Eric Bana has no interest in playing the Hulk ever again.

The Munich actor played Bruce Banner and his angry green alter ego in Ang Lee’s 2003 superhero film Hulk, and while most actors who sign up to portray superheroes end up reprising their roles over several movies, Bana saw Hulk as a one-off and never expected to return to the character.

“You certainly didn’t go into a film like that thinking you were going to do more than one… that just wasn’t in play,” he said during an appearance on the WTF with Marc Maron Podcast. “The expectations are not the way they are now. I approached it as a one-off.”

The Australian actor added that he wasn’t asked to reprise the role for 2008’s The Incredible Hulk, which starred Edward Norton, and he hasn’t ventured back into that genre because those films don’t appeal to him.

“It’s why I haven’t re-dabbled in that area,” he explained. “They’re not the kind of movie that I race out and see myself so that conversation is something I have with myself if I want to be a part of it.”

Bana was the first person to play Bruce Banner following Bill Bixby in 1990 and he admitted he was hesitant about signing up for the role.

“It wasn’t a quick yes, that’s for sure,” he shared. “It took me a while to get my head around it. I wasn’t privy to the script prior to signing onto the film. It’s one of the only films I have done where that was the case. It just wasn’t the type of film that I saw myself doing.”

The Hulk has been played by Mark Ruffalo since 2012’s Avengers Assemble, and while Bana hasn’t seen Ruffalo as the superhero, he added, “He’s the one who worked it out. He found his stride.”

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