Movie Review: Hellboy (2019)

When an ancient queen returns and is intent on wiping out humanity, the only way to stop her is to raise a little hell. And who better than Hellboy to do said hell-raising? Well, the live-action Hellboy reboot is out! Did it hit harder than the Right Hand of Doom, or was it a fizzling failure? Let's find out! I do want to warn that I will try to make this review as spoiler-free as possible, but there may be some minor stuff.

The first thing I had noticed was that this film took full advantage of its being rated R. Seriously. There is a ton of blood, violence, and f-bombs in the movie. I did feel the language was a bit excessive at times.

I did enjoy the cast. David Harbour of Stranger Things fame takes up the Right Hand of Doom, and his Hellboy is a bit more emotional and rougher-edged take, like he was a younger version of the character. He displayed some nice moments of humor in his performance, and there is a scene with him and Ian McShane's Trevor Bruttenholm that made me tear up a little. Daniel Dae Kim was also really good as Ben Daimio. His and Hellboy's interactions were fun. I also thought Sasha Lane's Alice Monaghan was great, too. I liked her evolution into a butt-kicker in her own right.

One of the flaws I felt the film had was the villain, Nimue. I felt she did come off as a bit wooden. Like they didn't let her emote. I also felt that her trying to tempt Hellboy to the dark side was kind of thin as we did not get a lot of Hellboy interacting with regular people to show that he was as 'hated and feared' as she claimed. I also was not completely into Ian McShane's performance as Trevor Bruttenholm. His Bruttenholm was a bit harsher and meaner than the portrayal by the late John Hurt in the GDT Hellboy films, and I think it would not have hurt for him to show some sympathy and kindness towards his son on occasion.

I have seen a lot of reviews saying this film was terrible. I do agree on one thing: This film is not as good as the Guillermo Del Toro films. I think that the film did not quite have the heart those did, mainly thanks to Del Toro's fondness for making monsters more human. However, I don't think the film was completely terrible. There were some cool visuals, and if you like bloody fights, this film would be right up your alley. This Hellboy is more of a straight-up action film than a character piece. And hey, the GDT films still exist, so they can still be enjoyed. Heck, if you have Netflix, the first one is there.

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