Hellboy (2019)

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Hellboy
Doing what the first two movies did and failed is the equivalent of "Dante leaving a tenth circle out of his inferno".
Genre: Supernatural Superhero Directed by: Neil Marshall Produced by: Lawrence Gordon Lloyd Levin Mike Richardson Philip Westgren Carl Hampe Matt O'Toole Les Weldon Yariv Lerner Written by: Andrew Cosby Based on: Hellboy by Mike Mignola Starring: David Harbour Ian McShane Sasha Lane Daniel Dae Kim Thomas Haden Church Milla Jovovich Photography: Color Cinematography: Lorenzo Senatore Distributed by: Lionsgate Millennium Media Release date: April 9, 2019 (New York City) April 12, 2019 (United States) Runtime: 121 minutes Country: United States Budget: $50 million Box office: $55 million Franchise: Hellboy

Hellboy (or stylized as HELLBoY) is a 2019 British-American supernatural superhero film based on the Dark Horse Comics character of the same name. Directed by Neil Marshall, the film stars David Harbour in the title role, alongside Milla Jovovich, Ian McShane, Sasha Lane, Daniel Dae Kim, and Thomas Haden Church. It is a reboot of the Hellboy film series and the third live-action film in the franchise.

Plot

Hellboy is back, and he's on fire. From the pages of Mike Mignola's seminal work, this action-packed story sees the legendary half-demon superhero (David Harbour, Stranger Things) called to the English countryside to battle a trio of rampaging giants. There, he discovers The Blood Queen, Nimue (Milla Jovovich, Resident Evil series), a resurrected ancient sorceress thirsting to avenge a past betrayal. Suddenly caught in a clash between the supernatural and the human, Hellboy is now hell-bent on stopping Nimue without triggering the world's end.

Why It Should Go to Hell

1. It has no charm, no heart, and is soulless; it just does whatever it can to exist. At least the original two films, including the first installment and its sequel, tried to be memorable and had some charm, but the reboot is just another attempt at being edgy.
2. It only exists just to keep the franchise running and alive. There was never going to be a reboot, but rather a sequel to Hellboy II: The Golden Army; unfortunately, Mike Mignola (Hellboy's comic creator) and producer Lawrence Gordon mistreated director Guillermo Del Toro by replacing him with an entirely new director. Outraged by all this, Del Toro left the production, followed suit by Ron Perlman, who refused to work on the film with said new director's involvement.
   • Aside from mistreating Del Toro and canceling the third film for this, Mignola also poorly treated director Neil Marshall and fired his preferred cinematographer with another one, making Mike himself the Butch Hartman of comic book movies.
3. It is R-rated, therefore setting an imbalance between the first two films. It is the only thing this film wants to focus on, rather than its story, characters, and as said before, charm and heart. And because of that, it sometimes takes it way too seriously. Even more than this, the film has way too much swearing. There is so much swearing that it would be enough for a South Park episode or also put films like The Wolf of Wall Street and Uncut Gems to shame. Every time they drop "fuck" or "shit", they have to say it boldly just so they can tell the audience "Hey, we're fucking R-rated! This isn't for those who are young!" Three characters are dreadful when it comes to swearing: Alice, Professor Bruttenholm, and especially Gruagach.
   • Not only that, but even the first line in the opening scene has an F-bomb in it.
   • Ironically, it got the final trailer only to say "Hellboy is rated R" and explain why it is.
4. Mike Mignola only cast David Harbour as Hellboy because he watched Stranger Things, which featured him. That said, David did not know about the Hellboy franchise.
   • David appeared overweight to play Hellboy, so he exercised to win the role. Regardless, he was still very chubby-looking, like Hellboy. Not only did David Harbour get cast automatically, but he was also unprepared for the role.
     • In this case, the posters of him muscled appeared to be "Photoshopped".
   • What's worse is that the characterization of Hellboy was also butchered; in the originals, even though he was cocky, at least he had a heart and was loyal to everyone around him, but here, Hellboy is a massive bully, rudely insulting his own father for his secret, making fun of South Korean people by calling Ben Daimio "uglier than a monster", even raiding a club and murdering innocent people, despite him saying that he is on the good side in the original films.
5. Aside from the performance of David Harbour, the acting is subpar, especially Milla Jovovich's role as Nimue, where she sounds like a terrible cosplay of a villainess.
6. The film suffers from several plot holes and illogical scenes, including:
   • Somehow, only one simple jaguar attack can make Ben Daimio a were-jaguar.
   • For some reason, Gruagach randomly gets bigger in his climactic fight with Hellboy (which Gruagach wasn't even like before this). To quote Alice: "How did he get so fucking big?"
7. It ruined the origin's source material. Rasputin, One of Hellboy's enemies, dies by a burn, despite suffering worse in the original, and Professor Bruttenholm actually originally planned to kill Hellboy. Still, for some sudden change, he adopts him. Also, some unexplained Nazi hunter running around is present during the origin.
8. Much of the film is unoriginal, with specific elements ripped from the Marvel Cinematic Universe.
   • Nimue is very similar to Malekith from Thor: The Dark World, as both characters are antagonists from different ages to destroy the world. What's weird is that both have the same flaws, notably being generic, dull, flat, and one-dimensional.
   • Some posters are carbon copies of the posters for Avengers: Infinity War and Endgame, too.
9. Mediocre visual effects that look like something straight out of the original film. For instance, the blood splattering everywhere is too thick and looks more like ketchup.
10. The advertisements and the marketing look abysmal, which doomed the film already, which is probably why the film flopped.
    • Many of the posters spoiled the presence of Anung Un Rama, something that is definitely not worthy of advertising, only to make the film seem "cool" with the biggest offender being the one with the tagline "Legendary AF", in which "AF" stands for "As Fuck".
    • David Harbour played a part in why the marketing was ridiculous. He once told everyone that if he gained 666 thousand followers, he'd do a hell-infested wedding with his new wife. The worst example of this is when David told everyone that Hellboy is unable to have sex because he is a demon out of absolutely nowhere; this leads to Liz's pregnancy in The Golden Army becoming a literal mystery, and even then, David has no right to say it, as Hellboy is not his character, neither did he play any part in his creation. The claim can also lead the film to get trashed because of it.
11. Blatant product placement, such as Monster Energy drinks.
12. Poor grasp of the source material and even the original film:
    • The film's major changes in the tone.
    • Hellboy can roar like a lion as Anung Un Rama.
    • Hellboy's favorite "hero" is Lobster Johnson.
    • Hellboy and Professor Bruttenholm cannot get along, despite being loyal to each other in the original film.
13. Overuse of heavy metal pop-culture music, which feels incredibly out of place in a Hellboy film.
14. The film also has a complete lack of knowledge, since it thinks that there is a different King Arthur and that Hellboy is the devil himself.
15. Getting rid of Liz Sherman, alongside Abe Sapien (whom they only revealed later on at the end for sequel-baiting), was a stupid and pointless move, mainly because Alice and Ben are the same characters, but with minor differences.
16. Bruttenholm tries to sugarcoat the fact that he tried to kill Hellboy after he found out.
17. Several scenes serve no reason to exist other than to pad out the film's runtime, notably the scene of Gruagach as a baby, Baba Yaga, and Hellboy eating, among others.
18. Possibly the most ridiculous death scene of the film is when Professor Bruttenholm is killed by a poke when Nimue slashes his throat with her finger. In the original movie, he is killed after being impaled by a sword, which is far more graphic than that and also actually heart-shattering; making it even worse is that the original movie and its sequel are only PG-13 rated, which is not an excuse for what happens here.

