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The Savage She-Hulk #1-25
The Savage She-Hulk Omnibus
The complete original adventures of She-Hulk in one mighty Omnibus! When criminal defense attorney Jennifer Walters is shot by a mob hitman, her cousin saves her life with a blood transfusion—but that cousin is Bruce Banner and his gamma-irradiated blood turns her into the Savage She-Hulk! Suddenly, she’s a mean, green lawyering machine, and criminals the world over had better watch out. Conflict rages not just between She-Hulk and the many super-powered enemies in store, but between Jennifer Walters and She-Hulk! Our heroine’s two halves are in a battle for control as She-Hulk fights transforming back into Jen Walters, while Jen risks losing herself in the She-Hulk’s power. And each has their own separate romantic interest — it ain’t easy being green. Savage She-Hulk (1980) 1-25, Marvel Two-in-One (1974) 88
648 pages, Hardcover
First published April 20, 2022
4 people are currently reading
59 people want to read
About the author
David Anthony Kraft
329 books5 followersDavid Anthony Kraft was an American comic book writer, publisher, and critic.
(source: Wikipedia)
(source: Wikipedia)
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Displaying 1 - 11 of 11 reviews
July 26, 2022
This omnibus ended up being decent enough. The best parts were the first several issues and the final few issues. Jen is working a high profile case and the mobsters decide to take her out. She gets shot then, like most people have heard, Bruce Banner gives her a blood transfusion with his blood to save her. Now she turns into the She-Hulk!! These beginning issues were a lot of fun watching Jen try to keep her alter ego a secret. When she would get angry, she would have to run off so no one would see her change. I found it funny how she was always conveniently wearing a white blouse when this happens so she was always in that white tattered top/dress you see her in on the cover. There was her childhood friend she grew up with that was younger than her but had a crush on her. His name was ridiculous. Zapper. Plus, even thought he was supposed to be younger than Jen, probably early 20s, he was drawn looking older than everybody. Looked mid 40s 😂😂 Then you have the other guy she meets, Richard Rory and the 3 way love triangle they all get caught up in. Some good laughs there even though it wasn’t meant to be funny. They introduce a fall out between Jen and her dad. Great idea for a story beat but the reason for the fallout wasn’t that executed well. However, as their issue rolled on it worked as a good side plot along with her dads new girlfriend. I knew she was up to something. The last several issues had Jen dealing with this new crime boss, Shade. He kept sending a bunch of powered folks after She-Hulk which made for some cool battles. Overall, I enough fun with this to get some enjoyment out of it. Vosburg’s art was pretty good throughout. Anyway, Sensational She-Hulk up next!!
October 7, 2023
(Zero spoiler review)
I've got to admit, I didn't know if I was going to make it through this one. Or if I did, I didn't think I was going to be holding onto it after I did. Now I can't foresee a reread of this anywhere in the near, or even the far future, but after a noticeable increase in quality, and direction around the half way point, we ended up with something that was at least enjoyable enough, though not at all particularly memorable.
I'm wondering whether it was continual editorial interference constantly changing the theme and general direction of the book, but throughout the opening half of its run, this title just didn't know what it should be. Amply demonstrated through falling back on a number of well worn comic tropes, not to mention being about as reliable as an expensive knock off watch you get on the cheap on an Asian vacation. This book really struggled to know what it wanted it's main character to be/do etc. I'm wondering if fans didn't initially respond very well to the premise of derivative characters, with editorial throwing every trick they knew at this thing to try and get it to sell. They didn't print the letters pages here. What with this being a very small book as far as an omnibus' goes, I can't imagine they wouldn't have wanted the extra few pages to pad this thing out. Unless of course, nobody was all that complimentary back in the day. We used to call these people fans, and their opinions and feedback were used to make things better, to make more money. Now we call them every hateful thing under the sun and try and destroy them, and drive them from the things they love, that they've supported for years. I couldn't blame them, given what I initially read as well. Then again, I'm just guessing. Like I said, it got better, but not by a hell of a lot.
