardians from being slaughtered despite knowing there's a chance that he might never turn back into himself and stay as Hulk.
Avengers: Infinity War[]
- After landing in the Sanctum Sanctorum, he warned Doctor Strange and Wong of the coming threat. The group then brought Tony in, while Banner informed everyone of who Thanos was and what he wanted.
- When informed of the Avengers' Civil War, he still tried to convince Tony to call Steve for help, as their rift was unimportant to Thanos' threat, and would have succeeded had Ebony Maw and Cull Obsidian not invaded NYC in that moment.
- He tried to force the Hulk to come out but failed, as his counterpart refused to come out anymore after being defeated by Thanos.
- After Strange was taken by Maw and Iron Man and Spider-Man went up to save him, he used Stark's phone to call Rogers and inform him of the current situation.
- He traveled to the Avengers Compound and reunited with Rhodey. Eventually, Rogers and his team came in with Wanda and the injured Vision, as Bruce kindly greeted his friends.
- He then began brainstorming ideas on how to safely remove the stone from Vision's head without killing him, to which Rogers suggested they search for aid in Wakanda.
- After arriving in Wakanda, he bowed in respect to T'Challa after being told by Rhodey to do so, though T'Challa stated that wasn't a custom there. He didn't seem too annoyed with Rhodey for tricking him.
- He then met with Shuri and the pair discussed ways to safely remove the stone from Vision's body.
- Eventually, the Black Order arrived in Wakanda, and since Hulk wouldn't fight, Bruce donned the new Hulkbuster armor in order to fight alongside the others. Banner then participated in the Battle of Wakanda and helped to hold off the Outriders until Thor arrived with Groot and Rocket, prompting Banner to enthusiastically cheer at seeing his friend alive and well.
- He tried to save Vision from Corvus Glaive and Cull Obsidian. While he killed the latter, it was clearly in self-defense because Obsidian would have killed him and eventually Vision.
- When Thanos arrived, he was the first to try and stand against him but was quickly subdued.
- In the following days, he studied a pager used by Nick Fury before his death and pondered what it could mean before Captain Marvel arrived, demanding to know where Fury was.
Avengers: Endgame[]
- He later monitored which of the Avengers' friends and allies had been killed in the snap.
- After Carol brought Tony back and both Tony and Steve had a heated argument, Stark collapsed, to which Bruce gave him a sedative so he could recover properly.
- After Nebula relayed Thanos' current location, he joined the others to fight him and donned the Hulkbuster armor again, bursting through the floor to Thanos' farm and grabbing his arm so that Thor can cut the gauntlet off.
- After Thanos tried to justify his actions, he pushed him angrily telling him how many he'd killed. Despite his anger, when Thanos then revealed he had destroyed the Infinity stones and Thor killed him, Bruce was shocked.
- In the following five years, Bruce continued to blame himself and locked himself in a lab where he managed to combine himself with the Hulk, to which he gained a sense of content with himself and began interacting more with the public.
- He eventually met with Steve, Nat, and Scott, who proposed the idea of using the Quantum Realm to travel back in time and retrieve the Infinity Stones to bring everyone back, after being convinced by Nat, he agreed to monitor the experiment.
- He later worked with Scott and though he accidentally aged him up and down, he managed to restore him to his normal self.
- After Tony joined in, he and Rocket went to New Asgard to recruit Thor who had become a drunk shut-in.
- When Thor refused to come, Bruce told him about how he had helped him when he was in a tough spot and that he would help him now. Eventually Rocket convinced Thor to join.
- He helped build the quantum tunnel and later assisted Scott (and then Clint) with the mechanics of the quantum suit, while also explaining how time travel would work and differ from movie interpretations to Rhodey.
- The team later discussed their experiences with the stones and how to properly retrieve them from each year.
- He went with Stark, Rogers, and Lang to 2012 during the Battle of New York and was embarrassed at seeing the past Hulk angrily attack the Chitauri.
- He went to look for the Time Stone and encountered the Ancient One, where he convinced her to give him the Time Stone by promising to give it back in the exact moment through usage of the Quantum Tunnel and mentioning how Strange had willingly given Thanos the stone.
- He returned only to find that Nat had sacrificed herself for the Soul Stone, after grieving privately with the other original Avengers, Bruce told them that they should make her sacrifice count.
- He then worked with Rocket and Tony to build the Nano Gauntlet.
- When the Avengers began arguing on who should wield the gauntlet, Banner decided to use it himself, acknowledging that no one else could survive and he had the most chance due to the gamma radiation in his body, saying that this was what he was meant for.
- He then used the gauntlet and handled its extreme pain in order to snap and cause the Blip, resurrecting trillions of people who had been killed in the Snap. He later revealed that he had also tried to bring Nat back but couldn't, saddened that this failure.
- After 2014 Thanos blew up the compound, he fell to the very bottom with Rocket and Rhodey, holding up the roof while trying to convince them to leave. They were eventually rescued by Giant-Man and joined in on the Battle of Earth.
- During said battle, he reminded everyone that they had to return the stones. The battle eventually ended with Iron Man sacrificing his life, and Bruce joined the others in kneeling in respect.
- He attended Stark's funeral, evidently saddened by the loss of his friend.
- He rebuilt the Quantum Tunnel so that Steve could return the Infinity Stones to their respective points in time.
Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings[]
- He and Danvers helped Shang-Chi tried to understand the purpose of the ten rings and the signal they sent out, and he welcomed him into the superhero life.
She-Hulk: Attorney at Law[]
- At some point he received a haiku from Blonsky apologizing for his attempts to kill him and forgave his former foe, believing in his redemption.
- He went on a trip with his cousin Jennifer Walters, but after a car-crash, she became infected with his gamma blood and turned into She-Hulk. Bruce prevented her from attacking a group of men and brought her to his beach house where he explained the situation to her.
- In the following days, he began trying to train her to control her Hulk anger and remained kind and firm despite her being overly rude and infuriating even calling Bruce out for unjustified reasons and overlooking his trauma by claiming she had gone through more.
- When Jen tried to leave, Bruce tried to stop her for her own safety and was attacked, which resulted in him fighting back and a brawl breaking out between the two, which concluded in them breaking the beach house. The two then made up as they fixed it and Bruce chose to let Jen leave and trust her with her hulk powers.
- He was eventually picked up by a Sakaaran ship to go finish some unresolved business, but gave some advice to Jen in how to handle the media before leaving.
- He returned to Sakaar and discovered he had a son named Skaar, who he brought back to Earth to introduce to his family.
Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania[]
- He helped Scott write his book to recount the events of the Battle of Earth and the Blip in order to mitigate the public's confusion regarding the events.
Trivia[]
- He is the first Pure Good to be introduced in the Marvel Cinematic Universe.
- Only Bruce qualifies as Pure Good, while The Hulk persona doesn't due to being far more wrathful and destructive.
- He is the only version of Bruce Banner so far to be PG.
External Links[]
- Bruce Banner on the Heroes Wiki
- Bruce Banner on the Marvel Wiki
- Bruce Banner on the Marvel Cinematic Universe Wiki
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