Hola all. Massawyrm here.
I fucking love Guillermo del Toro. He just…gets me. The guy digs deep into his brain, rattles around a bit back there, then pulls something out and with his cupped, wet, dripping hands offers up exactly what I was looking for. He can do fun. He can do brutal. He can do melancholic. And he can do all three at the same time. I love his films. But they’re not for everyone. He plays to geeks in a big way – both closeted, or like me, out and proud. Oh sure, most people THINK they’re del Toro fans because they loved Pan’s Labyrinth, but that’s like saying you’re a David Lynch fan because you like Blue Velvet. It doesn't count if EVERYONE loves it. No, del Toro ain’t for everybody. And the Hellboy series separates the fans from the otherwise better than anything else he’s done.
I mention this because if you didn’t love Hellboy – if you found it to be a soulless, lackluster, characterless attempt at a superhero film – than Hellboy 2 will not make you a convert. Guillermo returns to that universe and spends two more hours there without trying to “fix” anything he did “wrong” the first time around. And while everyone I’ve spoken with agrees that this is the superior film of the two, I’ve yet to hear from someone who had no love for the first change course with this one. And that is a very important fact to arm yourself with before considering whether or not to see this one.
But what if you dug the everloving shit out of the first one and two more hours in that universe is exactly what the doctor ordered? Well you, my friend, are in for a treat. Because this is every bit as good as Hellboy, but taken to a level (and to places) Hellboy was never allowed to really go last time.
What I love about the Hellboy universe is that it is the most “comic-booky” of the comic book movies. While every single superhero title to date has been handled by studios that have strived to root the films somewhere within the real, readily identifiable universe – del Toro has given the big high hard one to that idea and uttered two, very important, very distinctive words. Fuck it. This shouldn’t feel ANYTHING like the real world. It’s about the son of the devil for fucks sake. It’s a big giant demonic creature who shaves his horns, eats nachos, loves kittens and beats things to a bloody, messy pulp when they interfere with his breakfast. And THAT’S the universe del Toro puts on the screen.
Everything all the other guys have put so eloquently I can only second. You’re gonna see the Troll Market and flip the fuck out. You’re gonna watch the elemental sequence and just feast upon the sumptuous character design. You’re going to look at the elves and see them at once creepy and beautiful at the same time, like Michael Moorcock’s Elric of Melnibone brought to life at last. The visual palate here is just utterly indescribable. It’s like dropping your hallucinogen of choice only to then be handed a Brian Froud book for the first time in your life. There just aren’t words to describe what you’re going to see.
And yet as beautiful, incredible and mind splinteringly gorgeous this is, it is not any of these images that keep popping into my mind as I think back on this film. A demon, a telepathic fishman, a ghost in a robot suit and a mega hot ultra vixen pyrokinetic all walk into a room together surrounded by 4900 suits of indestructible armor and you pause to think for a moment – how the fuck did we get here? What eight year old sucking down 3 too many Yoohoo’s dreamt up this assembly of critters? And then you realize you don’t care, because the 8-year-old inside you wants to hear the rest of this other 8-year-old’s story. What I love about these films is that they put me in a universe where this kind of thing is somewhat normal. It is a universe where weird shit happens – and the weirdest of the weird get all that shit worked out.
Del Toro never brings it back to earth, never tries to make it feel real. The more four-color the better. These are fantasy movies, adventure films crafted by someone deeply in love with source material. And this one rocks even harder than its predecessor. These are exactly the type of films I had grown up watching. They sure as fuck were the movie I was WISHING at the time I could grow up with. And God bless Guillermo for giving them to me now. HIGHLY RECOMMENDED if you loved the first. Not so much if you that boat left you at the dock last time.
Until next time friends, smoke ‘em if ya got ‘em.
Massawyrm
Got something for the Wyrm? Mail it here.