Vosburg's art was a highlight throughout, although some of the inkers they stuck him with (right as the stories were really going nowhere) didn't make matters any better. The quality started strong, died off, then mostly came back by the end. Whatever failings this book had, you couldn't really blame Vosburg for them. Then again, the writer showed he had the chops to tell a decent story now and then. Whether it was editorial restraining him, or maybe his own less than stellar skills, again I couldn't say. Getting canned after 25 issues doesn't exactly speak volumes for its reception back then. But hey, you wanna see a really shit She Hulk, look at the modern artists representation, or try your luck with the Disney Plus show. That will make this look like a masterpiece. Decent, but not really recommended. 3/5
OmniBen.
I've got to admit, I didn't know if I was going to make it through this one. Or if I did, I didn't think I was going to be holding onto it after I did. Now I can't foresee a reread of this anywhere in the near, or even the far future, but after a noticeable increase in quality, and direction around the half way point, we ended up with something that was at least enjoyable enough, though not at all particularly memorable.
I'm wondering whether it was continual editorial interference constantly changing the theme and general direction of the book, but throughout the opening half of its run, this title just didn't know what it should be. Amply demonstrated through falling back on a number of well worn comic tropes, not to mention being about as reliable as an expensive knock off watch you get on the cheap on an Asian vacation. This book really struggled to know what it wanted it's main character to be/do etc. I'm wondering if fans didn't initially respond very well to the premise of derivative characters, with editorial throwing every trick they knew at this thing to try and get it to sell. They didn't print the letters pages here. What with this being a very small book as far as an omnibus' goes, I can't imagine they wouldn't have wanted the extra few pages to pad this thing out. Unless of course, nobody was all that complimentary back in the day. We used to call these people fans, and their opinions and feedback were used to make things better, to make more money. Now we call them every hateful thing under the sun and try and destroy them, and drive them from the things they love, that they've supported for years. I couldn't blame them, given what I initially read as well. Then again, I'm just guessing. Like I said, it got better, but not by a hell of a lot.
Vosburg's art was a highlight throughout, although some of the inkers they stuck him with (right as the stories were really going nowhere) didn't make matters any better. The quality started strong, died off, then mostly came back by the end. Whatever failings this book had, you couldn't really blame Vosburg for them. Then again, the writer showed he had the chops to tell a decent story now and then. Whether it was editorial restraining him, or maybe his own less than stellar skills, again I couldn't say. Getting canned after 25 issues doesn't exactly speak volumes for its reception back then. But hey, you wanna see a really shit She Hulk, look at the modern artists representation, or try your luck with the Disney Plus show. That will make this look like a masterpiece. Decent, but not really recommended. 3/5
OmniBen.
December 18, 2023
I'm guessing this was given the omnibus treatment because of the television show (which by all accounts was dire.) It's not a bad series but it's not a masterwork either. Defense lawyer Jennifer Walters is shot by a mobster and requires a blood transfusion, which she gets from her cousin Bruce Banner, and she becomes a hulk of her very own. Lots of subplots here, including the Jen/She-Hulk dichotomy, estrangement from her sheriff father, a love triangle with two boyfriends (one for each persona), and a war with the L.A. mobs. David Anthony Kraft was a friend and collaborator of Steve Gerber (Howard the Duck, The Defenders) and some of that sensibility is on display here with the tongue-in-cheek villains and social satire. He even brings back Richard Rory from Gerber's Man-Thing run, a character I rather liked as well. (Too bad about him.) I had a handful of the original issues but this is my first time reading the whole thing straight through. Though not a "graphic novel" it works well as a unified work. As DAK mentions in his introduction, there are few cliffhangers but everything still feels connected and flows along smoothly. An enjoyable slice of Marvel circa 1980.
August 10, 2024
Whew, that was a wild and messy ride, but you know what? I kinda enjoyed it.
