Kat Coiro directs six of She-Hulk: Attorney at Law’s nine episodes (Anu Valia helms episodes 5-7) and serves as executive producer on the Disney+ Marvel series starring Tatiana Maslany. Ahead of the show’s much-anticipated premiere, STARBURST had the pleasure of speaking with Coiro about finding the series’ comedic tone, controversies surrounding She-Hulk’s physicality and design, and what the hero’s journey has to say about women’s lived experiences.

STARBURST: She-Hulk is the MCU’s first outright comedy, and it’s also the first time an MCU character has broken the fourth wall. What can you tell us about creating the show’s tone and how it differs from the rest of the MCU?

Kat Coiro: Well, the scripts lean very heavily into comedy, and I always felt like my job was finding that balance between this very new, fresh, comedic world and also ensuring it fits into the MCU visually – that it has cinematic scope. In some ways, those two things are very different from an execution point of view because, for comedy to work, you need looseness, and you need to let actors play, improvise, explore, and go off-script.

But when you’re dealing with big action sequences and CGI characters, that requires a lot of preparation and some rigidity. And so, it was always about, where can we find these big cinematic moments? And where can we find these little, intimate moments of banter and character development?

An exciting aspect of Jennifer Walters’ transformation into She-Hulk is how she enjoys her sexual power in her new body. How did you ensure that her transformation and expression never played to the male gaze, which often defines her comic book portrayal?  

So much of She-Hulk’s journey is about how, unlike the Hulk, she maintains her self-consciousness, self-awareness, and a general sense of self and identity. But then you take this woman, who is very happy with her existence and lives a pretty rigid life, and suddenly she is perceived entirely differently by the outside world. There’s a moment we explored in the first episode – after she transforms inside Bruce’s machine and steps out – where she feels out this new body and this long hair and starts to enjoy the idea of being in a new form.

We questioned: what does it mean to retain your sense of identity while also being perceived in a wholly different way? Part of her journey is enjoying that, enjoying taking up space, enjoying turning all heads when she walks into a room and having people take notice of her in a way they never did when she was a regular woman.

And in your mind, what’s that saying about women at large?

I think it’s just an extreme version of what we all experience. If you put on a great outfit and do your hair, you feel very differently than you do wearing your sweatpants and having just rolled out of bed. Neither is good nor bad, but how you walk through the world is different. And so, Jen’s She-Hulk transformation is an extreme version of what we all experience on a daily basis.

There was one scene I think many women will enjoy, where a guy spends the night with She-Hulk, wakes up in the morning to Jennifer’s human form and goes, “who are you?”. Moments like that clearly telegraph women’s presence behind the camera.  

There were so many discussions about the female gaze versus the male gaze. We wanted her to be sexy and fun and to start to enjoy this liberty and this ability to live life differently. I always thought it was fascinating to see how She-Hulk affects Jennifer Walters, because you don’t need to be big and green and have long hair to feel that inner confidence and to feel like you can walk into a room and take charge. And so part of the conversation was also, how does this affect Jennifer?

In a similar vein, what would you say to people who have complained about She-Hulk being too small or not muscular enough in their eyes?

I would say it’s part of the systemic tearing apart of women’s bodies. I guarantee that if we had made her bulkier, we would have gotten complaints about that. We drew on real-life, strong women and Olympic athletes. Misty Copeland was someone we talked about a lot. We also had on our set a woman who is six-foot-seven, who was our body double and reference. We’re not used to seeing women who are that tall and take up that much space, and we wanted She-Hulk to feel like she fit into the real world.

The Hulk is a monster. He’s not on a human scale. However, She-Hulk had to exist on a human scale, and we talked a lot about strength versus aesthetics. It was never about making her this or making her that; it was about, how can she still go on dates at a restaurant, sit at a regular office chair, and live a very normal life despite being a superhero? And so, it’s damned if you do, damned if you don’t. I think it’s a window into how people feel the liberty to call women too fat, too skinny, too big, too tall, too short, and I hope they watch the show and all that goes out the window. Just enjoy the ride.

One can hope. We’ve talked a lot about the representation of women and women’s bodies and how She-Hulk breaks a lot of new ground. In your opinion, what’s the most exciting thing that the show and character are adding to the broader MCU?

My goodness, there are so many. There are so many themes that are really interesting and fascinating. I love the idea that this is a superhero coming-of-age story and that she starts completely resistant, because Jennifer is someone who doesn’t want ever to feel like things were handed to her or like she received something she didn’t deserve.

We talked a lot about the idea of imposter syndrome and how many women struggle with this idea that they don’t deserve the power they have or are not worthy of this power. Watching her come into her own and accept that this has happened to her and that it’s okay to take it to great heights and use her powers for good, that’s a journey I find fascinating. So many superheroes start raring to go while she is hesitant. That’s the kind of character development that I look forward to watching unfold.

She-Hulk: Attorney at Law is available to stream on Disney+ from August 18th, with episodes releasing weekly. 

Read our review here, and check out our interview with Tatiana Maslany’s co-star Ginger Gonzaga, who plays Jennifer/She-Hulk’s best friend and confidant, Nikki Ramos.