The Totally Awesome Hulk, Vol. 1: Cho Time (2016)

This is my first taste of Amadeus Cho, a legacy character with Hulk powers, and I’m already a fan.  This comic is snappy and fun, a cool monster romp with rootable characters and the start of a deeper plot simmering beneath the surface.  In other words, another Marvel title I’m definitely interested in continuing.

19-year-old super-genius Amadeus Cho has recently taken up the mantle of the Hulk, and he’s loving every minute of it.  But while he’s busy showing off, smashing monsters, and strutting his stuff for the ladies, his younger sister Maddy (his “eyes in the sky”) worries that he doesn’t grasp the full, devastating potential of his powers.  Because despite Amadeus’s insistence that he’s the one in the driver’s seat, always in control of both his anger and abilities, there’s a beast inside waiting to take over.

I enjoyed the hell out of this fast and funny volume.  Admittedly, I get a little tired of how it reintroduces the major characters at the start of every issue, but I’m guessing that’s a result of it being the start of a new comic and wanting to ease readers in?  Hopefully, it gets dropped, or at least lessened, in subsequent volumes.  But that’s my only real quibble.  Everything else is great.  By this point, I’m starting to get used to the way comic books liberally mix in characters from other titles as a matter of course.  Here, Amadeus and Maddy variously team up with She-Hulk, Spider-Man, and Thor, and other Asgardians factor into the plot as well.

The actual hero stuff is fairly Hulk-smash standard:  punch some monsters, fight some henchmen, listen to some Big Bads wax philosophical.  Where it gets interesting is in how it explores Amadeus and his relationship with his still-fairly-new powers.  I like how he reacts to the off-world baddies who’ve heard tell of the new beast defending the earth, the flashbacks to how he got his powers (combined with the fallout Bruce Banner got from his own) are well-done, and I love the way the comic demonstrates Amadeus’s inner struggle with the Hulk for control.

Amadeus himself is an immediately-engaging character.  He’s super-smart, majorly cocky, and kind of all over the place.  Maddy can see how the Hulk’s impulses are messing with his mind even when he is the ostensible one in control, but Amadeus is so self-assured, convinced that he’s got a lid on things.  It’s only when a villain digs into his past and runs him off the rails that he starts to understand just what he’s gotten himself into.  I really look forward to seeing where the story goes from here.

Warnings

Violence, suggestiveness, and thematic elements.