'She-Hulk: Attorney at Law' gives Tatiana Maslany a deserving but dated comedic showcase: TV review

No one is more annoyed by the nickname derived from "She-Hulk" than Jennifer Walters, aka She-Hulk herself. On a sharp break from her brooding cousin Bruce ('Avengers' veteran Mark Ruffalo), the reluctant lawyer-turned-superheroine (played by 'Orphan Black' star Tatiana Maslany) approaches life with a seductive smile and "let's get it over with." - with that!" sigh. That the public decides to call her "She-Hulk", as if she were nothing more than the female half of Bruce, is certainly an insult - but not one that Jen, a lawyer practiced in the art of smiling and endure constant frustration, may not brush with a well-placed eyeroll.

And so begins "She-Hulk: Lawyer". Marvel's latest swing in adapting a beloved comic book character into a show attempts to both distance itself from the studio's formidable film franchise and incorporate enough of its characteristics to keep fans invested. . From head writer Jessica Gao and director Kat Coiro, and heavily inspired by John Byrne's landmark comics, "She-Hulk" is quite charming as it bounces from one hijink to the next, especially between the capable hands of Maslany. But between her obligations to the larger Marvel Cinematic Universe, a much more limited budget than her film peers, and attempts to infuse Jen's story with a dated #girlboss energy, "She-Hulk" also represents an act of unstable balance that requires more time than it probably needs to settle into its own rhythm.

Though the 9-episode series is largely the quirky legal drama its title suggests, the first episode (premiering August 18 on Disney+) is all about Bruce trying to teach Jen the ways to be. "a Hulk" on some remote -tropical island pier. It might be daring to start a show with an episode that looks nothing like the ones to come, but in that case it's also somewhat necessary. Getting to know Jen in direct contrast to Bruce's Hulk, who spent most of her decade on screen as the self-flagellating straight man of the Avengers, is crucial to understanding how she might move the world in her new green skin.

It also helps that Maslany and Ruffalo instantly find a spark of family chemistry even through all the heavy Hulk CGI enveloping them – which, nervous fans should be relieved to hear, is doing better in its final form than the first trailer for the series suggested. (Be sure to stick around for the first mid-credits scene, featuring some really fun comedic work from Maslany as Jen cajoles Bruce for Avengers gossip.) Coira does her best to avoid fights traditionally muddy Marvel by making this one more elastic as the Hulks rush furiously through the palm trees.

While Bruce has spent most of his "Avengers" screen time struggling to keep a grip on reality between transformations, Jen has a stable enough grip on her turbulent emotions that she can shrug things off. shoulders the Hulk character like a comfy sweater rather than letting it weigh him down. As such, Jen has no interest in following Bruce's lead with a "sleazy government contract" when she could simply be keeping the stakes in her day-to-day life relatively low. When the two are together as Hulks, their differences are made more physically apparent; Jen's alter ego looks more like an extremely tall, muscular woman, while Bruce becomes an incredibly muscular colossus.

The reason why, Jen tells her skeptical cousin in an exchange that doubles as the show's thesis statement, is that she just doesn't need to learn self-control from the same way as him. "I'm good at controlling my anger...I do it pretty much every day," she insists. "If I don't, I'll be called 'emotional' or 'difficult', or I could literally get murdered. So I'm an expert at controlling my anger, because I do that infinitely more than you do. This may not be a groundbreaking statement at this point, but it's an undeniably effective way to make the She-Hulk experience markedly different from that of her sinister male counterpart.

As Jen tries to find a new place in the world as She-Hulk and the series shifts into "Lawyer" mode, each episode throws herself at the wall as much as possible to see what might stay behind. beyond Jen's relationship with Bruce and the MCU in general. Will it be Jen's professional life, where her best friend Nikki (Ginger Gonzaga) and her new colleague ("The Other Two" standout Josh Segarra) have to deal with the law's most annoying loopholes? Will it be her love life, in which pretty Jen can't find half as successful as the more sensual she...