September 18, 2023
She-Hulk is one of my favorite Marvel characters. If she weren't this is a two star book. Kraft's story lines rarely move the needle and he saddles both Jen Walters and She Hulk with love interests that feel like fanboy self inserts including Zapper Ridge, a medical student Jen Walters used to babysit who She Hulk eventually deflowers on a California beach and the last issue where she only agrees to help the Thing prevent a "China Syndrome" style attack on a nuclear power plant if he agrees to a romantic weekend with her. While the action in the series is solidly grounded in a mixture of mob bosses and mad scientists that feel pleasantly low stakes in comic terms and Kraft does a decent job weaving Jen Walters law work with the She-Hulks ragey fisticuffs, the human interactions at the heart of The Savage She-Hulk are mostly gross and spoiled this omnibus for me.
November 25, 2025
While John Byrne’s take on her has defined the character for all time, there’s a surprisingly strong core of personality already in place during this early run. It should be noted that in the first issue, penned by Stan Lee, there’s a hint of the fourth wall breaking that Byrne would bring to the character, when the narrator lists Bruce Banner’s various first names, which differed between early issues of his own comic and the TV-show.
The interconnected nature of the Marvel universe makes the world feel alive in a very organic way. There’s the obvious point of contact in that Jen gets her powers from her cousin via a gamma-irradiated blood transfusion, but Bruce Banner disappears from the story after that. In his place, we get to see stolen tech from Stark Industries (and later Iron Man himself), Dr. Michael Morbius, whose specialty as a scientist is more relevant here than his vampirism, and of course the book really comes to its own when Kraft grabs a character from Steve Gerber’s Man-Thing/Omega the Unknown books, Richard Rory, and adds him to the mix of Jen’s life.
Jen is not a repressed woman. Earlier on, the way she wrapped an arm around his neighbour and childhood friend Zapper’s leg while watching TV implied a great deal of intimacy, but after running into Rory? Within a few pages of meeting him they’re in the back of his car making out, and she’s the one who initiates the physical stuff after his invitation for a date. She goes after Rory as Jen and after Zapper as She-Hulk. Doing whatever she wants rather than trying to please others becomes a defining character trait for her. The love triangle of sorts (or is it a rectangle?) that is born here causes some friction, mostly for the men.
In his second introduction, writer David Anthony Kraft talks about how far Jen has come at the end of his run, driving around in a pink convertible as the She-Hulk, one she obtained after lending her talents to the use of a used car salesman (who speaks only in rhyme both on and off camera) and emphasizes just how much he got past the Comics Code Authority in having Jen date multiple men at once. This liberal stance is taken even further in the Marvel Two-in-One issue, where Jen practically forces herself on Bashful Ben Grimm, who doesn’t know what to do with her.
It does take a while for Jen to get to that point, though. Early on, typically for superhero comics, she attempts to maintain a dual identity, and a shockingly large number of people fail to connect the dots between the disappearing Jen and the appearing She-Hulk. As far as I noticed, only Rory ever deduces what’s going on. We see her go from transforming out of anger like the original Hulk to controlling her transformations to deciding to just stay the She-Hulk all the time, getting closer and closer to the way the character is known to be today, and the whole journey is told as a logical succession of events. Jen comes to accept being She-Hulk and so does society, despite her being a target for manhunts early on.
Jen’s father, Sheriff Walters is a prominent figure as the leader of those manhunts, a decidedly torn figure, and one of the more interesting cast members. Like a lot of the best writers in comics, Kraft seems in his element when writing human drama, besides which the superhero hijinks seem almost like filler. Walters’ wife, Jen’s mother, was killed by the mob, and he was consumed by the obsession of his work, leading to such obsession that a wedge began to drive itself between him and his daughter: throughout the series, when Jen defends someone in court, as her professional ethics require her to do, her father views this as an affront to what he sees as right.
Think on this. A man who is sworn to uphold the law, his daughter who has sworn likewise, and yet for her to do what is required of her is… wrong? Sheriff Walters is not in full, rational control of himself. He’s being torn away from his daughter by three different forces: the mentioned conflict between their differences in opinion on matters of the law, his hunt for the She-Hulk on murder charges and finally Beverly, a sort of wicked stepmother archetype, who keeps trying to get father and daughter to separate for her own benefit, and even she has her own backstory and how she turned out the way she did.
