Four years after She-Hulk: Attorney at Law came and went on Disney+, the story behind Marvel’s troubled series is blowing up all over again, and thankfully, it’s not more twerking.
What started as a fan arguing that Marvel should have made She-Hulk an ongoing case-of-the-week legal comedy quickly turned into a viral reminder of why that never happened.
X user QQ summed it up in a post now sitting at 3 million views: “The funniest story was how the creators originally conceived of She-Hulk as a case of the week type lawyer show but then they got to the writer’s room and they all said they don’t know how to do that as if it was lost knowledge like the Roman aqueducts.”
Then Edgar-nominated mystery novelist Daniel Friedman quote posted the whole sordid history, and his breakdown of the “extremely troubled” production has blown past 1.7 million views.
How Jessica Gao Landed She-Hulk
“The head writer and showrunner of ‘She-Hulk’ was Jessica Gao.
She was best known for being the credited writer on the ‘Pickle Rick’ episode of ‘Rick and Morty,'” Friedman begins.
During production of that episode, per Friedman, Rick and Morty showrunner Dan Harmon cast Susan Sarandon as the family’s therapist, a character Gao had scripted as Dr. Wong, and Gao “crashed out over the casting of a white actor for this part.”
“In 2018 this was a major transgression and as an act of contrition, Harmon did a podcast with Gao called ‘Whiting Wongs,’ which is 40 hours of him apologizing and learning about racism,” Friedman writes.
That podcast and the Pickle Rick credit did the rest.
“The writer credit on the Pickle Rick episode and this podcast raised Gao’s profile enough for her to land the showrunner gig on Marvel’s Disney+ ‘She-Hulk’ show,” Friedman continues, “but the production was extremely troubled.”
An ‘Extremely Troubled’ Production
Marvel sold the series as “Ally McBeal in the MCU.” According to Friedman, the studio never staffed it to deliver anything of the sort.
“In addition to not staffing lawyers or legal-drama writers on the show who could deliver on the ‘Ally McBeal in the MCU’ pitch, the ‘She-Hulk’ show required — as described by Gao in interviews — an extraordinary level of direct personal involvement and micromanagement from Marvel Studios head Kevin Feige,” he writes.
So the man running the biggest franchise operation in Hollywood was hands-on micromanaging a Disney+ legal comedy because nobody in the building could write one?
‘Catastrophic Test Audiences Responses’
Friedman notes that Gao kept things diplomatic about her boss in public. The details she shared tell the real story.
“Gao described her relationship with Feige as supportive and collaborative, but she also describes him routinely intervening to reshape the show in the wake of catastrophic test audiences responses,” Friedman said.
So the breezy fourth-wall-breaking comedy that hit Disney+ in 2022 was, behind the scenes, a show being repeatedly rebuilt by the head of Marvel Studios because test audiences kept rejecting it.
And then came the strangest creative standoff in Marvel Studios history.
Jessica Gao Threatened To Quit Over K.E.V.I.N.’s Hat
The finale famously sees Jennifer Walters break the fourth wall, climb through the Disney+ menu and confront K.E.V.I.N., the robot secretly controlling her show and an obvious stand-in for Feige.
Feige signed off on being the punchline. The dealbreaker was headwear.
Per Friedman, “Gao wanted to put a baseball cap on the robot like the one Feige wears, and that was a bridge too far for him.”
He added, “According to an interview Gao gave The Hollywood Reporter, she threatened to resign if the robot could not wear the hat, and Feige immediately accepted her resignation.”
The standoff only ended when, per Friedman, “a visual designer managed to mediate the dispute by incorporating a ‘hat-like element’ into the robot’s design.”
Marvel Erased She-Hulk, Retooled Daredevil
Friedman closes with the aftermath.
“The show was cancelled after the first season, the cast has been released, none of its events have been referenced in any other Marvel productions and ‘She-Hulk’ star Tatiana Maslany is not in ‘Avengers: Doomsday,'” he writes. “Jessica Gao has no IMDB credits since ‘She-Hulk’ was cancelled in 2022.”
That tracks with our own coverage, as Maslany recently addressed a possible She-Hulk return, while having taken shots at Disney.
The series introduced Jennifer Walters into the MCU, brought back Tim Roth’s Abomination, and debuted Hulk’s son Skaar (who happens to look A LOT like Feige). Four years later, none of it has gone anywhere.
And per our insiders, the original intent for Daredevil: Born Again was to make it goofy like She-Hulk, but that ended up getting retooled, which was confirmed months later by Feige and the trades.
Marvel Fans Still Show Up When Marvel Delivers
And spare us the superhero fatigue excuse.
Spider-Man: Brand New Day is sitting at $1.25 billion worldwide and counting, with $553 million of that domestic, per Box Office Mojo, after opening to a record $360 million.
Audiences show up in historic numbers when Marvel gives them something worth showing up for.
She-Hulk was not that, and Marvel’s silence says it knows. Four years on there is no Season 2, no cameo, not even a throwaway reference.
The robot got its “hat-like element.” The show got a burial.
