From the get-go, obviously NOT a continuation of the Guillermo del Toro versionings of the Mike Mignola character here. Some great fantasy realizations with those first two, no doubt, and credit in actually getting them made. Got a little goofy plot-wise there toward the end, whatever. Movin on. To This. When you preface the film with a flashback of 517 A.D. and call them ‘the fuckin dark ages,’ you have officially entered a new chapter of the Hellboy Storytellins.
Interesting mesh here of a ‘younger’ Hellboy, at least intellectually, since the dude ages like a reverse dog or some shit. Presented here in current-day-ish times, and a darker R-rated take on the Mignola comics. BPRD. Professor Broom. Incorporations of a lot of cool mythologies and fairy tales and folklore. And Hellboy just figuring out Hellboy, really.
This here is a bit...frenetic. A lot of evil shit and blood via a heavy CGI filter that can be a bit of a mixed bag. To be fair, the effects are not all the worst, just some dodginess that is not helped by some script issues. Unfortunately, it’s also kind of a 10 pounds of shit in a 5 pound bag kinda situation. The whole “channeling spirits” thing is pretty cringe and lazy for exposition not just once but twice. Humor and tone aren’t always a good match. Yeah. Some Cool individual stories, though.
Neil Marshall directed. He had some good early small-budget horror with Dog Soldiers and The Descent, and a few episodes of various decent-budget 2010s TV series including a couple from Game of Thrones. But apparently he has since disowned this movie due to meddling producers, the bad script and described the job as the worst professional experience in his career. Harsh.
Casting. David Harbour as Hellboy? Yeah, actually a decent choice. As much as I love Ian “Swearengen” McShane, I don’t know if he was the right choice here for the Professor. Milla Jovovich as the Blood Queen? I honestly can’t say she’s really been a good actress in anything I’ve seen her in. Maybe her bit part in Dazed and Confused? Even in The Fifth Element, she is kinda half retarded. Perfunctionary here, at best. And yeah, the script really doesn’t help her out either.
I try not to concentrate on the flaws of the movies I watch, but... Where Mignola takes a lot of cool old and new mythologies and folklore and elevates them through engaging stories and visuals, this one does the same, but with a blender. The vignettes of Mignola stories here are good individually (especially the Baba Yaga segment is pretty cool), it’s just they are stitched together poorly through brash modern editing techniques and music. It’s this disjointedness that kinda hamstrings the film overall. But credit to them for working in the Awesome Cheeziness known as Lobster Johnson. Yeah!