Nuance permeates the people in Jen’s life. Buck Bukowski is the assistant district attorney, a smug, arrogant, seemingly slimy man who antagonizes Jen at court, but within the very second issue throws himself recklessly into harm’s way to save her (or so he thinks) but costing an innocent life in the process. When he realizes his culpability in this person’s death, his boisterous personality is deflated. Bukowski is a defender of justice as much as Jen or the sheriff and must endure hardships just as they do. One wouldn’t expect such an antagonist to be both a good person and capable of such
I had no prior experience with David Anthony Kraft save for a few Defenders issues that were collected in the first Moon Knight Epic Collection, but reading Savage She-Hulk has lifted him high in my estimations. The main artist here is Mike Vosburg, who likewise was unknown to me prior to reading this. Savage She-Hulk looks like a 1980s Marvel comic, as is to be expected, but where it shines is in the people, in the domestic scenes, more so than the action or sci-fi weirdness. Writer and artist are well matched, with one preferring to write people and their drama and the other preferring to depict it, with many an interesting, recognizable face or casual gesture or lifelike posture that artists more dedicated to that pure superhero action.
I think of scenes like Rory lying on the couch, getting up and stretching. I think of scenes like She-Hulk kissing Zapper and practically lifting him off his feet for their lips to reach each other, of the page where She-Hulk has taken a car and is driving like a maniac into what she perceives as the freedom of the open road… until she notices she’s almost out of gas and how exuberance deflates. I think of how people slouch or lean on any old thing that might support their weight. It’s all just a little bit more effort than is required to convey the scene, born from observation of how humans exist physically in space and how they act.
This original She-Hulk run is more than just a historical curiosity, it’s good comics in its own right and deserves to be read as such.
The interconnected nature of the Marvel universe makes the world feel alive in a very organic way. There’s the obvious point of contact in that Jen gets her powers from her cousin via a gamma-irradiated blood transfusion, but Bruce Banner disappears from the story after that. In his place, we get to see stolen tech from Stark Industries (and later Iron Man himself), Dr. Michael Morbius, whose specialty as a scientist is more relevant here than his vampirism, and of course the book really comes to its own when Kraft grabs a character from Steve Gerber’s Man-Thing/Omega the Unknown books, Richard Rory, and adds him to the mix of Jen’s life.
Jen is not a repressed woman. Earlier on, the way she wrapped an arm around his neighbour and childhood friend Zapper’s leg while watching TV implied a great deal of intimacy, but after running into Rory? Within a few pages of meeting him they’re in the back of his car making out, and she’s the one who initiates the physical stuff after his invitation for a date. She goes after Rory as Jen and after Zapper as She-Hulk. Doing whatever she wants rather than trying to please others becomes a defining character trait for her. The love triangle of sorts (or is it a rectangle?) that is born here causes some friction, mostly for the men.
In his second introduction, writer David Anthony Kraft talks about how far Jen has come at the end of his run, driving around in a pink convertible as the She-Hulk, one she obtained after lending her talents to the use of a used car salesman (who speaks only in rhyme both on and off camera) and emphasizes just how much he got past the Comics Code Authority in having Jen date multiple men at once. This liberal stance is taken even further in the Marvel Two-in-One issue, where Jen practically forces herself on Bashful Ben Grimm, who doesn’t know what to do with her.
It does take a while for Jen to get to that point, though. Early on, typically for superhero comics, she attempts to maintain a dual identity, and a shockingly large number of people fail to connect the dots between the disappearing Jen and the appearing She-Hulk. As far as I noticed, only Rory ever deduces what’s going on. We see her go from transforming out of anger like the original Hulk to controlling her transformations to deciding to just stay the She-Hulk all the time, getting closer and closer to the way the character is known to be today, and the whole journey is told as a logical succession of events. Jen comes to accept being She-Hulk and so does society, despite her being a target for manhunts early on.
