I enjoyed Hellboy (2004) and Hellboy: The Golden Army (2008) with Ron Perlman. “The series details the adventures of Hellboy, a Cambion (or half-Demon) B.P.R.D. agent whose true name is Anung Un Rama. The franchise has grossed a total of $325.2 million, on a combined budget of $212.5–$221 million.” (Wikipedia)
The reviews of Hellboy (2019) were so bad, I didn’t see it. David Harbour starred. The movie cost $50 million to make and its Box Office was $55.1 million.
Like a fool, I decided to watch Hellboy: The Crooked Man (2024) when it showed up on HULU. Terrible! Jack Kesy played Hellboy fighting a toxic spider and enduring some clumsy CGI. Don’t waste your time like I did… GRADE: D (for dreadful)
I have very low tastes. I like Hellboy. I even liked David Harbour’s Hellboy. I’m heading over to Hulu right now.
Jerry, I’ll be interested in your review of HELLBOY: THE CROOKED MAN.
I thought “Hellboy” was cute but the second one burned everything to the ground that I liked about the first one so thoroughly it permanently soured me on del Toro. I’ve had no interest in the anything Hellboy since and have heard this one was YouTube fan movie awful. Somehow I don’t think its failure will prevent any further movies as we are at the zombie IP era of deadend culture. My condolences on having sat through this.
Byron, hope springs eternal so I had a faint feeling that maybe this new HELLBOY: THE CROOKED MAN might get the HELLBOY franchise back on track. Wrong!
You and Jackie are on the same page. She loved the Ron Perlman Hellboy movies and we skipped the Harbour one.
Now that we have Hulu and Disney for four months, I’m going to watch The Mandalorian.
Jeff, THE MANDALORIAN is infinitely better than HELLBOY: THE CROOKED MAN.
Okay, I just watched it and it’s bad. The direction sucked. The photography sucked. The soundtrack and music sucked. Some of the actors tried, but guess what? they sucked, and so did their accents. Little logic or continuity and a plot that’s as fuzzy as peach left to sit in the open for three weeks. The guy playing Hellboy looks like he got third runner-up in a bad Liam Neesen lookallke contest. And somewhere along the line, Hellboy wasn’t allowed to be Hellboy, The script adapts a limited series comic book written by Hellboy Mike Mignola. The film’s script was by Mike Mignola, his frequent collaborator Christopher Golden, and director Brian Taylor — I want to lay all the blame for the movie on Taylor becausse I just can’r believe that Mignola and Golden would go so far off the track ln their own. Somewhere along the line they threw in a dash of Manly Wade Wellman’s Appalachian fantasies without really understanding them, as well as a hint of H.P, Lovecraft (the film takes place in 1959, long before Lovecraft and Cthulhu were ubiquitous, but that doesn’t stop Hellboy from referencing Lovecraft’s cosmic mythology as if everyone were familiar with it). Adeline Rudolph played Bobbie Jo Sung in this, her film debut, and it shows she’s not ready for prime time — at least with this director. The film is the first in a potentail series in which director Taylor wanted to reset the franchise — making Hellboy younger, and the series R-rated. According to the production company’s president, special effects for the main demon character were disappointing, so they went to AI — but Taklor denied this saying, the producer misspoke and confused the film with another; according to Taylor, no CGI was used for either Hellboy or the Crooked Man. Either way, the special effects were disappointing. Principal photography was donen in Bulgaria, which may or may not have had a deliterious effect on the film (who am I to dis Bulgaria’s film industry?),. One Rotten Tomatoes comment: “THE CROOKED MAN buckles under its constraints resulting in an uneven, third-rate bag of all tricks and no treats.” So, George, I think your review was spot-on.
Would I watch again? Heck, yes! IT’S HELLBOY! Did I mention I have very low tastes?