In the hands of someone other than Guillermo del Toro, the Hellboy franchise could possibly have been a complete disaster. Thanks to del Toro's ability to beautifully capture the mythical and fantasy aspects of the Hellboy universe, we are treated to a sequel that improves upon the first film.
Visually, Hellboy 2 wins. This film comes to life on the big screen. This sequel takes on more of a grand "epic" scale in comparison to the first one. There are larger battles and del Toro does them justice. He has a knack for such creativity and as far as the visuals go, I was not disappointed. The monsters and mythical creatures were so brilliantly created. Whether they were his own creations or concepts taken from the comic books, I don't know, but either way, they came out stunning.
The one area that I was disappointed in was the story. I felt it was lacking a lot. The whole Golden Army concept was a neat idea that I wish was expanded on more. In my opinion, it seemed as if all the major key plot turns and outcomes came too quickly and too easily. The ending felt rather forced and unfortunately very expected. While it's hard to knock a film in this genre too hard for plot woes, the fact that it was indeed del Toro who wrote the script leaves me doing so. After being stunned by both The Devil's Backbone and Pan's Labyrinth, I was expecting a little more. Do not worry though, these complaints are about all I could find to be even close to being wrong with the film. They don't take away from any of the fun of the film.
Ron Perlman is excellent once again as Hellboy. The rest of the cast is as good as they need to be. The real stars here are Red himself and the visual feast. It's a treat to see on the big screen. The film is all around fun and entertaining and one of the better summer films, so far.
3.5 STARS OUT OF 5
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