Jen’s father, Sheriff Walters is a prominent figure as the leader of those manhunts, a decidedly torn figure, and one of the more interesting cast members. Like a lot of the best writers in comics, Kraft seems in his element when writing human drama, besides which the superhero hijinks seem almost like filler. Walters’ wife, Jen’s mother, was killed by the mob, and he was consumed by the obsession of his work, leading to such obsession that a wedge began to drive itself between him and his daughter: throughout the series, when Jen defends someone in court, as her professional ethics require her to do, her father views this as an affront to what he sees as right.
Think on this. A man who is sworn to uphold the law, his daughter who has sworn likewise, and yet for her to do what is required of her is… wrong? Sheriff Walters is not in full, rational control of himself. He’s being torn away from his daughter by three different forces: the mentioned conflict between their differences in opinion on matters of the law, his hunt for the She-Hulk on murder charges and finally Beverly, a sort of wicked stepmother archetype, who keeps trying to get father and daughter to separate for her own benefit, and even she has her own backstory and how she turned out the way she did.
Nuance permeates the people in Jen’s life. Buck Bukowski is the assistant district attorney, a smug, arrogant, seemingly slimy man who antagonizes Jen at court, but within the very second issue throws himself recklessly into harm’s way to save her (or so he thinks) but costing an innocent life in the process. When he realizes his culpability in this person’s death, his boisterous personality is deflated. Bukowski is a defender of justice as much as Jen or the sheriff and must endure hardships just as they do. One wouldn’t expect such an antagonist to be both a good person and capable of such
I had no prior experience with David Anthony Kraft save for a few Defenders issues that were collected in the first Moon Knight Epic Collection, but reading Savage She-Hulk has lifted him high in my estimations. The main artist here is Mike Vosburg, who likewise was unknown to me prior to reading this. Savage She-Hulk looks like a 1980s Marvel comic, as is to be expected, but where it shines is in the people, in the domestic scenes, more so than the action or sci-fi weirdness. Writer and artist are well matched, with one preferring to write people and their drama and the other preferring to depict it, with many an interesting, recognizable face or casual gesture or lifelike posture that artists more dedicated to that pure superhero action.
I think of scenes like Rory lying on the couch, getting up and stretching. I think of scenes like She-Hulk kissing Zapper and practically lifting him off his feet for their lips to reach each other, of the page where She-Hulk has taken a car and is driving like a maniac into what she perceives as the freedom of the open road… until she notices she’s almost out of gas and how exuberance deflates. I think of how people slouch or lean on any old thing that might support their weight. It’s all just a little bit more effort than is required to convey the scene, born from observation of how humans exist physically in space and how they act.
This original She-Hulk run is more than just a historical curiosity, it’s good comics in its own right and deserves to be read as such.
May 21, 2022
So, I’ve read all these issues before. As recently as last year. But I jumped at the chance to get them in omnibus form.
She-Hulk doesn’t get nearly the credit she deserves for being a fairly progressive feminist comic book. It’s comic book elements are all pretty formulaic and villain of the month (no problems with that). But Jen Walters’ struggles to be an attorney in the 70s are all pretty well done. The author was making a conscious effort to do this. His forwards to each major beat in the Jen Walters/She-Hulk’s first epic run are definitely worth reading.
The format is great. The paper is good and there is some fun backSpace material. Layouts, different artists’ interpretations etc. My own copy has a very nice Frank Cho cover.
My only major criticism of this volume is that it left out the thing that has made these omnibus volumes so jazzy for me.
The reprinted letters pages. These are gems and should totally be put in all omnibus editions. They provide such a fascinating window into the readership and the times these books were written in.
That is why I can only give this otherwise glorious edition 4 rather than 5 stars.
She-Hulk doesn’t get nearly the credit she deserves for being a fairly progressive feminist comic book. It’s comic book elements are all pretty formulaic and villain of the month (no problems with that). But Jen Walters’ struggles to be an attorney in the 70s are all pretty well done. The author was making a conscious effort to do this. His forwards to each major beat in the Jen Walters/She-Hulk’s first epic run are definitely worth reading.
