I whole-heartedly enjoyed the first episode of She-Hulk: Attorney at Law. The writing from Jessica Gao was mostly razor sharp and Tatiana Maslany is solid gold in the role of Jennifer Walters/She-Hulk. The special effects may not be perfect--I wish She-Hulk's hair moved a little more--but, as someone who regularly re-watches classic Doctor Who, I can't complain.
The bulk of the first episode involves Bruce Banner (Mark Ruffalo) accidentally infecting Jennifer, his cousin, with Hulk blood, and his subsequent training/therapy for her. The chemistry between Ruffalo and Maslany is so good and the writing so perfectly captures the tone of rivalrous siblings that it's an endless delight. Where the comedy mostly didn't work in Thor: Love and Thunder, it's all executed beautifully here. It has the advantage of the characters not being flippant and silly when a whole town of children has been kidnapped by demons.
There was really only one moment I didn't like and it was when Jennifer made an oblique reference to mansplaining. I fully believe there are people--men and women--who arrogantly take it upon themselves to explain things they have no right to. But I have certainly not found men to be the sole perpetrators. They don't even make up the majority of perpetrators in my experience.
But we could take this to be Jennifer's biased judgement and not the writer's since a big part of the first episode is that Jennifer doesn't understand herself or her new situation as well as she thinks she does.
It's a shame Bruce Banner isn't sticking around for the whole series because the relationship between these two characters is definitely the star of the show so far. There hasn't been a whole lot of non-Bruce Banner related material although I did really think it was funny when Jennifer ran into a group of random, really supportive women in the bathroom. It was a little absurd but not implausible.
She-Hulk: Attorney at Law is available on Disney+.
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