9. Mark Ruffalo The Avengers
Pre-Avengers, The Hulk was something of the red-headed stepchild in the Marvel Movie Universe. The big green monster had been the subject of two notable misfires already, with Ang Lee's Eric Bana-starring noble experiment falling down for a lack of action film whiz-bangery and Louis Leterrier's later Edward Norton vehicle being seen as merely passable. There was real fear about slotting the Hulk into the Avengers, because unlike the other Marvel stablemates, he didn't have a sure-fire hit behind him coming in, and the fact Norton became the second Hulk to be dropped for being too difficult to work with didn't exactly fill us with hope. But into the breach or rather, the stretchy purple sweatpants strolled Mark Ruffalo, giving us a new spin on the character we hadn't seen before. To my mind, the Bruce Banner of the previous two Hulks was possibly the least interesting main character a Marvel film had. Both Bana and Norton played the part by focusing on inner turmoil and a need to stay buttoned-down and reined in, making for an occasionally hard watch. However, Ruffalo took the opposite view, giving his perma-tanned Banner a surfer-dude chilled out attitude which was punctuated with occasional outbursts of anger. It made him great to watch, tuning possibly the biggest liability in alter-ego terms into a mesmeric character full of insecurities yet somehow still possessing a breezy self-confidence. His performances alongside Robert Downey Jr's motormouth Tony Stark were incredible and made him a worthy contender for the film's hotly-contested MVP crown. The scene where he eventually hulks out in New York was a moment of fist-pumping awesomeness, and all that pay-off was made possible by Ruffalo's nuanced portrayal.You can tell that Marvel have every faith in their new Bruce they're looking to shoot new Ruffalo-centric films as part of their Phase Three in an attempt to create a new, possibly barnstorming take on the franchise. Be honest, before The Avengers came out, did you really expect that to happen?