The Incredible Hulk has always had a troubled relationship with his anger. On one hand, rage fuels the Hulk’s strength, giving him the power to become Marvel's most immortal rage monster. On the other, that same rage has made Hulk a menace in the eyes of the world, a monster to be feared and attacked. While the Hulk rarely wants anything to do with these “puny humans,” at one point in Marvel Comics he realized he had a problem with anger and violence, and sought professional help.
This happened during a period of The Incredible Hulk where three of Banner’s personalities – the savage Green Hulk, the hedonistic Grey Hulk, and Banner’s human psyche all merged to form a new being – the powerful and intelligent “Professor Hulk” (aka “Smart Hulk”). While this new Hulk was articulate and had seemingly vanquished his personal demons, some of his friends still worried he still had some unresolved issues…
One of these friends was Bruce Banner’s psychiatrist Doctor Leonard Samson. A recipient of gamma radiation himself, “Doc Samson” divided his time between super heroics and his own psychiatric practice. Samson led the attempt to merge the Hulk’s personalities, and although his experiment appeared to be a success, Samson still insisted that the Hulk come to him for regular psychiatric evaluations.
For his part, the Hulk found the sessions a waste of time… at first. Believing that he no longer had to worry about losing control or warring with alternate personalities, Hulk went on to join and eventually lead a team of superpowered beings known as the Pantheon. This made it difficult to keep up with his regular therapy sessions, and he began meeting Samson via holographic projection, much to his psychiatrist’s disgust.
Samson finally began to get through to Hulk when he asked Bruce how he would describe himself. When Banner claimed he was a rational, analytical man, Samson asked him how he dealt with many of his recent problems with supervillains. When the Hulk admitted he had solved all his problems by beating up anyone who stood in his way, Samson pointed out that such behavior was not rational. Unnerved, the Hulk left – but Samson’s words lingered with him. Later, the Hulk tried a different approach by talking to his enemies and inviting them to come to a peaceful solution. In response, his enemies opened fire on him... and Hulk beat them up again.
Despite his cavalier attitude toward his psychiatrist, Hulk finally realized that he needed professional help when he traveled to an alternate future and came face-to-face with the Maestro, an evil version of himself who had conquered the world and used humans as disposable pleasures. Horrified and disgusted, Hulk returned to the present and finally broke down in front of Samson, begging him to not leave him and finally talking openly about his feelings and issues. While Samson and the Hulk made some progress, circumstances once again tore Banner’s psyche apart and he reverted to his original multiple personality disorder state (even discovering that the “Professor Hulk” who he’d thought was really Banner was just another alternate personality).
Nevertheless, the fact that Hulk was willing to admit he had a problem with anger and was able to seek out help was a nice change of pace from usual Hulk stories. The Hulk may be doomed to remain a tortured monster in the Marvel Universe, but that doesn’t mean he’s incapable of coming to terms with his feelings, or his rage.