Hellboy II: The Golden Army

Dir: Guillermo Del Toro

Starring: Ron Perlman

Selma Blair

Doug Jones

Luke Goss

Seth MacFarlane

Creating an entire universe can be quite taxing. There are such intricate details that must be analyzed and rules that the entire atmosphere needs to adhere to. One can only imagine how methodical and tedious it must be. One of the fortunate aspects of creating a universe is being able to revisit it for a second effort. With the first pass over with, you’re free to make corrections and take your vast apprehension of the material and march forward. Any bumps that were overlooked during the first time around have been steam rolled. At least they should be. Lucky for us, Del Toro completely submersed himself in the Hellboy universe the first time around, and Ol’ Gil doesn’t inch his way into the pool; he does a god damn swan dive straight into the deep end. 

With such a great set up with the first Hellboy, and fresh out from the most impressive work of both his and cinematographer Guillermo Navarro’s collective careers, there’s nowhere to go but up with this new installment in the Hellboy franchise. Wonderfully paced and brilliantly shot, Hellboy II: The Golden Army, feels at times like more than your typical “extract your brain upon entering the theatre” action film. True it isn’t without it’s flaws, but even those are cleverly masked. Flashbacks revealing the premise (a somewhat arguably lazy plot device) is told through a cleverly choreographed show of stop motion animation, and a sappy scene in Hellboy’s most vulnerable moment happens at the feet of one of Del Toro’s more frightening and beautiful monsters to date (Jones' Angel of death).  

A language barrier accounts for some overly enthusiastic cheese, but Del Toro’s “isn’t this cool?” attitude works so well within the Hellboy format. His need to explain to the audience what is hip makes for some ridiculous puns and slow motion camera work, but whereas this habit hurt previous efforts, these fingerprints fit perfectly inside Big Red’s universe. 

On the subject of message, Hellboy II: The Golden Army offers no solution to the problem it addresses. The human race has been the bane and suffering for mythical beasts and paranormal beings since the beginning. In their pride and never ending thirst for power, they have become numb to destroying both the beautiful and frightening. Whereas sometimes bringing up the problem is enough in itself, this time around it would have been nice to be given something other than an overwhelming sense of self loathing when the finger was pointed at man. Now I feel terrible for destroying the things that I used to be afraid of. Especially when the scary things are this pretty.

All in all, this film is a solid piece of action cinema thanks to its director and its director's choices. Rather than follow in the footsteps of the overwhelming wave of simpleton "comic book" directors, Del Toro refuses to adhere to the confines of a graphic novel. Hellboy II is a film, and he treats it like such. Comic book rules don't apply here. This is an entirely different monster. And for this monster, it's OK if you leave your brain inside its cavity when you watch it.