Infernal Hulk #1 is an exciting start for the series that pushes our protagonists in a fresh direction. Johnson and Klein are one of the most exciting creative teams going today, and their dive into the dark nature of the Hulk is shaping up to be a classic. Read Full Review

The Infernal Hulk #1 delivers a ferocious reinvention of Marvel's mightiest monster, pairing Johnson's emotionally sharp, lore-rich horror storytelling with Klein's career-best, nightmare-fueled visuals. It's bold, bloody, smart, and instantly grippingprecisely the kind of transformation story Hulk fans will be talking about for years to come. Read Full Review

Kennedy and Klein give readers the perfect beginning to a new kind of Hulk horror series, one where the monster is actually a monster. This is a major change to the Hulk status quo, and it's amazing. I'm sold on this book, and I'm pretty sure you will be too. Read Full Review

While it can help to know what has happened up to this point in Johnson's Hulk run, you can dive into Infernal Hulk #1 without having read what has come before and just appreciate the carnage and destruction. It's an interesting direction and teases something big coming not just for the comic, but the Marvel Universe as a whole. Read Full Review

Infernal Hulk #1 kicks things off with a huge bang of a first issue. Readers get the necessary recap, solid atmospheric buildup, and the reveal of the possessed Hulk is right out of an action-horror movie. The titular Hulk illustrated spectacularly by Nic Klein is great as is the following destruction that's appropriately epic and brutal. And by the end of the comic, the seeds of whats to come in future issues are already being planted. Read Full Review

The Infernal Hulk #1 is bold, bloody, smart, and viciously inventivea reinvention that doesn't feel forced. It feels inevitable. Hulk fans will be talking about this for YEARS because it's not just good it's "why wasn't Hulk always like this? good. It's monstrous, mythic, and metal. If Hulk had a Spotify playlist right now, it'd be 90% horror soundtracks and 10% "somebody help Bruce Banner. Read Full Review

The Infernal Hulk #1 is a brutal, violent, and borderline horror start to a new age and era. The art really encapsulates this perfectly and is absolutely stunning. The story has started off more as a recap than moving the story too forward. This isn't a completely bad thing, as that means there is room to grow. But for anyone who was reading the latest run of The Incredible Hulk, this feels more like a "previously on then a start to a new era Read Full Review

As someone who dips in and out of Hulk books, Im not totally clear on where Infernal Hulk picks up in his recent canon, but I dont necessarily think it matters if youre up-to-date or not because of how impactful the overall package is. For Hulk fans who are current, though, I cant imagine they wouldnt be interested in what promises to be a notable new chapter in the life of Bruce Banner and those unfortunate enough to cross paths with him. Read Full Review

Klein delivers beautiful art, but beyond the well detailed panels, there is no life to the art itself. It seems to just showcase violence for its own sake and nothing of substance. Read Full Review

The good news is that Infernal Hulk seems to be working to restore the status quo and get to a point where we can ignore that gamma radiation was ever canonically the power of Hell. The bad news is that, based on this first issue, it will be a simmering storyline that will read better as a trade paperback than from month to month. It isn't bad, but it seems more likely to confuse new readers than excite them. Read Full Review

For those with taste buds tuned to cosmic horror and mythic guts, The Infernal Hulk #1 is worth a glance. If you're counting on Hulk, Banner, or any recognizable Marvel heroics, consider this issue a ruse: the only smashing you'll get is your expectations, not much more. Read Full Review

Plot
Eldest, the son of the Mother of Horrors, managed to separate Hulk's body from Bruce Banner's, using it as his own and thus beginning the Age of Monsters, where he would start summoning different monsters.

In Kentucky, Eldest, with Hulk's body, attacked the U.S. Army, murdering them with extreme cruelty in very descriptive sequences, in order to create the living city of Gologolthia, a place that became the monster capital of the world and where Eldest's throne was located.

Eldest transformed all these murdered soldiers into monsters under his control.

This news triggered an alert from the Avengers and the Fantastic Four, while Bruce Banner remained unaware of everything that was happening.

This comic has a gloomy and mesmerizing supernatural horror tone.

Art
It has many textures and is sometimes uncomfortable due to the scatological and almost gory details of the monsters; it is undoubtedly an impressive work of art.

Summary
Hulk is the conduit for Eldest and his plan to rule the planet with his army of monsters, who have been plotting this attack for eons.
Visually and narratively captivating more

Unbelievably Good 🤩

It's fine. But for a relaunch, it doesn't really explain much. Unlike Mortal Thor, that worked as a continuation and as a soft relaunch, this doesn't work as well.

I was intrigued by the cover and the title from previews, though admittedly I was not a fan of the previous PKJ run. Outside of some kind of cool Lovecraftian imagery, there is really nothing to see here. There really isn’t much of a story and it just seems like a jumble of violent gory acts. I finished the issue but I won’t be returning for more.

Infernal Hulk #1 looked like a great opportunity to jump back on the Hulk bandwagon, but the mindless violence was a no-go for me. Don't get me wrong, as a horror fan I do enjoy blood and guts, but I hate it when the gore is portrayed as comedic, which is the case here. I would usually attribute it to an incapable artist, but Nic Klein knows exactly what he‘s doing.
What makes this issue even more of a disappointment, is that it pretty much continues a story from the last volume without any chance for a new reader to understand what's going on. Also, the issue is pretty light on story.

All in all, Infernal Hulk #1 was a lot of things - but good it wasn't.

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• Starman123

sad comics - Dec 5, 2025

For them to have opted for a relaunch after thirty unproductive issues, it's because they were desperate to at least stay on the list, and that's why THIS achieved two printings, not because the story was good, but because it sparked the curiosity of the more unsuspecting reader that this could be a way to reintroduce them to the character without having to read what was published before. Marvel digging its own grave.

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In all my many years as a Hulk fan and comic geek , I've never come across a story so nonsensical in all my life. The art was crap coloured by numbers and the pacing was horrific. My candidate for the worst Marvel no1 of 2025.......JM

To call this bad is to insult comics that are merely bad but can improve with time.

To have hope in this is probably someone hoping that woke books will become a cultural phenomenon, when in reality it has left so many cracks that it's slowly disappearing; what was already empty will become total emptiness.

The writer is a tool of an entire editorial team; I should feel sorry for him. He's promoting monsters and entities at Marvel (that nobody cares about, they're so irrelevant), trying to chart his own course, but always pleasing those who don't consume what he writes AS IT SHOULD BE CONSUMED, GIVEN THE PRAISE HE RECEIVES. In short, the greatest harm this writer is doing to himself is writing a character he clearly doesn't like (and limits) to make money and be able to repost (unfounded) praise on his Twitter. There's no progression, nothing actually evolves, and poor Nick Klein, known as the Marvel artist who keeps trying to be Joe Bennett, infuses his art with such ABSURD colors that, in color, the possessed Hulk becomes a kind of modern version, very close to a walking transvestite. All the cartoonish pages give it a childish tone that they call "something original in comics."

And we're giving another piece of garbage a negative review, and we're only here to see the end of it, which will be as insignificant as Donny Cates's, but we can't deny that Phillip Kennedy Johnson (the one who claims to be such a fan of Ash Williams, but who isn't man enough to portray all the visceral gore in classic Evil Dead or the anthological Immortal Hulk) at least tried. He didn't do anything in four years, but he tried to ensure that the emptiness in comics prevailed. more