User blog comment:20thCentFopp/How Realism Caused the Failure of the Original Incredible Hulk/@comment-24308873-20131130204326/@comment-4652104-20131130212341

And he's all over the place!

I think he's like the teenage boy character in novels for teenagers. He's there so that there is somebody readers can identify with. They can imagine themselves as members of Rick's Teen Brigade (or whatever it was called) easier than as Thor or Iron Man. That would be why there is no Rick Jones in Spider-Man (as far as I know).