She-Hulk – The Retreat Review

And there it is. The MCU connection (outside of, you know, the obvious green cousin and giant green client) for She-Hulk. Now, that’s not to say that there weren’t some fun, comedic moments within “The Retreat” – because there absolutely were – but with only two episodes remaining (and a promised Daredevil appearance still to come), we’re running preciously short on runway to tie up this Intelligencia situation in any real way. Which was one of my major worries as the series zigged and zagged through fun hijinks and we waited for the MCU-sized other shoe to drop.

An episode spent checking in on Emil Blonsky’s new retreat center* wasn’t a bad idea – Tim Roth is killing it in his return to the character, and it’s not like Jen didn’t need at least a small break to take stock of the massive identity crisis she’s been pretending not to have the entire series. So, self-care: A good thing. And it was also fun to meet up with the kooky gang (but not “the gang,” because, you know, parole board and all that) of super-powered folks Blonsky has cobbled together to “help.” Heck, it was nice to get a bit more background into Wrecker (nice touch on his immediate “No, not blood” comment when Saracen brought it up, reminding us that people are, in fact, out for Jen’s blood and Josh was almost certainly a plant like most of the audience guessed last week). It also doesn’t hurt the future MCU plans to remind folks that there are vampires and vampire hunters on the horizon in Blade. So, a fun grab bag of characters and, in the end, Jen does get the mental and emotional boost she needs to recognize that she has to integrate both sides of herself and see them both as valuable for her to move forward.

*So, where was Blonsky’s harem in all of this? If you recall, they’re the ones who financed the entire retreat center, but they are strangely absent from things. Is it possible (probable?) that Blonsky did, in fact, turn into Abomination to trigger the inhibitor? Is something more sinister going on here? After all, if Tim Roth is willing to reprise his role for a television series, it stands to reason he absolutely would for additional film projects – perhaps Abomination wants out of his parole and back into the action, and didn’t really love all those women now that they have given him what he wanted?

So, I suppose it’s time to address the Intelligencia. Well, we don’t know for sure that HulkKing (who is obviously Todd, the creepy She-Hulk date who was super interested in finding out just what might be able to pierce She-Hulk’s skin and who happens to be absolutely loaded) is anything other than a rich creep who wants to take down She-Hulk, but if the series is name-dropping the Intelligencia, you can guess that the MCU wants to at least start their introduction within their canon. And, considering several of the classic members have previously been introduced in other MCU properties and will return in future installments, well, it makes sense to let us know this bad guy group is out there. Leader and MODOK, two key members, have been confirmed for upcoming MCU projects (Leader will be appearing, with Tim Blake Nelson once again portraying the character, in Captain America: New World Order while MODOK will grace movie screens in Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania), so a soft launch of the organization here (perhaps without its key villains in place?) would make sense if we’re getting introduced to members in other projects.

I have no problem with the series swerving into the MCU “big bad organization that links to other projects” lane. What I do question is how long it’s taken us to get to this point and how precious little time we have left to deal with the potential fallout from the revelation that the Intelligencia site isn’t just a bunch of incels with keyboards but is, in fact, a potential threat to Jen (and other hulked-out folks, including Bruce). The choice to slow burn the show’s “bad guy” was a mistake. Yes, we needed time to get to know Jen, understand her personal life, her work life, her support system. But we also didn’t need to take some of the swerves the show has taken only to have this particular reveal throw a wrench in the rhythm of the series at this late point. Sure, the pieces were there for awhile but now we have two episodes to introduce their plan and solve it? I mean, we definitely don’t have the time left to solve anything – other than perhaps a reveal and take down of Todd only to reveal someone even more powerful is involved, so I’m assuming we’re going to be left with questions regarding just what they are going to do with whatever information they learn from Jen’s DNA.

But after how much fun the series has been to this point, the reminder that it’s really just another cog in the MCU machine is a bit of a bummer. I know there are plenty of viewers who will be excited to try and decode just what is happening here and how it all links together into the bigger picture, but I was really hoping we’d get a series that was more about Jen in the end and less about what Jen’s introduction to the MCU can mean for the universe as a whole. Maybe I’m starting to experience MCU fatigue – I know I wouldn’t be the only one – but I genuinely enjoyed that She-Hulk seemed far more invested in telling us Jen’s story – and the stories of the show’s colorful and fun supporting cast – and less invested in watching her be a superhero. It was cool to watch a normal person deal with some complicated changes to her life while still keeping her head on straight and proving that she was just as capable hulked-out as she was as Jen. Now, we have to take a step back and see how Jen and She-Hulk fit into the greater machine surrounding them, which is less fun, less interesting, and far more complicated. Who knows – two episodes from now I could be incredibly hyped about what She-Hulk has to say about the future of the MCU. But I suspect I’ll be bummed out that we lost the chance to have a series that was about a singular entity in order for Marvel to remind us that it’s really just one of many elements of a greater tapestry – whether we want it to be or not.