Warning: This article contains significant plot details, so be advised of potential spoilers for Incredible Hulk #24 (2025).
The Incredible Resilience of the Hulk
Among Marvel’s iconic heroes, few can compare to the extraordinary healing abilities of the Incredible Hulk. While characters such as Wolverine and Deadpool showcase impressive regenerative powers, the Hulk’s resilience stands unparalleled. He has faced brutal deaths, extreme injuries, and devastating attacks, yet he always returns to his full strength, seemingly unscathed.
Bannister and Charlie’s Perilous Journey to Doctor Strange
In Incredible Hulk #24, crafted by Phillip Kennedy Johnson and illustrated by Kev Walker, Bruce Banner teams up with the young Charlie Tidwell to seek assistance from Doctor Strange, the former Sorcerer Supreme. However, the duo discovers that while Strange embarks on a quest in Asgard to reclaim his powers, they must instead rely on Clea Strange, who offers her help.
A Traumatic Encounter with Lycana’s Cult
Their situation takes a deadly turn when an act of goodwill unveils a sinister trap. Banner and Charlie fall prey to the cult led by Lycana and her ravenous skinwalkers. After enduring a gruesome fate where Bruce is horrifically eviscerated and consumed by these monsters, the Hulk arises in an astonishing display of regeneration.
The Hulk’s Most Savage Regeneration: A Brutal Battle Against Skinwalkers
Initially, the lycanthropes use a magical reading room to confine Bruce, designed to block gamma radiation and deceive him into seeing it as a safe haven. Unknown to Banner, it conceals a horde of Lycana’s skinwalkers just waiting to dismantle him. They attack mercilessly, tearing him apart and completing what should have been his demise. Yet, the Hulk is no ordinary being.
As the cult revels in their perceived triumph, they suffer a gruesome surprise when **green tendrils explosively erupt from their bodies, causing catastrophic damage to their insides**. In a horrifying transformation, the Hulk’s body reconstructs, emerging from his enemies’ remnants in one of the goriest revivals in recent memory. Despite Clea Strange’s commands to finish him off, the Hulk, now fully reformed, turns the tide by brutally attacking the false sorceress while protecting Charlie.
Cosmic Powers: Grants of Immortality
The Hulk’s Healing Factor Is Literally Godly
Throughout his comic history, the Hulk’s durability is well acknowledged, especially during Al Ewing and Joe Bennett’s innovative series, Immortal Hulk (2018). This series revealed that Bruce Banner, alongside other gamma-emissaries, are destined avatars of a formidable entity known as the One Below All. Long before the fateful gamma bomb explosion, this cosmic force identified Banner to become its vessel. This connection endows the Hulk not only with immense strength and rage-fueled power but an unparalleled healing factor as well.
When faced with fatal injuries, each Hulk doesn’t succumb to death the way ordinary beings do. Instead, they are transported to the Below Place—a desolate dimension housing the One Below All. Here, they await revival, brought back to the land of the living through mystical portals referred to as Green Doors. The Hulk and Bruce Banner are thus equipped with an insurmountable ability to rise from lethal injuries, time and time again.
The Hulk’s Healing Factor: Marvel’s Most Overpowered Regeneration
Not Even Death Can Stop the Green Behemoth
The harrowing events within this issue are just one of many occurrences highlighting the Hulk’s extraordinary healing prowess. In earlier narratives, such as Hulk #1 (2014), he reformed after a catastrophic head injury, while in World War Hulk #5 (2008), he was reborn from the ashes after being obliterated by cosmic forces. Throughout the Immortal Hulk run, both Bruce Banner and his gamma brethren have withstood horrors that would instantly annihilate other heroes.
The Hulk’s regenerative capabilities are unrivaled in the Marvel universe. As long as the One Below All sees value in Banner’s resilience, the Green Goliath mysteriously returns from the dead after each encounter. Death cannot conquer him; only serves to amplify his rage and rejuvenate his power, making him stronger than ever. The Hulk is a force of nature, linked to one of Marvel’s deepest cosmic conflicts, ensuring that he remains unbeatable. Sorry, other Marvel characters with healing factors—the Hulk’s is undeniably the best.
Incredible Hulk #24 (2025) is available now from Marvel Comics.