Movies I Loved - Hellboy II: The Golden Army

By Ephraim Belnap

A great mid-2000's entry to the comic book urban fantasy genre. We watched it as a palate cleanser after the goshawful 2007 Ghost Rider. It has everything Rider has, except it's actually good. 

The premise - continuing from the first film - is that the half-demon protector of humanity nicknamed Hellboy gets a chance to expose himself to the human world, but at the same time the disgruntled elf prince Nuada tries to destroy humanity by activating the titular supernatural army. It's a tight little urban fantasy film; people have guns, everyone's kind of snappy in a 21st century way, but they're fighting monsters from classic mythology and the occasional steampunk robot. This is directed by Guillermo Del Toro, who made Pacific Rim and The Shape of Water, so it's full of fantastic, retro-future aesthetics and awesome-looking costumes. Apparently studios tried to mess up the story and he lost funding for refusing to bend with it, so he made these awesome costumes despite budget cuts. 

The plot is pretty straightforward, as described, but the presentation is fun, and while the character dynamics can feel a little stale by this point - boring romantic banter and a villain who hates humanity 'cause consumerism!!1! - it's a much better product than it was at risk of being. The villain is especially compelling, being essentially evil Legolas, with all the unrealistically cool fighting skill you'd expect of him. I'd confidently say that the final duel between him and Hellboy is perhaps the best one-on-one fight in a comic book movie ever, with the highway fight in Winter Soldier being a very close second. 

But yeah, it's pretty fun. It's about two hours flat, it's PG-13 for some swearing and action, and it's basically a good time. If you're a fan of this genre, you'll like this film. If you're not, it'll still be all right.