Why it's Hot:
- First battle of the Hulk and the Fantastic Four
Synopsis:
THE INCREDIBLE HULK The Thing and Alicia are exiting a symphony auditorium at the end of their date when they notice soldiers marching on the streets. Someone panics as they see through the Thing's disguise and calls him a monster. The soldiers attack Ben -- mistaking him for the Hulk. After they subdue Ben, they realize the error and apologize for the unprovoked attack. Alicia calms Ben down and he returns to the Baxter Building. There he complains about being mistaken for the Hulk to his teammates. The Fantastic Four are soon visited by General "Thunderbolt" Ross, who has come to ask for the Fantastic Four's assistance in destroying the Hulk. Ross then shows them footage of the Hulk as well as the recent destruction of various military test weapons that are being designed by Dr. Bruce Banner. Ross tells them that the military believes that the Hulk is responsible for the destruction of these devices. After coming up with various theories on how to take down the Hulk, the Fantastic Four bring Ross to their newest model of the Fantasti-Car that was designed by Johnny and they all fly to New Mexico to Gamma Base. When they arrive they find that the military's prototype anti-gravity missile has been wrecked. Ross introduces Reed Richards to Bruce Banner, his young assistant Rick Jones, and another scientist named Karl Kort. When Ross tells them that the Fantastic Four will be going after the Hulk, Banner tells his employer that he believes that someone is framing the Hulk for these acts of sabotage. Kort then excuses himself from the meeting and on his way out he bumps into the other members of the Fantastic Four who have been waiting impatiently outside. Kort is frightened by the Thing and flees the hallway, dropping his wallet as he goes, and it is picked up by the Torch. Having become fed up with waiting, the Thing comes bursting into the office with the other members of the Fantastic Four, angering Ross, especially when the Thing picks up an entire bookshelf of phone books and rips them in half. Reed calms down General Ross and Banner goes on to explain that he believes that someone, whom he and Rick have dubbed the "Wrecker", is really responsible for the acts of sabotage. The Human Torch then introduces himself to Rick, showing off his flame powers before handing over Karl Kort's wallet asking Jones to return it to him. Banner and Jones then leave and go to their secret cave hideout. There Bruce shows Rick a scale model of his next invention, a device that could erect a force field around a city in order to protect it from a nuclear attack. Bruce vows to stop the Wrecker as the Hulk before he can destroy his invention. Meanwhile, Rick goes to return the wallet to Karl Kort and seeing a card sticking out of it, he is shocked to find that it is a membership card to a communist organization. Kort, having sneaked up behind the boy, gets the drop on Rick and takes him prisoner at gunpoint. Later the Fantastic Four are testing out a new one man, rail-driven rocket car using the Thing as a test subject. As the Thing rockets down the rails they notice that the rails had been crushed. Ben's rocket car is quickly derailed, but he is saved from a nasty fall by his teammates. When Bruce arrives on the scene and tells them that the Wrecker kidnapped Rick Jones, the Fantastic Four dismiss this, convinced that the Hulk is responsible for the sabotage and