The format is great. The paper is good and there is some fun backSpace material. Layouts, different artists’ interpretations etc. My own copy has a very nice Frank Cho cover.
My only major criticism of this volume is that it left out the thing that has made these omnibus volumes so jazzy for me.
The reprinted letters pages. These are gems and should totally be put in all omnibus editions. They provide such a fascinating window into the readership and the times these books were written in.
That is why I can only give this otherwise glorious edition 4 rather than 5 stars.
October 11, 2022
A very fun read.
July 8, 2024
These are from the original short-lived run of the She-Hulk, the first issue scripted by Stan Lee and penciled by the legendary John Buscema, and the rest a consistent crew of David Anthony Kraft writing and Mike Vosburg on art.
I've enjoyed Vosburg's art ever since I first caught sight of it in an issue of John Carter Warlord of Mars and he doesn't disappoint here, though I lean slightly more toward the issues inked by Chic Stone. The stories here are of a somewhat more serious bent than those of the John Byrne and Dan Slott eras.
Those eras are full of downright silliness that only Byrne manages to (mostly) pull off due to his artwork and layouts. This omnibus is full of solid stories that are still a lot of fun, and I find it vastly preferable to the Slott era.
I've enjoyed Vosburg's art ever since I first caught sight of it in an issue of John Carter Warlord of Mars and he doesn't disappoint here, though I lean slightly more toward the issues inked by Chic Stone. The stories here are of a somewhat more serious bent than those of the John Byrne and Dan Slott eras.
Those eras are full of downright silliness that only Byrne manages to (mostly) pull off due to his artwork and layouts. This omnibus is full of solid stories that are still a lot of fun, and I find it vastly preferable to the Slott era.
February 15, 2023
I've been wanting to read this series for a bit, and finally got the omnibus for Christmas so I didn't have to wait to collect all the original issues. I jumped into it and enjoyed the nostalgia of 1970's Marvel, but also grew dissatisfied with some of it. The constant recaps were a staple of Marvel philosophy back then but trying to read the book as a whole, it became burdensome. As an origin of the character, it was pretty fun to read to see how far we have come. From a psuedo-split personality to her own woman, she quickly established herself as not just a clone of her cousin. I'm definitely glad I added it to my bookshelf.
March 13, 2023
She-Hulk has always been subject to a lot of mixed feelings from Marvel Comics fans. She's just one of those characters where you either love her or hate her, it seems. And if you are one of those who love her, look no further than her original first series. Yes, a disclaimer is almost completely necessary: this series was published between 1980 and 1982, and as such does indeed fall victim of the shortcomings of comics from this era when viewed through a modern lens. But take that away and we have a great introduction to a brand new hero that feels like she could become the next big thing. To this day it is agreed that She-Hulk's origin story is one of the most interesting and intriguing out there: a car accident intentionally caused by the mob to take hotshot new lawyer Jennifer Walters off a case that could spell trouble for them leaves her in dire need of a blood transfusion, and of course the only person with a matching type that could perform a transfusion in time is her cousin Bruce Banner - a.k.a. the Incredible Hulk! He knows this will save Jen's life, but also condemn her to suffer the same gamma radiation blood disease that turns him into the verdant juggernaut he hates so much. A very well-crafted and believable dilemma on the writers' part, with the only "deus ex machina" being that he just so happened to be in town this particular day. The following issues depict Jen's struggle to find what it means to have these new powers, and how to balance her real life while also beating the tar out of big bad guys. Her ability to stay mostly herself during the transformation allows for far more interesting dialogue and plot developments than her cousin, at times. But what makes the series really great is Jen's eventual acceptance of herself, and deciding to transform permanently. She is an outstanding character with a lot going for her, and in a lot of ways some would say better than her predecessor. "Savage" laid the foundation for things to come, and is an excellent start to an excellent superhero.
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