WARNING: This Article May Contain Spoilers
OK, so it looks like if I’m going to cover all 3 actors that have played the Hulk then just like Spider-Man I’ll be working backwards starting with the most recent (and in my opinion, possibly the best). I think Ruffalo brought a lot more the role and truthfully has my favourite line in the entire MCU just in the first Avengers film; “That’s my secret Cap, I’m always angry”.
Zodiac
In my opinion, Ruffalo slightly takes a more ancillary role compared to his future MCU counterpart in Robert Downey Jr but I wonder if this because in real life it was the press that began to crack the case instead of the police but I haven’t looked into it that much. Hence why Jake Gyllenhall’s character suddenly becomes even bigger. Anyway, I’ll be honest, in Ruffalo’s first couple of scenes I can’t help but giggle due to his repeated requests for animal crackers. It actually bugs me how little the police end up involved in this film but as I said, I haven’t looked into the actual case as much as I maybe would have if I was covering this for my serial killer article
Rumour Has It
Spoiler Alert! I don’t understand why Ruffalo’s character of Jeff even takes Sarah back. She so selfish throughout the whole film that she doesn’t deserve the happy ending that she gets. A normal person will realise that Beau Burroughs isn’t their father, and walk away back to the man she supposedly loves. But no! She sleeps with him and practically ignores Jeff for the rest of the film meaning that his role is actually pretty small in comparison, until he comes and finds her, catching her with Beau. I’ll be honest, I thought this film was going to worse than it was but I spent the majority of the time feeling bad for Jeff and despising Sarah.
13 going on 30
OK, so it’s the second rom-com on this list, and we all know I don’t like rom-coms HOWEVER this was actually a pretty good film. Yes, once again Ruffalo is an ancillary character but he is also the true love interest of the whole film and I really like how quite subtle they are about it because it does come to a point that you think ‘oh my God, they aren’t actually going together’ but when they do (not a spoiler, if you’re not an idiot) they don’t go at it in the usual cheesy way.
Honorary Mentions
I’ll be honest, Mark Ruffalo really turns his acting skills to a lot of different genres. Looking into him more I discovered that he was in both Mirror Mirror sequels (didn’t even realise they made more than one). OK yes, I referenced two rom-coms above, but like Zodiac he has taken on more serious roles as well including war film Windtalkers with Nicholas Cage and Shutter Island with Leonardo Di Caprio (both of which I don’t think are that great, not Ruffalo’s fault, just weak films). He even stars in possibly my favourite Jim Carrey film – Eternal Sunshine of a Spotless Mind.
