Before Tatiana Maslany, Marvel's She-Hulk Was Nearly Played By An '80s Action Star

She-Hulk made her first television appearance on the animated series "The Incredible Hulk," which aired for a single season from 1982-1983 (with Victoria Carroll voicing the character). At the time, She-Hulk, aka. Jennifer Walters, was a relatively new character, having made her first appearance in Marvel's comics in 1979. It's entirely likely that "She-Hulk" was a response to the dual successes of the TV series "The Incredible Hulk" and "The Bionic Woman." Creator Stan Lee may have felt that it was high time to combine the two into Jennifer Walters, the cousin of Bruce Banner.

Then, in 1989, She-Hulk was given a Marvel Comics solo series titled "The Sensational She-Hulk," and the tone of the comic dramatically changed. She-Hulk was now a self-aware comedic character who regularly broke the fourth wall, tore through her own panels, and yelled at the writers of her own books. "The Sensational She-Hulk" was also a lascivious comic series, often presented with a lot of cheesecake drawings of the titular character. Its writer would even point out how such drawings were actually exploiting women, lampshading any accusations of sexism.

Eventually, the character began turning up on TV more and more, at least in animated form. She was voiced by Cree Summer in the 1990s "Incredible Hulk" cartoon series and played by the likes of Katee Sackhoff, Eliza Dushku, and Tiffani Amber Thiessen in various other animated projects. Finally, She-Hulk became part of the Marvel Cinematic Universe in 2022 with the show "She-Hulk: Attorney at Law," with Tatiana Maslany portraying Jennifer Walters in her non-Hulk state in live-action and She-Hulk via CGI and motion capture.

However, back in the early 1990s, an effort was made to produce a live-action "She-Hulk" film, with '80s action star Brigitte Nielsen headlining and horror movie luminary Larry Cohen directing.

Brigitte Nielsen was an excellent choice to play She-Hulk, as she was an outsize screen presence and already an action star by the 1990s. She had technically even dipped her toe into the Marvel Universe back when she made her big screen debut in 1985's "Red Sonja." You see, Robert E. Howard invented the character Red Sonya of Rogatino and is cited in the film's credits, but Red Sonja is the name of a Marvel Comics character inspired by Howard's creation. That means "Red Sonja" is the first true Marvel movie (in some sense, anyway).

In addition, Nielsen had appeared in "Rocky IV," "Cobra," "Beverly Hills Cop II," and played the lead in the 1988 Italian thriller "Domino" by the time the live-action "She-Hulk" movie entered development. She really was an ideal choice for Jennifer Walters.

Digital Spy published a piece about the Larry Cohen/Brigitte Nielsen "She-Hulk" feature film in 2020, and it seems that the project came quite close to happening. Cohen, as many cineastes know, was the director of notoriously daring horror movies like "It's Alive," "Q — The Winged Serpent," the killer yogurt film "The Stuff," and the utterly, utterly baffling cult flick "God Told Me To." Digital Spy noted that Cohen came on board the project first, and Nielsen followed. The two even staged a publicity photo with Nielsen in greenish makeup and wearing a very '90s superheroine costume. From the looks of the image, Cohen was going to make She-Hulk a grey-skinned creature with green lipstick and eye shadow. It's not a bad look, honestly. 

The film, however, seems to have stalled out after that, and it's not altogether as to why.

The casting of Brigitte Nielsen, combined with the steely look of the publicity photo, leads one to believe that Larry Cohen's "She-Hulk" was meant to be something of an action thriller. Indeed, Nielsen would've surely been able to convincingly smash through walls with aplomb. Still, it's unclear why the film was canceled. One might safely assume it was an issue of budgeting, scheduling, a bad script, and/or all the other usual things that prevent movies from being made in Hollywood. 

Moreover, both Hulk and She-Hulk had a rocky time making the leap to live-action. In 2003, director Ang Lee directed the contemplative, analytical film "Hulk" starring Eric Bana, Nick Nolte, and Jennifer Connolly. The masses were initially mixed on the movie, although "Hulk" has since been reexamined and found a new audience. Then, in 2008, Louis Leterrier directed a more action-packed and moderately successful film titled "The Incredible Hulk," which starred Edward Norton and was officially included in the MCU. Finally, Mark Ruffalo took over the role of Hulk in the 2012 movie "The Avengers" and has since become a supporting player in the MCU at large. By then, people finally seemed to love the live-action version of the character. 

With the Hulk established, She-Hulk could finally be inducted into the MCU with "She-Hulk: Attorney at Law." The show, however, was a comedy/legal series about the ins and outs of the legal system in a universe lousy with superheroes. "She-Hulk" also broke the fourth wall a lot, with Tatiana Maslany's Jennifer Walters often talking to the audience directly.

For better or worse, it's a far cry from a 1990s actioner. It's another tale of things that could have been.