Hellboy (2019) User Reviews

Watch the del Toro duology instead...

[rubenrui · 5/10 · 11 April 2019]

Although the effort of the director and the talent of the actors, the movie lacks the charm of the Guillermo del Toro duology. The movie is way more faithful to the comics but it also tries to be faithful to the previous movies (which every reboot should try to be) but it just becomes a mess of attempts. The CGI is overused- WHEN WILL STUDIOS LEARN!- and although the creatures design is very interesting, pretty much every character lacks the dept the old duology provided. At the end of the day Hellboy(2019) is just another failed reboot that tries to be it's own thing while respecting the previous movies. My rating? 5 out of 10, but I do agree with the 61% rating on rotten tomatoes because the movie isn't all crap, there's a charm to it but it's not enough to make you overlook it's flaws. Just watch the Guillermo del Toro duology, it's a far superior franchise, and I would of loved to see the third movie if the studios didn't cancelled it. If you are interested in the director Neill Marshall (which despite the failed attempt of rebooting Hellboy is a damn good director) go watch Dog Soldiers which is criminally underrated. See you next time at the movies, Ruben the Critic

Adequate, but where's the love?

[Leofwine_draca · 6/10 · 26 September 2020]

HELLBOY is the third instalment of the filmed comic book franchise, sadly lacking the magnificent presence of director Guillermo del Toro who is replaced by likeable B-movie stalwart Neil Marshall. Unfortunately Marshall didn't contribute the script, which is undoubtedly the weakest thing about this generic offering, and despite copious amounts of his trademark gore and bloodshed, this is a film that doesn't amount to much. Ron Perlman didn't come back either, and David Harbour is a weak imitation, his Hellboy lacking singularly in charisma and feeling more like a heavy metal band member more than anything else. The film offers endless spectacle and action heavily dominated by CGI effects, but the mish-mash of plot and forced humour, while watchable, doesn't have the same love and care that went into the two prior films. Put it this way: I can happily re-watch either of those, but I won't be re-watching this one.

no longer fun

[SnoopyStyle · 4/10 · 5 July 2019]

During the time of Camelot, King Arthur dismembers the evil Nimue (Milla Jovovich) and his knights carry the remains to far off hiding places. In the present day, Hellboy (David Harbour) is battling evil under the command of his adoptive father Trevor Bruttenholm (Ian McShane). Alice Monaghan (Sasha Lane) is a close companion on the team who has clairvoyant powers. Team member Ben Daimio (Daniel Dae Kim) distrusts Hellboy and takes mysterious injections.

All the fun seems to have been drained from the franchise. Everyone is playing a singular tone of sarcasm and anger. There is plenty of splatter as the movie seems to be leaning towards the horror genre. It's not horror in terms of being scary. It's horror in terms of having some of the visual language without the effects. The story telling is rather flat. I expected this to be a scavenger hunt for the parts of Nimue but that's not the case. It becomes a series of events and battles with sound and fury signifying nothing.

Terrible Writing, Weird Directing and Awful CGI

[misho-29395 · 2/10 · 20 April 2019]

Watching this, it feels like a twelve-year-old wrote the screenplay by tacking together scenes that might look cool without giving any thought to what the dialog would sound like when spoken out loud by human beings. Ian McShane does his best to sound convincing, while some of the other actors don't seem to see the point in even doing that and it's hard to blame them. There are plot holes throughout and segments that make little-to-no sense and add nothing to the story, although would maybe look neat if the effects were any good. The whole thing generally feels like someone slapped together at least four or five stories and tried to turn them into a coherent whole, which wouldn't surprise me, although I don't know enough about the comics to say for certain.

I'm not sure where to place the blame for the awful pacing, but the movie is just unrelenting. There are times when things should wind down, but then it's just more noisy stuff happening. For example, at one point a character is in need of specialized medical attention and they find out it'll be a fairly-long and "treacherous" trek to get it. The character is then cured within 1-2 minutes of runtime, the trek portion being a few seconds of that, then we jump straight into some exposition, then we jump straight back to what we were doing before, presumably after a long and treacherous trek back that also happens instantaneously. To get an idea of how jarring this feels, imagine if Gandalf told Frodo about what it would take to destroy the ring and the next scene was at Mount Doom.

