Generally, I've not found Marvel's D-T-DVD stuff released so far to be that impressive, but these both really worked, in terms of what they set out to do.

Starting out, I'd say that the Hulk is really just kind of there in both stories; he's worked into the plot, but in both cases the writers basically hijacked the initial idea (Hulk vs. Wolverine, Hulk vs. Thor) to tell some other story. In Wolverine it's "finally, we get to do an R-rated version of Weapon X", and in Thor it's "finally, we get to cram in absolutely every aspect of the Thor mythos that we have any interest in onto animation" (which, given that there's both an animated series and a second D-T-DVD which is trailed here, may have been a bit unnecessary, but it's still good).

Part I: Hulk vs. Wolverine

Basically a big fight scene. Wolverine is called in by Department H to deal with a rampaging Hulk, who has seemingly destroyed an entire town along the US-Canadian border. Wolverine tracks the Hulk down (not really knowing what he is at this point),fights him, and basically fights to a draw (this is the 70s-era version that Wolverine was created to fight),and then are captured by Weapon X (which apparently isn't associated with Department H here). This story is tied into the Wolverine and the X-Men cartoon, so Wolverine, Banner, Sabretooth, and Professor Thornton all have the same voice actors; also here are Lady Deathstrike, Omega Red, and Deadpool. Thornton wants Wolverine back in the program, but Deathstrike and Sabretooth would rather kill him, so they stab Thornton and, well, try to kill him. Big fight, etc. The attraction here is seeing "claw people" (as Hulk calls them) stab each other a lot with blood and stuff; Deadpool's quite funny.

Part II: Hulk vs. Thor

Starting out, I'll say that fans of Thor who were expecting an epic throwdown between the two will be disappointed here; this might more accurately be titled "Hulk walks all over Thor, and so Thor has to find some other way of stopping the Hulk". I personally have never found the uber-godmoder Hulk all that interesting, but it's an established thing, so there you go; getting past that, the story's pretty good, and if you like Thor's world pretty everybody is here.

The story takes place during the yearly Odinsleep, when the All-Father rests and all the villains try to conquer Asgard because Odin is absurdly powerful and they've only got a chance when he's not there. Thor and co. beat up all comers, as usual (Thor's getting rather depressed by this endless cycle). Loki and Enchantress capture Bruce Banner, and turn him into the Hulk; Amora then pulls Banner out the Hulk (and Loki kills him),leaving only the incarnate rage (see Hulk #300 in the early 80s),with Loki pulling the strings. However, the rage becomes too much and breaks Loki's control, and Rage-Hulk is loosed and starts destroying everything. He beats up the Warriors Three and Balder, then pummels Thor to death (to Loki's delight),and heads off towards the city; Hela is about to claim Thor's soul, but Enchantress intervenes and brings him back to life, since her whole motivation for helping Loki was she was angry that Thor chose Sif over her. Thor and Enchantress capture Loki, and Thor makes Loki go with him to Hel to reclaim Banner to put him back in the Hulk, and sends Enchantress to help Sif, who's the End Boss guarding Odin. So Thor and Loki journey thither, while Hulk punches his way through like a bajillion random guards, Brunnhilde and the other Valkyries, etc. on his way there.

As a tour of the Nine Worlds, it packs quite a lot into 40+ minutes (it's the longer of the two); both of these stories just drop you into an established world, which is refreshingly different from how a lot of these films do things; you pick up all the necessary information as you go along.

I have always liked superheroes and superhero movies, so I thought to myself that Hulk vs. should be entertaining. And on the most part, it was. I didn't care much for the rather angular animation style of the Hulk vs. Thor segment(though the colours were nice and atmospheric),nor for the rather dull character of Thor. The basic stories of both segments are quite standard also, understandable considering the length but with a longer length you do wish some of the characterisations especially in the Hulk vs.Thor segment to be more developed. However, the Hulk vs. Thor segment does have its good points, Loki is wonderfully arrogant as a villain, Dr Banner's dream sequence is heart-wrenching and Dr Banner himself is a character you really identify with. The music is rousing, the action is compelling enough and the writing is good. The Hulk vs. Wolverine segment is outstanding. The animation is much smoother and more fluid, with the backgrounds detailed and beautifully realised. The music rouses and haunts when it should, the writing is sharp and the story despite the standard idea is crisply paced and compelling. Wolverine is a much stronger hero, but I remember this segment best for Deadpool, who cracks me up with his wisecracks. The only letdown to Hulk vs. Wolverine for me was its inconclusive ending. Hulk is awesome in both Hulk vs. Thor and Hulk vs. Wolverine as is the voice acting. All in all, uneven but enjoyable. 7/10 Bethany Cox

Hulk vs comprises of two "epic" battles (and I use quotes lightly and meaningfully) as he faces off with Wolverine and Thor, two other Marvel comics staples that he's faced off against many times - indeed the introduction to Wolverine was in a Hulk comic by Len Wein - and what happens when SMASH! becomes the proverbial name of the game here. But there is and there isn't so much smashing all the time. This may be good in some cases, but when the cover emphasis such a SMASH EVERYTHING IN SIGHT thing with the Hulk, it becomes a minor let-down when the Hulk and Wolverine only face off for about, oh, ten minutes out of the relatively short 36 minute running time, and while there is much more Hulk SMASH in the Thor movie, it also isn't as much fun as Wolverine really is.

Why is this? One thing that Wolverine gets right, and it's fascinating to see the short animated film get this right and not at ALL in the theatrical 2009 feature, is Deadpool. He's introduced here as being apart of the Weapon X program, and as the '(Mercenary) with the Mouth', he's awesome here. He's witty and sarcastic and kinda mean but in a fun killer way (kinda like one of the Warner brothers from Animaniacs or something, I got a Yakko vibe off him),and whenever he's on screen he steals the show even away from someone like Wolverine who as animated here can hold his ground too. The basic idea is that Wolverine is brought to the woods to stop a "monster" from tearing stuff up, sees Bruce Banner, he hulks out, they fight a little... and then it goes into this Weapon X sub-plot, more about Wolverine's origin (sort of) and other things, and while Deadpool made it better and it became more entertaining, the Royal-Rumble aspect seemed lacking until near the latter part of the short.

The Thor short is a little more clever in its set-up: here, Loki, Thor's nasty younger and jealous brother, brings Bruce Banner to Asgard for an express purpose, to have him Hulk-out and kick Thor's ass while under his control (he has some kind of magical power to do this, don't ask me why). There is an odd-sorta-interesting twist that didn't make a lot of sense (then again I've yet to read a lot of Hulk comics) where Banner is actually pulled out of the Hulk's body with magic once he turns into the Hulk and then watches with horror as the Hulk (un, not Banner-Hulk, just Hulk-Hulk) not only tries (but obviously doesn't) kick Thor's ass into oblivion, but Asgard as well.

I did like that aspect about Hulk being let loose by Loki's incompetence and arrogance and that Thor was the only one to stop him, but it also doesn't make for a lot of fun as everything is taken so seriously. Some of the animation in this segment is also better than in Wolverine, so there is that. Bottom line, for Hulk/Wolverine/Thor fans, there's a little of something here for you all, and for the Hulk/Thor combo there's a lot of action and destruction - almost too much, but where would Hulk be without being such a destroyer of things - but each film also suffers from some problems. So it's worth checking out, and since it's on video only there's no other way to really see it, but unless one's a die-hard or starting to really get into Marvel animated work (and to be fair they're underrated up against work by DC animated) it's not worth rushing immediately to see.