As Good As The First One

Rating: 7/10 (11 July 2008)

Hellboy II: The Golden Army opens (as most comic book movies do) with a back-story. In ancient times there was a war between humans and a magical, invisible realm. This fantastical kingdom led by King Balor creates an army of golden soldiers. (Think Lord Of The Rings meets Transformers.) However, this army is too powerful and, since they aren't human, they ruthlessly slaughter every enemy on the battlefield yielding no quarter. King Balor, realizing the error of his ways, forms a truce with mankind. Man can have the cities and his kingdom will live in the forest and shadows. Flash forward several centuries and King Balor's son, Prince Nuada, wishes to break this truce and wage war on humans. But first he must usurp his father's throne and then reassemble the mystical crown that will allow him to regain control of the Golden Army.
If you're eyes haven't glazed over after reading all that, then you'll love this movie.
Guillermo del Toro returns as director for Hellboy II and it's safe to say that this movie would quickly disintegrate without him. As strong as Ron Perlman's performance as Hellboy is, it would be a wasted effort without the love and care that del Toro obviously has for this world. Del Toro allegedly passed on directing a number of very high profile films (I Am Legend, Halo, Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince) in order to return to Hellboy. He clearly has a great deal of love for this universe. As evidenced in the first Hellboy and Pan's Labyrinth, del Toro loves creating and filming unusual creatures. This being a sequel, the budget is higher and every penny of it appears to be on the screen.
Ron Perlman has a blast in the roll of Hellboy - the candy-eatin', cigar chompin', cat-lovin' spawn of Satan. Much of the humor in the Hellboy franchise comes from the incongruity between the way these characters look and the way they act. They may look like they're from the bowels of Hell, but the love cartoons and kitty-cats, classic literature and Barry Manilow. As tough or creepy or scaly as they might be, they have quirks and foibles just like everyone else. To quote the bard: "If you prick us, do we not bleed? If you tickle us, do we not laugh? If you poison us, do we not die?" Of course, let's not give the film too much credit by dragging Shakespeare into all this. At the end of the day, this is just a movie about big monsters punching bigger monsters. But, thanks to del Toro, it's fascinating to look at and it's briskly paced.
Doug Jones returns as Abe Sapien, a fish like humanoid that has to wear a sort of reverse scuba gear when leaving water. In the first film, Jones played the physical part but, at the studios request, the voice was dubbed in by David Hyde Peirce. The studio figured that DHP was a bigger star and would be able to help better promote the film. However, DHP was so impressed at what Jones brought to the character without words that he declined a credit for the film and refused to do any press for the movie. He so wanted to honor Doug Jones performance that he even tried to emulate his manner of speaking when he recorded his dialogue. This time Abe is all Doug Jones. While Jones does a fine job, sometimes his performance (with his slight frame, overly polite manner and British accent) is a little overly reminiscent of C3PO.
Abe falls in love with Princes Nuala, Prince Nuada's twin sister. They have a sort of Corsican Brothers relationship where if one is caused pain the other will feel it too. The twins also seem to have a, shall we say, "close" relationship. This is never overtly addressed (so don't let it stop you from bringing the kids), but it is certainly an underlying element of their relationship. And, really, if there is one thing that America has been clamoring for when it comes to our summer blockbusters, it's more incestuous subtext.
The action pieces are fast and furious in this film but nothing ground breaking. Hellboy fights a big monster, Hellboy fights a really big monster and, just to keep it fresh, Hellboy fights a lot of little monsters.
For all of Hellboy's inventiveness, whether it be as a comic book or on the big screen, it's never really resonated with me personally. But it has a legion of fans (no pun intended) and they certainly won't be disappointed by this outing.
On a 2008 summer super-hero scale of 1 to 10, with 10 being Iron Man and 1 being Hancock, Hellboy II: The Golden Army gets a 7.