The direction is mostly just odd, and I have no idea if it's because the director couldn't figure out what was happening in the script or because someone was meddling with his work.

Finally, the CGI monsters look terrible. There are some impressive uses of practical effects, but the transitions between those and their CGI counterparts are blatant.

Hell did not freeze over

[kosmasp · 7/10 · 8 July 2019]

Even though some critics thought it might. Now this had a bad standing from the beginning. And while the actors are quite nice and the R-rating was secured (something fan boys really wished for), it did not make nearly as much money as it was supposed to. Or rather as much as the producers and the studio hoped for overall.

And while this is layed out to warrant sequels, this probably won't happen. And it's almost a shame, because it isn't at all bad. The effects are good, the new Hellboy managed to stay afloat (which is quite an achievement if you think about the shoes he had to fill - or is it the horns?) - the story made sense too. But I guess there is a comic book fatigue to a degree. There are so many movies out there, that people pick and choose. Maybe there were other reasons too, but in the end it doesn't really matter ... speaking of endings: there is one mid credit scene and one after credit scene. So if you watch it, watch it proper

I could not wait for this movie to be over.

[markwilliamraymond · 1/10 · 22 April 2019]

Story was rushed, very little character development, and the climax was disappointing. They should have funded a 3rd Guillermo del Toro movie instead. I try and give movies a chance, including this one, but the film was really bad. The only other movie I've ever wanted to leave early for was Dumb and Dumber To.

Had fun watching this

[gus76 · 7/10 · 11 April 2019]

Currently being slammed by critics and sitting a very low score on rotten tomatoes, Hell Boy is a film I went into with zero expectations. I just wanted something silly, entertaining and over the top, and the exactly what I got, and I must say, I enjoyed the..erm..hell out of it. Directed by Neil Marshal, who has worked on Game of thrones and West World, this is not the Neil Marshall who gave us the horror masterpiece that is The Decent. This is the Neil Marshal who gave us Dog Soldiers and Doomsday. Silly, gory, surprising and does not give a **** about embracing it absurd concept to the full. David Harbor knocks it out of the park as Hellboy, and one thing he has over Ron Perlman's performance is a sense of threat; that he really could be evil of pushed too far. The whole film moves at a fast pace and has a feel of a video game, but here it works, with a mix of Devil May Cry and God of War, especially in the combat and design of some creatures. Maybe I was in a forgiving mood but the Bebop like villain Gruagach had me in stiches with his sweary mouth and English northern accent. Go see it if you want some outrageous fantasy violence and a few laughs.

Damn my eyes!

[neat-stuff · 2/10 · 12 April 2019]

I don't consider myself an angry guy but if this is the new standard for blockbusters, Baba Yaga can have both my eyes because I will have no further use for them. There's nothing I can think of to defend this cinematographic abomination. This extremely ugly shot cosplay version of Mike Mignola's Hellboy comic does not even attempt to tell a coherent story. The soundtrack consists of some out of place rock songs that are stuck in random places in the film. Unlike Del Toro's films, there is no way of feeling any sympathy for the one-dimensional characters. The endless stream of silly one-liners and aimless quips make you realize that these annoyingly unpleasant characters have nothing to tell us over the course of two (!) excruciating hours. The movie simply jumps from exposition piece to action scene and back again. And where Guillermo Del Toro created a tactile world with a balanced combination of practical effects work and sparingly used CGI, we are now saddled with special effects that look like the deleted scenes from a Playstation 3 game. It's incomprehensible that Mignola believes that this soulless version is closer to the comics. I think the claim that the a fan of the source material would be at peace with this terrible movie is an insult.

Harbour has Hellboy Handled

[zwarner-64374 · 7/10 · 12 April 2019]

Harbour does a great job in this film playing the anti-hero Hellboy. The script was not great and after reading reviews I thought it would be garbage. There are enough redeeming qualities to watch this movie in theaters. It has solid action sequences with plenty of gore. It's disappointing critics tore it apart. I give it a solid 7 it's entertaining just try not to take anything away from it and enjoy the ride.

