Apparently the She-Hulk title has a pretty rich history of being rather tongue-in-cheek. Like Deadpool in the Cable & Deadpool series, She-Hulk has been known to routinely break the fourth wall and talk to her audience. While there isn't any of that to be found in this new She-Hulk series, there are plenty of inside jokes about comic books, their audience and the industry itself that will make any avid fan chuckle.

The story behind this series is that She-Hulk gets hired by a legal firm that specializes in superhuman cases. The firm has a catch though, they hire Jen Walters not She-Hulk. For a chracter who basically chooses permenantly to remain in her superhero form, this becomes a real identity issue for She-Hulk and this struggle between the confident "Shulkie" (*shudder*) and the insecure Jen is central in the first two trades. It's also one of the more interesting aspects of this series.

This new series is written by Dan Slott. It seems that Slott is slated to be Marvel's new golden boy, since they put him on the new Avengers The Initiative title and he'll be one of the many new Spider-man writers after the One More Day event, but it's on this She-Hulk series (and to a lesser extent The Thing) that Slott really got noticed.
Slott has a definite lighthearted style to his writing and fans of the Initiative will really enjoy this book, unfortunately I'm of the opinion that The Initiative is below average so while this series definitely had some positives, it really struggled to maintain my interest throughout all four volumes.
The first two collections are definitely the best. They have some genuinely funny moments and clever shots at the comic book industry. For example, since She-Hulk works at a superhuman law office, the lawyers use longboxes to research a case rather than legal books. When these longboxes get destroyed the legal team have to head down to the local comic shop to do some research, this outing leads to great exchange between She-Hulk's assistant and the clerk:
CLERK: Hey, I've seen you in an issue of She-Hulk. Gotta say, the continuity in your book? It sucks. Like in issue three. People could remember the Inifinity Gauntlet saga, even though everybody got their minds wiped at the end of the I.G....
ASSISTANT: Is that so? Then how do you remember it?
CLERK: Read it in a comic.
ASSISTANT: Exactly. Because licensed comics, like the Hulk, covered those events. And they saw print before the mind wipe. And when people read 'em, they remember, see?
CLERK: Whatever.
Another standout for this book is the character of Awesome Andy. He's the Mad Thinker's Awesome Android who has since been reformed and works as a legal clerk. He wears a chalkboard around his neck to write on since he has no face and can't talk, but both Slott and artist Juan Bobillo really manage to convey his emotions to the reader, with both touching and hilarious results.
Unfortunatly the final two trades really lack the humor that's so prominent in the first two collections and with the main story being far weaker, they really struggled to maintain my interest. They also suffered from more and more fill in artists as well which really took away from the fun that was found in the first two collections.

The series regular artist is Juan Bobillo but numerous issues are done by a variety of fill-in artists. I'm not really familiar with Bobillo but he has a very cartoony, lighthearted style that really fits the book, so much so that when a more detailed (and some might argue, better) artist comes along to fill in for a few issues, the art feels very out of place. Bobillo's interpretation of both the mousey Jennifer Walters and the massive She-Hulk are the perfect contrast and really help illustrate the differences between the two characters (even though we are told by She-Hulk that they are one and the same, the character's behaviour and the art both tell us differently). The biggest negative I found with his art style is the numerous guest stars that show up in this book. Bobillo's interpretations of Spider-Man, Hawkeye and The Thing look particularly off and this is a real knock against a book that relies so heavily on guest stars.

I'd recommend the first two trades to anyone who misses days when comics managed to have fun. there is plenty to enjoy in these collections, from Spider-Man suing J. Jonah Jameson for libel, debates over the legality of using a ghost as a witness to their own murder to the villain, Constrictor suing Hercules for physical abuse and mental anguish. It was definitely a fun read but really fell off the rails with the final two collections, I would only recommend those to people who enjoy more simplified storytelling and standard Hulk action. But other than that I feel it lost the humor that was so pivitol to volumes 1 and 2, even the cases that try to capture the feel of the original series tend to fall pretty flat (how did Slott fail to make a concept like charging former Avenger Starfox with sexual harassment funny????)

Volume 1 & 2 receive a B-, Volume 3 & 4 a D and the series as a whole I would give a C-. See if you can find 1 & 2 in the library and you won't be disappointed.

MIKE