She-Hulk: Attorney at Law is close on the horizon as Tatiana Maslany joins the MCU as Jennifer Walters. The series has had a less than easy road to hitting Disney+, having to deal with the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, as well as complaints from a subsection of fans over the project's CGI. The crew behind the show, along with Marvel Studios President Kevin Feige, have assured audiences that the series coming together and will look indeed spick and span by the time of its debut.
As evidenced by the series' Comic-Con Hall H trailer, She-Hulk has plenty of surprises including some Malcolm in the Middle-style fourth-wall breaks, and an appearance from Charlie Cox's Daredevil. But surely as is the way with every MCU trailer, there is a lot more hidden away in each of She-Hulk's nine episodes.
However, what to and what not to include in every piece of marketing is a delicate dance amongst movie and TV studios. And apparently, in She-Hulk's case, things got a little heated (in a fun way) on the matter.
Hulking-Out on Kevin Feige
During the She-Hulk official press conference, series head writer and executive producer Jessica Gao, along with star Tatiana Maslany and director Kat Coiro, revealed that the recent San Diego Comic-Con trailer for the series caused some tension between the crew and Marvel Studios President Kevin Feige.
When asked what their memories were of the Hall H Marvel Studios panel, Gao said that she just remembers "sniping" at Kevin Feige the whole time backstage, as the pair had just "spent weeks fighting about what should go in the trailer:"
“While we were watching the trailer [at SDCC], because Kevin [Feige] was standing next to me, we had spent weeks fighting about what should go in the trailer and what shouldn’t. And so, it was just the two of us sniping at each other over our respective positions and the pieces that were in the trailer.”
Maslany said that she was "just so thrilled that [they] got to" be a part of such an event and called the crowd "very warm" and "so welcoming:"
“I mean I think I blacked out (laughs)… Yeah, and I was, like, shaking before we got out there. But I do remember being like… first off, I remember the feeling that we all had which was like, just buzzy, giggly, excited. You know, just so thrilled that we got to do this. But then also just like this very warm crowd, who does really… know everything about this universe… way more than some of us do… But they were so welcoming and… also like, ‘Let’s see what this is.’ You know what I mean? And there was a fun interchange there to be able to present the trailer to them. We all laid on the ground truly and watched on the big screen with them, and that was really fun.”
One of the biggest moments of the trailer was the reveal that Matt Murdock (aka Daredevil) and his new yellow and red suit would be a part of the series, to which Coiro called "a huge relief" for not having to keep a secret anymore:
“It was nice not to keep Daredevil a secret too. That was a huge relief.”
The group also addressed the fourth-wall breaks seen in the show and how they will be incorporated uniquely. Coiro pointed out that the character has been doing addressing the audience long before some other big names who use the gag, like "Deadpool or Fleabag:"
“Well, I like to say that she was doing it long before Deadpool or Fleabag…”
Gao broke down the process of introducing these turn-to-the-camera moments, saying there were "a lot of evolutionary steps" to get to what they ultimately look like in the series. The writer even mentioned the idea of on-screen "editor’s notes" at one point, with Jennifer Walters actually "actually interacting with [them]" as they appeared:
“If you know anything about She-Hulk as a character, you would know [about her fourth wall breaks]… We really talked– it went through a lot of evolutionary steps. A long of like, ‘How much is she talking to camera? Is she talking directly to the audience? Is there another meta element? Is she talking to somebody else that’s more behind the scenes?’ You know? At one point, there was an iteration in the script where, instead of really talking directly to camera, there were text boxes that were editor’s notes that were like the comic books, how there were editor’s notes in comics. And she was actually interacting with the editor’s notes that would be on screen. We did eventually scrap that idea, but I mean, we went through a lot of different versions of how she could do it.”
The Fight Over She-Hulk
While Gao, Maslany, and Coiro can joke about it now, it is obvious that there were some high-tension moments in the lead-up to that Comic-Con trailer being given the green light. This is probably the case with nearly every piece of Marvel marketing at this point, but it is one that is rarely ever made public.
What would be interesting to know is: who was on what side of the argument? It can be assumed that one major point of contention was the reveal of Daredevil that ultimately made it into the trailer. But who was pushing for what? Was Kevin Feige the one saying that Charlie Cox's Man Without Fear should be there? Or was it the other way around?
From the sounds of it, Gao was the one who didn't want that reveal to be included in the lead-up to release. Instead, it seems that she wanted to have fans find out he was there when he shows up wherever he does in the run of the series. But that is a total assumption, and She-Hulk could be hiding even more secrets, that were not brought up prior to that first episode's premiere.
She-Hulk: Attorney at Law is slated to start its nine-episode run on Disney+ on August 18.