Neither a complete disaster nor a triumph.

[BA_Harrison · 5/10 · 23 August 2019]

517 A.D.: King Arthur defeats the Blood Queen (Milla Jovovich) with the help of his trusty magical sword Excalibur, chopping her into pieces and burying her still-living body parts in the far reaches of the land. 1500 years later, changeling Gruagach (voiced by Stephen Graham) pieces the queen back together so that she can destroy mankind and rule the Earth with monsters as her loyal subjects. Hellboy (David Harbour) is given the job of preventing this from happening.

The majority of fans and critics gave this film hell on its release. So what did it do to deserve such damnation?

For many, the simple fact that it wasn't directed by Guillermo Del Toro and didn't star Ron Perlman was enough to demonise the movie, but even overlooking the change of director and leading man, there is still plenty to dislike: the creature-filled action scenes are over-reliant on unrealistic CGI; the comedy frequently mis-fires; Daniel Dae Kim and Sasha Lane are lousy as Hellboy's sidekicks; and the plot is rather scattershot. Oh, and there's a REALLY bad ectoplasmic Ian McShane.

Having said that, there is also quite a lot to enjoy: the R-Rating allows for plenty of graphic gore (although, sadly, much of it is also digital); there are some delightfully absurd moments (Hellboy's encounter with hideous witch Baba Yaga, who lives in a house on giant chicken legs, is excellent, and Eastenders fans will enjoy seeing Mo Harris brandishing a machine gun); the links to Arthurian legend are fun, and apparently make the film more faithful to the comics than Del Toro's movies; and director Neil Marshall occasionally shows us what he is really capable of (the single-shot fight scene in a Siberian complex at the end of the film is wonderful).

All in all, a very mixed bag of a movie: not the completely hellish experience that I had heard it was, but far from great.

Love it, need more.

[lantzstumpp · 8/10 · 12 April 2019]

I strongly urge anyone that considers themselves a fan of #Hellboy, the comics, the characters and not just the #GuillermodelToro/#RonPerlman films, please go see this film. This is a very different take on these iconic characters and the world they inhabit and it is the most fun version that I've seen so far. Don't get me wrong, I loved GDT's films, the man crafts beautiful modern fairly tales and this film was smart no to try and replicate that. Instead, this movie has more in common with #SamRaimi's #ArmyOfDarkness, over the top violence and Gore, not for those with a weak stomach, and frequent profanity. #DavidHarbour does an excellent job and plays the role very differently than Perlman did and it has the potential to propel him from TV into a full time movie star. #IanMcShane brings his usual gravitas and presence to the role previously embodied by the late great #JohnHurt, again being smart to not emulate that performance and make this role entirely his own.

I feel like this movie is suffering from the same disconnect and out of touch effect that critics had with last year's #Venom. Critics almost universally panned that film while audiences similarly loved it. Every negative review I've read for this so far continually compares it unfavorably to the previous films and many also take issues with the excessive use of violence, Gore and adult language. What did you expect, this is an R Rated film and is thoroughly advertised as such.

I hope positive word of mouth from fans makes this successful as they set up some very cool stuff for a potential sequel.

If you love these characters like I do, if you love balls to the wall, over the top action horror, please see this film.

Pretty good... Could have been better but enjoyed

[rahulsamanta-88930 · 7/10 · 15 April 2019]

David Harbour looks awesome as Hellboy. Can learn from the mistakes and be back with a bang in the sequel. Has potential. Glad to not have listened to the reviews and the critics... Hoping for a sequel and for the hellish red demon to be back

Not Even Good Actors Could Rescue Bad Directing

[salamandermike · 1/10 · 12 April 2019]

I loved the 2004 version with Ron Perlman. That production team nailed it. I was expecting they would reboot the franchise because they had some new ideas. Doesn't seem like that was their motivation. The 2019 version is a mess. The source material is SO rich, but they only skimmed the surface of it, focusing on broad ideas so much that I couldn't really care about any of the characters or even the fate of humanity. The writing is bad and feels like a Jr. High boy's creative writing assignment, full of fantastic concepts that have all been done before. There's a lot of explaining about past events and scene setup that should come from situations and dialog, but instead is given to us in a "Oh yeah, forgot to tell you..." fashion. Then there was the editing... Scenes were mishmashed together to tell the story loosely. I'm not an editor, but I even noticed scenes that would have been better left out or rearranged in a different order. Halfway through the movie, I left.

