2 of 3: Hellboy II Review

I went to the Stroud Mall Saturday morning to try and sell some CDs and DVDs I no longer wanted. The store I had brought them to had to wait a couple of hours until the higher-ups showed up to pay out, so I needed to kill some time. I took advantage of this, and went to the theater and paid $4 to see the sequel to Hellboy:

Hellboy II: The Golden Army

The movie begins with a tale of how the Golden Army came to be, and then takes you into the B.P.R.D. (Bureau of Paranormal Research and Development), where top agent Hellboy (Ron Perlman) leads its agents on taking on attacking paranormal creatures. He soon gets involved with the plans of an evil elvish prince (Luke Goss) who is attempting to find the Golden Army and unleash it on the human population. It then becomes a race to see who can get to the Golden Army first, all while Hellboy has to deal with his relationship with fellow agent Liz (Selma Blair) and the reaction of the human population to his existence.

Director Guillermo Del Toro is known for his visual tastes, and this movie doesn't hold back with its special effects and interesting look to the characters and surroundings (most notably the Goblin Market the characters enter). The movie's focus is entirely on these elements more than the story, which does hold its own thanks to the actors playing through it. Ron Perlman continues to show why he was the best choice for the Hellboy characters, and is the stand-out of the movie. The rest of the cast stay average, which was good considering the movie is about Hellboy.

As for flaws, the villain prince who is impressive in the fights scenes can't carry it onto the character he plays. Luke Goss was much more convincing as the villain in Blade II than as Prince Nuada in the film. Also Jeffrey Tambor's character as the head agent does a complete 180 from his character in the first movie, and I think that hurt his overall feel in the sequel. He was originally a hard-ass, and now he has become a timid supervisor, which doesn't fit like his character did originally.

Overall, the movie is worth watching just for its amazing visuals, and if you're a major fan of the Hellboy character. If you haven't seen the first movie, it's not completely necessary, but I can
say the the sequel has done better than the original. Rather than give a score this time, I'm just going to give a general statement about how entertaining the movie is. For those who like visually-pleasing movies and their fair share of science fiction and action will definitely enjoy this movie. Those who might not are those who aren;t fans of the sci-fi genre. That being said, I feel that Hellboy II is an entertaining movie that does the series well, and will likely spawn a third movie dowen the road.

Joe