She-Hulk: Attorney at Law finished off its first season and it was a lot. Maybe it was a little. Or both at the same time. Either way, it was crazy and the fact that Marvel hyped it up with a trailer made entirely of old footage except for two brief shots of Hulk vs. Abomination was kind of brilliant considering where it led to. As the final episode exploded in character callbacks and hackneyed twists turning into an oversaturated fight scene that Jen Walters felt did a disservice to her season-long storyline, the episode suddenly went full meta as She-Hulk confronted K.E.V.I.N., the AI behind the creation of the Marvel Cinematic Universe. Things got cute with references to the X-Men and Black Panther: Wakanda Forever, but ultimately, Jen erased Hulk’s grand return despite K.E.V.I.N.’s insistence that it was building up towards a movie with a special introduction. Even though Jen pulled a Wayne’s World and got the ending she wanted, Cousin Bruce still showed up anyway with some special company. He appeared at the family cookout (funny enough, a callback to Bruce and Jen saying their goodbyes in the first episode) and introduced everyone to his son Skaar. Out walked a green warrior monk – played by Wil Deusner and a lot of CGI – to everyone’s shock. Going by release dates and the whole “five years later” thing from the Blip, Skaar is presumably 10-12 years old. That’s presuming he was not snapped out of existence by Thanos. Then again, Skaar aged up a whole lot faster in the comics. Skaar was practically the poster boy for what was the “Hulk Family Era” of Marvel Comics. Like in the movies, Hulk did serve as a gladiator on Sakaar, but the situation was much different. The Illuminati decided that Hulk was too dangerous to be allowed to roam Earth as a ticking time bomb natural disaster, so they tricked him, betrayed him, and shot him off into space. They intended to send him to a peaceful planet to spend the rest of his days, but something went wrong and he ended up on a ruthless barbarian planet. Whoops.
Caiera the Oldstrong
In the story Planet Hulk, Hulk gradually fought his way up the ladder on Sakaar and became its king. He married Caiera the Oldstrong, a warrior woman with the ability to tap into a planet’s energy and grant herself stone powers. With Hulk on the cusp of true happiness, tragedy struck when the ship that brought him to Sakaar mysteriously exploded, causing such a blast that it killed the pregnant Caiera. Driven by rage, Hulk and some of his Sakaarian buddies (including Miek and Korg) returned to Earth to wage war on its heroes in a story called World War Hulk. Notably, while the story of World War Hulk was still being told, Marvel released a batch of What If? comics. One of them was What If? Planet Hulk, written by Incredible Hulk scribe Greg Pak. The main story of the issue had Caiera survive the explosion with Hulk dying instead. She succeeded in invading and enslaving Earth. Years later, we would see the creation of a massive Hulk statue and in that moment, Caiera’s son would appear to tell her it was complete. Appearing for only a couple panels, this absolute unit who looked like a cross between the Hulk and Metalocalypse’s Nathan Explosion was secretly only a teaser for things to come. This was during a time when there were just Hulk characters everywhere. General Ross had become the Red Hulk with his daughter Betty becoming Red She-Hulk. Rick Jones became the new Abomination, calling himself A-Bomb. Not only did Skaar have an insane twin brother Hiro-Kala, but also a half-sister from an alternate future named Lyra. This status quo led to the 2013 animated series Hulk and the Agents of S.M.A.S.H., where Hulk, She-Hulk, Red Hulk, Skaar, and A-Bomb were a superhero team. They had to alter Skaar’s origins quite a bit here and removed all the backstory about being the Hulk’s son.
The Hulk Family Future
Once the Hulk Family Era had run its course, Marvel put the genie back in the bottle. During one of his “best of both worlds” phases where Hulk had Banner’s intellect, the gamma giant became fearful of what would happen if any of the Hulks reached the age of mental deterioration. He went on a one-man mission to depower all the other Hulks, except She-Hulk, who protected herself with lawyer mumbo jumbo. Skaar was written out by losing his power, though presumably still having his mother’s stone powers. He went off to find his own path as a human. Skaar later got re-gamma’d because it’s comics. He has not been a big player in a long time, but that might change with this sudden MCU appearance. Speaking of, what does this mean for the MCU? It’s possible that we are heading towards a loose World War Hulk adaptation, albeit one where Skaar’s existence is already apparent. Universal’s hold on the release of Hulk solo movies is set to expire in 2023, so they have plenty of time to finally give Mark Ruffalo the project he’s been wanting.
