Marvel has found a new Hulk, and this time Bruce Banner is being overshadowed by a very unlikely successor: Beaker. The Muppet Labs assistant becomes a skyscraper-sized gamma-powered giant after an experiment combines Bruce Banner’s radiation with Hank Pym’s size-changing technology in The Muppets Take the Marvel Universe #1.
The story, titled “A Terrible Invention,” comes from writer Kyle Starks, artist Mike Henderson, colorist Yen Nitro, and letterer Joe Caramagna. As ScreenRant reports, Dr. Bunsen Honeydew recklessly mixes gamma radiation with Pym Particles before handing the unstable result to Beaker. The experiment does not merely make Beaker larger—it creates a Hulk-sized catastrophe whose defining battle cry remains his familiar, panicked “MEEP!”
The joke works because it fuses two of Marvel’s most recognizable scientific origin stories. Bruce Banner’s Hulk is traditionally created by exposure to gamma radiation, while Hank Pym’s Ant-Man and Giant-Man identities depend on Pym Particles. Marvel’s own Hulk character guide describes Banner as transforming after exposure to heavy doses of gamma radiation, while Pym’s technology gives heroes a way to alter their size without simply turning into a conventional giant.
Beaker’s transformation appears in a one-shot that gives Marvel’s superheroes an unusually chaotic set of guest stars. Marvel’s official release coverage describes the book as a celebration of the 50th anniversary of The Muppet Show, with Chip Zdarsky and a large ensemble of creators bringing the Muppets into the Marvel Universe. The issue also includes stories pairing Muppet favorites with characters including Wolverine, Doctor Strange, Miss Piggy, and the Avengers.
The crossover is not presenting Beaker as a permanent replacement for Banner in Marvel’s main superhero continuity. Instead, the new Hulk is a deliberately absurd one-shot invention—but the gag still lands because Marvel has a long history of passing the Hulk mantle to other gamma-powered characters. Marvel’s own history notes that Amadeus Cho became a new Hulk after absorbing his own gamma powers, while recent stories have also experimented with demonic and alternate versions of the character.
That makes Beaker’s enormous transformation less a continuity shake-up than a showcase for what crossover comics can do when their rules are allowed to collide. The Muppets Take the Marvel Universe #1 went on sale September 23, 2026, as a 56-page one-shot, according to IGN’s preview. Fans looking for a serious new Hulk successor will need to look elsewhere—but anyone wondering what happens when Muppet Labs science meets Marvel physics now has an answer: Beaker gets very, very big.
