The Marvel Cinematic Universe has seen its heroes battle hyper-intelligent AIs, evil aliens with infinite powers, multiverse-travelling witches, butchers of gods, and so much more. But no one has ever had a battle like She-Hulk just had — in a courtroom, with her literal identity on the line. By doing so, the audience finally (we think) got a clearer idea of what the Disney+ show is aiming for, with plenty of wit and humour along the way.
Episode five of She-Hulk, “Mean, Green, and Straight Poured Into These Jeans,” picked up right where the fourth episode left off. Jen (Tatiana Maslany) is still reeling from the copyright infringement lawsuit Titania (Jameela Jamil) served her over the name “She-Hulk.” Titania is all in on “She-Hulk,” releasing a line of skincare, beauty, and wellness products. Jen sees the billboards on the Sunset Strip and even tries to confront Titania at her popup at the Grove (all of which are very specific LA references that made me feel like I was watching an episode of Entourage, but in a less problematic way). The social-media superhero has gone full Kardashian with Jen’s superhero name, and Jen pretends like she doesn’t care, but she does.
Jen’s boss does not like seeing the name and person he invested in, She-Hulk, being used to promote products like “Booty Boost” and urges her to clean up her own mess. He makes Mallory Book (Renée Elise Goldsberry) take Jen’s case and very quickly it’s obvious this was the right move. Mallory has confidence and swagger Jen doesn’t and decides to countersue, alleging Titania stole the name just to profit off it. The problem is, she needs to prove Jen was using the name before the lawsuit. Hmmm, wonder how she’d do that.
Meanwhile, in a very funny but very tangential side story, Pug (Josh Segarra) asks Nikki (Ginger Gonzaga) to help him wait in line for some limited edition sneakers (the Iron Man 3s, in case you were wondering), and he brags about his “Drip Broker,” Alonzo, a man who can get him anything. Nikki wants Jen to get some new clothes, so the unseen Alonzo directs them to a seemingly innocuous boba tea shop. The shop is supposed to secretly specialise in superhero clothing, but what it really sells is bootleg Avengers merch. (Much more on this in the random thoughts below.) This isn’t the type of clothing Nikki was talking about, so after some back and forth, she and Pug end up at the door of a man named Luke Jacobson (Griffin Matthews). Luke is the MCU equivalent of Edna Mode from Pixar’s The Incredibles and again, after some negotiation, he agrees to make Jen new outfits that don’t make her look like “Shrek,” according to Titania.