Redeeming Qualities

1. David Harbour puts on a good performance as Hellboy.
2. The designs of the monsters are terrific and exceptionally well done, like on the Giants (during the scene where "Psycho" by Muse plays).
3. Some of the visuals are quite nice to look at.
4. The soundtrack by Benjamin Wallfisch can be funny, even for those who like rock and metal music.

Reception

Upon release, Hellboy received generally negative reviews from critics, audiences, and fans of the original, with criticism aimed at the plot, tone, and gore, along with unfavorable comparisons to the del Toro films, but praise for the make-up effects, Benjamin Wallfisch's score, and Harbour's performance. The film currently holds an 18% "rotten" critic score and 49% audience score with a critic consensus that reads, "Bereft of the imaginative flair that made earlier Hellboys so enjoyable, this soulless reboot suggests Dante may have left a tenth circle out of his Inferno." On IMDb, the film has a 5.2. and a 31 on Metacritic, indicating “generally unfavorable reviews”. The responses to the criticism from the crew members, including David Harbour, Milla Jovovich, and Lionsgate only made the scores even worse.

Awards and nominations

While the original won multiple positive awards and nominations, including Best Make-Up, the reboot grabbed 5 nominations in the 40th Golden Raspberry Awards, including Worst Reckless Disregard for Human Life and Public Property.

Box office

The film could not even make its budget back, with only $44.6 million out of a $50 million budget. A sequel was planned but canceled due to the film's failure, leading to the studio effectively killing the franchise.

Trivia

• If you buy the movie for 4K, you can get a steel book and a free copy of a comic book on which the movie was based.
• Ed Skrein, known for roles like Ajax in Deadpool was originally planned to star as Ben Daimio but stepped down and was recast due to backlash over whitewashing.
• Brawlhalla made a DLC featuring Hellboy, Nimue, Ben Daimio, and Gruagach to promote this movie.
• Azzael, Hellboy's father, can be seen as a shadow silhouette.
• There would be a sequel to this film (just like with Dark Phoenix), but it was canceled due to its underperformance at the box office. It would later be retooled into another reboot called Hellboy: The Crooked Man.

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