Soulless lifeless dull af boring cgi action flick

[mr_chatila · 4/10 · 18 April 2019]

Had to write this review seeing how so many others give it a 10, seriously? There's almost nothing to like or admire about this compared to the great 2 previous hell-boy movies directed by the great Guillermo del Toro. So disappointing and so forgettable, it's a tragedy and sin to moviegoers they opted to make this ramshackle ruinous flick instead of ending the initial hellboy trilogy by making hellboy 3. The horde (audience) wins over the others who appreciate really good things I guess!!!

Dumb but entertaining

[vmanson-49017 · 7/10 · 10 April 2019]

Yup the movie is dumb but that's hellboy. The cgi and monsters are nice. Alot of action not much talking. I was entertained.

zzz .... zzz .... zzz

[FrenchEddieFelson · 4/10 · 8 May 2019]

I really like the character of Hellboy with his little John McClane side, i.e. « I did not ask to be here, but as I am stuck here, please let me smash them all, one by one, just to have a little fun », and the dark atmosphere. The soundtrack is punchy and punk rock. At last, the Computer Generated Imagery is globally successful. For now: that's heavy! Nevertheless, the story is so predictable and terribly far-fetched. In short: desperately annoying. It's really an uninterrupted series of dismemberments, decapitation and eye-gouging delights during manifold battles against apocalyptic monsters. These scenes are strung together at a blistering pace for one disappointing purpose: make you forget an incoherent script full of moronic plot twists. Well, well, well, ... another film without much interest than we will quickly forget.

Hellboy is in pretty good hands.

[kehathaway · 7/10 · 14 April 2019]

First the bad and they aren't that bad. 1) While David Harbour does a pretty good job as Hellboy. But he lacks the natural charm that Ron Perlman had in the title role. Not to say that there aren't times that he comes off prefect for the part. 2) It is a well made film. But it doesn't have the spit and polish that Guillermo del Toro put into his film duo. One the good side Neil Marshall and the writers stayed true to the story Hellboy. The role of the big bad was beautifully played by Milla Jovovich (fair warning on this part I have been nursing a 20 + year crush on her). Daniel Dae Kim and Sasha Lane were great in their roles of Domino and Alice. They add a little more depth to help flesh on the new world created for the film. And the adding of Church as Lobster Johnson was great. On a whole it was a solid film. If you like modern fantasy, and want to move away from the Marvel/DC fight of which is the better superheroes. You could do worse than Hellboy.

A few things I hoped for, a ton of what I was afraid of.

[wabuckles · 4/10 · 12 April 2019]

I love the Hellboy comics, the novels, the short stories, all of it. Hands down my favorite comic book character ever written, and not likely to change.

They got a few things right, fair credit where its due. The Hellboy in Mexico story was spot on and well done, Daimio and Gruagach were both fairly accurate, and the Baba Yaga's chicken leg house was just about perfect. They NAILED the Osiris Club and the Wild Hunt, which got a huge smile from me.

But... Man, the rest of it? Why is Hellboy suddenly at odds with the Professor, who is suddenly a foul-mouthed monster hunter? Why rewrite the details to the origin? Why so dramatically change Alice?

The sad fact is that this movie tried to do WAY too much in adapting The Storm and the Fury, which is essentially the climax of the entire Hellboy saga. There are too many moving pieces to that story, too many callbacks to previous stories, and truthfully its way too big a scope to try and cram into one story, even if the script and director were up to the challenge. And unfortunately they were not. The story is all over the place and rushed, the dialogue is really hackneyed in spots, and overall it just ends up a mess.

David Harbour really does a great job in making Hellboy his own take on the character, but the script does him no favors in giving him very little room to work. If They ever make another, I do hope they bring him back, because it's clear how much he cares about the character.

fun, gross, crazy & very likeable... this 'soft' reboot IS Hellboy in EVERY WAY, SHAPE & FORM!

