Whether it’s an alien invasion or a class-action lawsuit, Jennifer Walters will fight for you. She’s got power in the courtroom and in her fists. Fun fact: Way before Deadpool even entered the world of comics, Jen was the one breaking the fourth wall and joking it up with the audience. So how does a small lawyer become a jolly green giant of a hero? Let’s find out!
Jennifer Walters was just the shy law student daughter of Elaine and William Morris. She hadn’t see her cousin, Bruce Banner, much lately since he’d been on the run as The Hulk. This would change when a crime boss who’d cross paths with her sheriff father would cause an explosion greatly injuring Jenn. Thankfully Bruce was in town and with no one else able to help and being the only viable donor, gave Jenn a blood transfusion, knowing she was relatively safe, Bruce would flee again as the Hulk was still wanted.
The crime boss wasn’t through with her father and Jenn isn’t one to be fridged. Upon the boss’ men sent to kill her attacking her, her new gamma infused blood caused her to transform into a Hulk creature of her own. Dubbed She-Hulk by one of the soon to be thrown away criminals, Jenn would realize that her anger allowed her to turn into a mighty being able to face off against all kinds of villains. Finishing up law school at UCLA, she’d go on to become a great lawyer. She’d take on a case with Morbius, the Living Vampire, who would help Jenn be able to control her transformations. Jenn would realize she liked life as a 6’7″ powerhouse, green or otherwise.
Now with full command of her powers, Jenn would join the Avengers and soon be wisked off with many other heroes and villains to Battleworld to fight in the Secret Wars for a cosmic being’s amusement. When she returned she’d take the Thing’s place on the Fantastic Four where she’d forge a bond with the team that continues to this day. During a mission, Jenn would learn that exposure to radiation would cause her to become more like her cousin’s Hulk than her normal lucid experience.
Going back to the Avengers, Jenn would have such experiences as being mind controlled into joining the circus, fighting a living hill, and representing a former Golden Age hero by getting her a new comic book so she can live forever like Cap and Namor have been able to. While working with teammate Jack of Hearts, Jenn would be exposed to his ability to absorb and retain radioactive energy due to the Scarlet Witch’s manipulation (she was not in her right mind at this time) this would cause her to go feral again and end up killing the Vision by ripping him in half. Jack of Hearts, now back in control of his own powers used his abilities to bring Jenn back into balance. When she finally regained control, Jenn was mortified to learn what she had done, along with nearly destroying a whole small town and that the entire Avengers team couldn’t stop her when she was feral.
Quitting the Avengers, Jenn would focus on being a lawyer. This would become extremely useful as the Superhero Registration Act went into effect and Jenn learned something new. While in She-Hulk form, she found herself being pro-registration, but while as just human Jenn, she sided with anti-registration. These mixed views allowed her to help both sides in different ways. Such as putting Spider-Man’s lawsuits against him, now publicly known as Peter Parker. were stuck in red tape. She would also defend Speedball, now called Penance, who had been responsible for the tragedy that lead to the Registration Act.
Eventually, Jenn would disagree with Tony Stark on some of his tactics, this was when she’d learned that Tony had implanted her with nanites to stop her from being She-Hulk, Amadeus Cho would help her eliminate these for a time until a more permanent solution could be found. Her cousin had, unknown to her, been shot into space and had returned with an army of people near her power level in strength and durability. During World War Hulk, Jenn would get her powers back from Tony so she could fight against her cousin’s Hulk and his armies. She would help people escape Manhattan and get captured for a time to fight in gladiatorial battles.
Soon after World War Hulk ends, Jenn would be taken to another dimension to defend her universe from being destroyed, she won the case and both universes were allowed to co-exist. For a time, but we’ll get back to that later. It is through messing with dimensional travel that Jenn is able to meet an alternative version of herself and gain her own powers back permanently.
A Red Hulk and Red She-Hulk appear and while Jenn spends time and money to investigate who they are, she is presumably killed by the Red She-Hulk. Jenn doesn’t have time to die though and is put into stasis until she is later rescued. Jenn would team up with Red She-Hulk to fight the one responsible for manipulating them into fighting in the first place. Back in action Jenn would work for the Future Foundation, the team in place of the Fantastic Four who had gone dimension hopping and was the lawyer for the Mighty Avengers team.
Doc Green was the result of her cousin being infected with the technical virus, Extremis, granting Hulk with Banner’s intellect. This would result in Doc Green finding a way to cure gamma-irradiated individuals like himself and going around eliminating anyone with gamma-based powers. In the end, as the Extremis wore off, Jenn was the only one he deemed better for having her powers and gave her the last vial of cure in case Hulk ever became too dangerous to live, outweighing his usefulness in extreme situations.
During the Battleworld merging of realities, Jenn was the leader of A-Force. A team of superheroes designated to protect their section of Battleworld. When reality came back to normal, a Jenn who had no recollection of this old world found herself in charge of a team made of her fellow A-Force teammates with only one of them remembering their prior adventures.
There you have it folks! She-Hulk is one of my absolute favorites. If I had to get gamma radiation all up on me, I’d want to turn out like her. Jenn uses her lawyers skills to help her friends, who constantly seem to need them, and her brawn when push comes to shove. See you next time!
Suggested Reading
Savage She-Hulk
Sensational She-Hulk
She-Hulk
A-Force
Dr. Bustos
drbustos@comicattack.net
