For the past two years, we’ve had a fun little tradition building here on SuperHeroHype. We published two articles, totaling twenty superhero movies that almost happened at one point in time, ranging from the likes of Joss Whedon’s Wonder Woman to a Horror inspired version of Spider-Man. Now we’re back with another installment, but in keeping with the spirit of sequelizing an article, here are 11 superhero sequels that almost happened.
Ang Lee’s Hulk 2
Though it may not fit the standards of what fans are eager to see these days in superhero films, Ang Lee’s take on Hulk was a an important step for comic book movies. Lee was just coming off of the success of Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, and chose the material as his next project. Even before the film opened, talk of a sequel was already ongoing, as producer Avi Arad revealed at the premiere that screenwriter James Schamus was already penning the script.
At the time, Schamus said that his script would focus on “Banner’s epic struggle with his inner demons” which would result in the Hulk going gray for the film, much like his original appearance in the comics. Two villains were also in the mix for the film, including The Leader, the brains and The Abomination, the brawn. It wasn’t clear at first if Ang Lee would work on the film, though he said it was a possibility at first.
“Maybe,” the director said. “I need to de-Hulk this process.”
A May 2005 release date was targeted for the film, but when Universal failed to hurry up on the sequel, the rights reverted back to Marvel who had already begun work on their very own, and now world famous “Marvel Studios.” Writer Zak Penn was brought on to rework the script, which at the time was still a follow-up to Lee’s movie. The studio later decided that the film would not be a continuation, scrapping any connectivity to Lee’s original film. Schamus would reveal some years later what his initial plans were for the film, telling Film Divider:
“I started on Hulk 2, and then quickly decided before anybody made the phone call that I’d make the phone call and say, ‘You know what, I’m actually working on a little something something and I’ve got to think about studying for my Bar Mitzvah so we’ll move on.’ And so that was fine, but I had a really cool idea and it was on like a Native American reservation and it was all about radioactivity and it was really political and like, that would have been awesome.”
