Marvel Studios' She-Hulk: Attorney at Law is officially up and running with Episode 1 now available to stream for the world on Disney+. But leading up to the final episodic Disney+ series of Phase 4, Marvel hasn't had an easy road in bringing this exciting new story to life.
The issue that's been most front and center has been the show's use of CGI, which takes on challenges that Marvel's never seen before due to its leading character being largely computer-generated. While fans have seen some improvements in this regard, more recent trailers and final footage have started to calm fans' worries to some extent.
But on top of just the CGI work, rumors hinted that some She-Hulk was causing concerns behind-the-scenes during the post-production process as well, with many worried that it wouldn't land the way Marvel hoped it would.
Although the reaction to the series' first four episodes has been overwhelmingly positive thus far, a new report detailed some of the major changes that actually took place within that first set of episodes ahead of the series' debut.
She-Hulk Changed Episode 1 Post-Filming
Speaking with Variety, She-Hulk: Attorney at Law head writer Jessica Gao shared some insight into how Episode 1 changed during the post-production process.
Gao revealed that the show's episode order was actually adjusted, as most of the first episode originally appeared in Episode 8, instead of showing the origin story right off the bat:
"The episode order was slightly different — we changed things up a little bit in post. Most of the pilot that you see was actually Episode 8. We waited until the very end of the season to really reveal her origin story."
When asked why this decision was made, she felt that people simply "wanted to know that information sooner," not wanting to wait so long to find out about Jennifer Walters' origin story:
"There were several factors leading up to the decision, but really at the end of the day, we just realized people really wanted to know that information sooner. It was hard for them to not know the origin story and then get to know this character."
This was also a big factor in how much of a crunch there was with regard to the CGI and the VFX work, which Gao admitted "made people scramble" when the story changed so drastically:
"Oh, yeah. I’m sure it was [a crunch]. Switching that up, I’m sure, made people scramble. The VFX artists just have to do an impossible task in general. You know, like, this is such a massive undertaking, and they’re already under such a time crunch."
Where Will She-Hulk's Original Episode 1 Fit Back in?
Warning - the rest of this article contains spoilers for the series premiere of She-Hulk: Attorney at Law.
So what has become of She-Hulk's original first episode? Well, it is likely that Marvel has simply shifted the episodes down the line slightly. Eagle-eyed fans will notice that Jen is currently a deputy district attorney in the series premiere and is actually prosecuting against her future employer GLK&H. Therefore, it is likely that what is now the second episode would have been the premiere, establishing Jen's status quo as a lawyer working for the law firm's superhero division.
Looking at the penultimate episodes of every Marvel Studios Disney+ show thus far, it's usually where much of the leading heroes' backstory comes to the forefront along with plenty of emotional story beats. This includes Wanda's trip down memory lane in WandaVision, Marc Spector having to revisit his traumatic childhood in Moon Knight, and Kamala Khan's blast to the past when she lived through the Partition in India in Ms. Marvel.
Particularly with Jennifer Walters' origin story changing slightly from her comic book counterpart, this show had a tall order in making sure that her beginnings weren't left a mystery, which is why things were altered after the show was initially filmed. Thankfully, fans are already seeing improvements from a CGI front, even with Marvel scrambling to get the show just right, and the story and visuals should only improve further with each passing episode.
Episode 1 of Marvel Studios' She-Hulk: Attorney at Law is now available to stream on Disney+.
