Remember when Bruce Banner had his own movie but he was played by a different actor and no one seemed to mention it until suddenly characters from that movie would pop up in the MCU? Well, buckle up for another great return to the Marvel world!
When The Incredible Hulk first came out in 2008, it introduced us to a cast of characters that would, for the most part, vanish from the Marvel Cinematic Universe. Bruce Banner was played by Edward Norton, who would go on to be replaced by Mark Ruffalo in The Avengers (2012). For a long while, the only character who did come back was William Hurt’s Thunderbolt Ross, and it wasn’t until recently that we saw Tim Roth’s Emil Blonsky again.
But it seems as if the MCU doesn’t want to fully erase the legacy of The Incredible Hulk because we now know another important character in Bruce Banner’s story is making her return. And it’s honestly really exciting because in a lot of ways, she is the one character I really wish we’d see come back in Ruffalo’s arc. I’m talking about Liv Tyler’s Betty Ross!
Betty is Bruce Banner’s main love interest, but she’s also the daughter of Thunderbolt Ross and a brilliant scientist in her own right. The fact that she hadn’t come back to the Marvel Cinematic Universe didn’t feel right at all. But according to The Hollywood Reporter, she’s coming back for the fourth Captain America movie, which will feature Anthony Mackie taking over the mantle.
Tyler joining Captain America: New World Order makes perfect sense because not only does she deserve to come back to the Marvel world in a big way, but she also has needs to make up for some lost father-daughter time.
A father-daughter reunion
It felt odd that Betty was nowhere to be found, but her father, Thunderbolt Ross, was littered throughout the Marvel Cinematic Universe. William Hurt would pop up, causing problems for the Avengers and making it so Tony Stark and Steve Rogers had to fight over some accords. And now, things are really gearing up for Thunderbolt’s involvement in the MCU.
It’s unfortunate that Tyler’s return as Betty is happening after the passing of Hurt. We now have Harrison Ford taking over as Thunderbolt in the new Captain America movie. Betty coming back to see her father, especially when he’s potentially the President of the United States, does make a lot of sense. I don’t know if that means that she’s going to see Bruce and talk with him again, but it is nice to have Liv Tyler back in the Marvel universe!
Until we know more about her involvement in the series, at least we know Betty and her father will be back together and we’ll get to see how their relationship has evolved over the last 15 years—which will be interesting because they didn’t have the best relationship to begin with.
(featured image: Universal Pictures)
