Issue(s): She-Hulk #52, She-Hulk #53, She-Hulk #55, She-Hulk #55, She-Hulk #56, She-Hulk #57
Cover Date: Jun-Nov 93
Title: To Die and Live in L.A.!: "Visit L.A.-- and die!" / "Death becomes her" / "Alive again!" / "The young and the resurrected" / "The edge of plight" / "Family business"
Credits:
Michael Eury - Writer
Todd Britton / Darren Auck / Pat Olliffe - Penciler
Mike DeCarlo / Dave Cockrum / Art Nichols / Fred Fredericks - Inker
Renee Witterstaetter - Editor

Review/plot:
Despite the fanfare around the new creative team in issue #50, Todd Britton only lasts one issue (#51 was a fill-in). Pat Olliffe becomes the regular penciler with issue #54 but he and writer Michael Eury only last until the end of this storyline. I like Olliffe and he'd already done good work on Tales of Asgard back-ups and on Nomad at this time, but the art here is a mess. To be fair, that may be because the story is a mess.

I picked up issue #57 in a bargain bin at some point on the grounds that the Hulk was guest starring, and i was duly unimpressed and stayed away from the rest of this run. But now for the project i've gotten them all and "unimpressed" is putting it nicely. One problem seems to be that Eury wasn't sure if he wanted to continue to write She-Hulk as a meta-aware comedy or as a straight adventure. Everything about the concepts says the former - really it's more Steve Gerber than John Byrne but definitely not serious - but the trappings and pacing are all geared towards the latter, so it comes across being the worst of both worlds where we have these ridiculous concepts that everyone is treating with dire seriousness.

The whole plot pivots off of "explaining" the joke from She-Hulk #36 where She-Hulk's old boyfriend Zapper had a wife that looked just like She-Hulk with a different skin color. It's revealed in this story that Zapper was so obsessed with She-Hulk that his wife got plastic surgery to try to look like her, and all of this upset her scientist father so much that he initiated a plot against her, beginning by sending the robot War Zone after her in issue #50.

Meanwhile, weakened by a toxin that was released by War Zone, She-Hulk gets into a fight with Titania while wearing lingerie (RME)...

...and later gets "killed" by a super-powered pastiche of James Dean called the Rumbler.

You see they used to call fights "rumbles" back in James Dean's days, so he has earthquake powers. He should be teamed-up with the Wild One. And then both of them should be drowned in a sack in the river.

She-Hulk spends an issue as a ghost...

...and then in the afterlife.

I didn't even know the Kangaroo was dead.

Then Zapper brings her back to life with an infusion of gamma energy. But his father-in-law secretly increased the dosage, causing She-Hulk to become "savage"...

...necessitating the involvement of her cousin.

Yecch.

There's also a zany subplot about She-Hulk agreeing to act in a soap opera.

The filming is interrupted by the return of the War Zone robot.

Here's a scene making fun of people who bought the Marvel Swimsuit issue.

Hey Marvel, you published it! Don't act surprised that kids are "drooling" on it.

I did think the shading used to show the Hulk's shadow when he shows up to be an interesting technique.

I don't think i've ever seen that before.

The comic is sometimes funny...

...but like i said, it also takes itself seriously a lot of the time. And when it tries to be outright funny in the John Byrne fourth wall breaking style, it feels like a pale imitation.

And it's also six fricking issues long, which is way too long for a goofy story like this. It really seems like this book should have been mercy-canceled after Byrne left.

Quality Rating: D

Historical Significance Rating: 1

Chronological Placement Considerations: She-Hulk was exposed to War Zone's toxin "a few days ago" but i want this book to catch up with publication schedule so i'm putting a fair amount of space between issue #50 and this arc. In issue #52, the Thing is shown to have an undamaged face...

...but Four Freedoms Plaza is shown to be damaged.

In issue #55, the Thing is now wearing his helmet. And it's not like a lot of time is meant to have passed between issues.

Since the FF's building was not damaged in issue #50, i placed it before Infinity War, but i'm placing this afterwards. I'm assuming that the Thing was using an image inducer in issue #52, as i've had to do in a few other places.

The Hulk's appearance is context free. I'm not counting Death or any of the dead characters as appearing.

References:

• She-Hulk was exposed to War Zone's toxin in She-Hulk #50.
  
• She-Hulk and Titania's fight is a rematch after the one in She-Hulk #49 when She-Hulk was stuck in Weezie's body.
  
• While in the afterlife, She-Hulk meets her mother and they talk about the death of She-Hulk's friend Jill. The original She-Hulk #2-5 show both deaths.
  
• In the afterlife, Death tells Bucky that Baron Zemo killed him the first time but she's gonna kill him again. Zemo (seemingly!) killed Bucky in the flashback in Avengers #4.
  
• While She-Hulk is thought to be dead, Wyatt Wingfoot thinks back to when they first met in Fantastic Four #269. He then says that during the Human Torch's wedding in Fantastic Four #300 that he wished that he and She-Hulk were getting married, and he mentions their ill-fated engagement in She-Hulk: Ceremony #1-2.
  
• While She-Hulk is dead, the soap opera produces consider getting Pia Zadora (spelled P. Isadora this time), who played She-Hulk in the movie in She-Hulk #12.

Crossover: N/A

Continuity Insert? N

My Reprint: N/A