[nate-car · 6/10 · 17 April 2019]

Although the trailer & even poster had more spoilers than you could possibly believe, & the casting switch takes a bit to get used to, this new 'soft' reboot IS Hellboy in EVERY WAY, SHAPE & FORM! Even without Del Toros creature shop, the digital characters & translations from the Hellboy comic were on point, interesting & terrifying. The R rating, is probably the movies biggest flaw- excess swearing & SUPER graphic violence seem unnecessary & is probably a box office mistake for a paranormal action movie that kids would absolutely love. Except for the origin briefly retold, it seems like JUST another great Hellboy adventure more than a reboot, being so close to the first two movies that Del Toro & Pearlman could EASILY come back with a sequel in a years' time & it not hurt whatsoever. While skeptical to begin with I completely warmed up to it in very short time- fun, gross, crazy & very likable.

A wash

[imdb020-643-129772 · 1/10 · 20 April 2019]

Unfortunately, the new "Hellboy" movie is a comics on a screen. It's flat, the dialogs are unnecessary, there are fights here and there, there are continuity issues, there are a bad camera work and bad editing. It looks like no one told the director that the cinematography is a very different form of art. The movie is boring and honestly bad. A waste of time and money.

It's a good movie if you know who Hellboy is.

[Codacious · 9/10 · 2 May 2019]

The movie itself should be a 6.5, maybe a 7 if you're a fan so I'm surprised by the low scores until I looked and seen how many people gave it a 1. Do you know how bad a movie has to be to receive a rating of 1? At first I thought the bible thumpers were uniting, but that doesn't seam to be the case so now I'm left to wonder who these *bright intelligent beings* are so I can filter any review or opinion they may have to the recycle bin.

I missed Doug Jones in this one as it's a reboot of sorts, but only after the movie was over as it held my attention for all the right reasons. I'm giving this a 10 to help offset the idiotic 1 reviews from people who thought they were sitting down to watch Mary Poppins.

Don't listen the critics

[JackieDriver · 6/10 · 12 April 2019]

I went to this movie with high expactasions, I came back and I was right, the movie was very good, the action, the comedy, the cgi it was all perfect. I liked the fact that they sticked to the comics. So dont listen the critics just go and see it!

Don't expect art

[jhuffgunn · 12 April 2019]

I really like Hellboy, and liked this movie a lot. I also liked the Del Toro movies, but this movie is more similar to the comics. It has fun action and I enjoyed the ride. CGI wasn't great, but I didn't bother me too much.

This is now the worst film I've ever seen.

[nopplex · 1/10 · 16 April 2019]

Somewhere there's a monkey at a typewriter claiming plagiarism. I really don't know where to begin with what I hated about this film. Simply put, I would say imagine 7 seasons of Game of Thrones lore and plot twists condensed into 2 hours via a series of flashbacks with added dick joke humour. I imagine my review will be removed but I'll add that the creators manage to include 2, that I can recall, child abuse jokes... because, you know, that's always funny?!

These 10s and 9s were paid off

[DcharlesS · 1/10 · 19 April 2019]

There's no way a sane person who paid $13 would rate this above a 4. Terrible script, mediocre acting, unnecessary gore. Decent soundtrack. Had all the amblings of a bad Disney movie. The Bureau for Paranormal Research and Defense. Let's talk about this unprepared Mickey Mouse operation. What do you think they'd use for weapons in apprehending paranormal beings? Some kind of energy sucker like Ghostbusters, maybe? Or some new, state of the art plasma gun introduced to us specifically for this movie? Nope. Regular guns. That's right. They have billions of dollars for high tech facilities in the Colorado mountains and London and plenty of manpower but nothing in the way of taking down a particularly nasty apparition. You'd think they could be a little imaginative in their writing and give the BPRD a weapon that could at least plausibly kill a spirit. That is their business after all. Then again, maybe the writers were trying to give us the feeling that the BPRD was an overfunded government program that blew all its cash on expensive buildings(Winston Churchill's desk??), locations and transportation then had nothing left for what they actually needed the money for -which is the very definition of today's government! If that was the case then they hit the nail right on the head!