We knew the third Captain America movie from Marvel Studios was going to be big when they announced the subtitle—Civil War—in addition to Robert Downey Jr.’s co-starring status. But when Marvel unveiled the full cast list, it was positively humungous. It includes the entire new Avengers team that assembled at the end of Avengers: Age of Ultron, as well as Paul Rudd’s Ant-Man, a new character played by Martin Freeman, and an old character who made his first and only appearance in The Incredible Hulk—the “forgotten” Marvel movie.

William Hurt reprises his role as General Ross in Captain America: Civil War, and when the movie hits theaters next spring it will have been eight years since the release of Hurt’s Hulk movie. That film was only Marvel Studios’ second release as an independent studio, and it came out the same year as Iron Man, at which point the Marvel Cinematic Universe was still a far off dream.

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Image via Marvel Studios

But now it appears that Marvel Studios is ready to finally make The Incredible Hulk feel like less of an outlier in its library, as they’re bringing in Hurt’s character for Civil War. IGN recently caught up with the actor and he explained that the General Ross you see in Civil War won’t necessarily resemble the Incredible Hulk Ross too closely:

"I loved playing Ross the first time because I was able to try and create an ego as big as the monster he was chasing. And one that was as warped too. [Ross in Civil War] is different because it's a different style. It's a more modernized style. And what they've done is they've taken a character who was the Ross from the older film and made a new version. This is a much newer Ross. A much different Ross. And I liked that a lot. I haven't had a lot of time to understand it, but I'm doing the best I can. And they haven't fired me yet."


I love the fact that Hurt admits the complexities of this vast Marvel Universe are somewhat confusing, but it sounds like he’s enjoying returning to the MCU all the same. And if bringing Ross into Civil War is the first step in moving towards another eventual Hulk movie, all the better. Though since Marvel’s slate is already full with other films through the year 2020, I’m not exactly holding my breath.

Click here for all of our Captain America: Civil War coverage. For a refresher on all of Marvel’s confirmed releases, see below. And for a catalog of all upcoming superhero movie release dates, click here.

  • Ant-Man – July 17, 2015
  • Captain America: Civil War – May 6, 2016
  • Doctor Strange - November 6, 2016
  • Guardians of the Galaxy 2 – May 5, 2017
  • Spider-Man Reboot – July 28, 2017
  • Thor: Ragnarok – November 3, 2017
  • Avengers: Infinity War – Part 1 – May 4, 2018
  • Black Panther – July 6, 2018
  • Captain Marvel – November 2, 2018
  • Avengers: Infinity War – Part 2 – May 3, 2019
  • Inhumans – July 12, 2019
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Image via Marvel