Former Marvel Legend Makes His Horror Movie Debut in ‘The Hermit’

Lou Ferrigno, the 6’5″ former bodybuilder who played the title character in The Incredible Hluk TV show in the 1970s and ’80s, is returning to the screen, this time as a cannibal pig farmer in the new horror movie The Hermit. The plot of should sound familiar to anyone who’s seen a slasher movie from the ’70s onward: two teenagers (played by Malina Weissman and Anthony Turpel) get dragged on a vacation to the woods. One thing leads to another, and soon enough they find themselves fighting for their lives against an enormous backwoods murder machine.

The Hermit is directed by Salvatore Sciafani and being released by Uncork’d Entertainment. “Lou Ferrigno delivers a performance that horror fans won’t see coming,” said Uncork’d President Keith Leopard, per Bleeding Cool. “The Hermit is dark, action-packed, and wildly entertaining. It’s exactly the kind of bold genre film our audience loves, and we can’t wait for viewers to experience it this March.”

Check out the trailer below to get an idea what their audience is in for:

‘The Hermit’ May Or May Not Be Set in Texas, There’s No Chainsaw, But There Could Definitely Be a Massacre

The trailer definitely gives off Texas Chainsaw Massacre vibes, what with teenagers traveling to a rural area and being terrorized by an enormous cannibal who seems to take orders from his mother. Although Ferrigno’s character seems to prefer an axe to a chainsaw. And while he doesn’t wear a mask, the movie does take care to shroud him in shadow much of the time. There just so happens to be a Texas Chainsaw Massacre TV show in the works at the moment, so the timing is fortuitous.

Lou Ferrigno hasn’t been in a movie since the 2019 thriller comedy Ring Ring, which also had horror elements but didn’t fully embrace the genre like The Hermit does. Before that, he played the Incredible Hulk in the Marvel Cinematic Universe. Of course, Mark Ruffalo played Bruce Banner (and is still holding hope that he might get to star in a solo movie about the character), but whenever Bruce transformed into the Hulk, that was Ferrigno doing some of the grunting and yelling. Ferrigno stayed on in that capacity through 2017’s Thor: Ragnarok.

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And before that, Ferrigno put his enormous size and ripped physique to good use in sword-and-sandal epics like Hercules and Sinbad of the Seven Seas. For a while, he was kind of like an American Arnold Schwarzenegger, but slightly younger and not nearly as famous. His towering frame makes a comeback in The Hermit, where he looks like a truly threatening presence.

The Hermit will be out on digital and on-demand platforms on Tuesday, March 3.