A Marvel Superhero Just Twerked On Screen

Well, no one called that.

By Michileen Martin | Published

This article is more than 2 years old

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SPOILERS for She-Hulk Episode 3 incoming! You’ve been warned!

In 2019’s Avengers: Endgame, we saw a Marvel superhero–Mark Ruffalo‘s Hulk–dab. In last year’s Eternals Kumail Nanjiani’s Kingo became the first Marvel superhero to work as a Bollywood leading man while playing another Marvel superhero (Richard Madden’s Ikaris). And now, She-Hulk: Attorney at Law brings us a new MCU cultural milestone. The third episode of She-Hulk streamed Thursday on Disney+ and the end credits scene of “The People vs. Emil Blonsky” shows She-Hulk twerking.

That’s right: She-Hulk twerks and some fans are losing their minds about it. Some background: One of the storylines from “The People vs. Emil Blonsky” involves Jen’s (Tatiana Maslany) old meat-headed colleague Dennis Bukowski (Drew Matthews)–the same guy who tries to replace Jen in delivering the closing argument in the premiere episode–being fooled by a shape-shifting Asgardian Elf (Peg O’Keef) into believing he was dating rapper Megan Thee Stallion and spending close to $200 thousand on her. Dennis wins his case and Megan herself makes a cameo in the courtroom, celebrating that the woman who dared impersonate her has been defeated. In the end-credits scene, Jen’s boss Holden Holliway (Steve Coulter) walks by her office, where he sees Megan signing on to become She-Hulk’s client, and the pair dancing in celebration. You can see a clip of the moment below.

It’s a funny end to perhaps the funniest episode of She-Hulk: Attorney at Law so far, but a lot of fans are losing their cool over it. Most of the outrage seems to be coming from a very specific corner of fandom that decided to dislike She-Hulk long before the first episode streamed, who are using the allegations that surfaced last month of VFX artists enduring abusive working conditions to justify hating something they were poised to hate regardless. It is, by the way, somewhat disturbingly telling just how many of the fans complaining about She-Hulk twerking are doing it with gifs of Homelander from The Boys. You can see some examples below.

https://twitter.com/Hey___Beter/status/1565285083916877824

There were, of course, plenty of other reactions to the She-Hulk twerking scene. A lot of fans enjoyed the end-credits laugh, and some enjoyed it for some other obvious reasons. Still others added some hilarious and pointed responses to the critics. You can see examples of that below.

https://twitter.com/216_TheOne/status/1565298105637126150
https://twitter.com/conniestheo/status/1565386827795660803
https://twitter.com/litha_ntushelo/status/1565392934299656192
https://twitter.com/FaceTheNathan/status/1565399372623396866

That last tweet makes a damn good point, arguing that John Byrne–who wrote and drew Sensational She-Hulk, the comic from which the Disney+ series takes most of its inspiration, as well drawing and writing the fan-favorite Fantastic Four run in which she joined the team–seemingly had no qualms about drawing the hero in sexy and suggestive poses. So anyone arguing that making She-Hulk twerk has somehow taken dignity away from the character might want to do as much as five minutes researching the source material first. Some examples of the pre-Disney+ purity on display in the hero’s comics are on display below.

she-hulk
Sensational She-Hulk #34, Marvel Comics 1991
Sensational She-Hulk #39, Marvel Comics 1992
Sensational She-Hulk #40, Marvel Comics 1992
Sensational She-Hulk #43, Marvel Comics 1992

Look at all that dignity! What happened to the good ol’ days? The fourth episode of She-Hulk: Attorney at Law is due to stream next Thursday on Disney+