Review: Hellboy

I wasn’t feeling well today, and there wasn’t much on the tube, so I tuned in to the only movie playing that I hadn’t seen before: Hellboy.

In sci-fi, comic book, geek circles I had heard that this was a pretty good movie, and from the previews it seemed like it had some decent special effects and some humor in it. It even spawned a cartoon and I think they’re making a sequel. So I had expectations that it would be a fun movie with a worthwhile plot, despite it being about a demon-superhero, a concept with which I have a problem.

It had a moment or two, here and there, but overall I have to say this movie bored me to tears. I almost quit watching it a couple times. If there had been anything else mildly interesting on, I would have switched. The characters were all one-dimensional, the mysteries were unsatisfying, and the battles were all the same. Couldn’t have cared less about a single character, except maybe the doctor. Well, the fish guy was kinda interesting too, but he turns out not to have had too much of importance to do with the plot. He wasn’t even in the last third of the movie.

The plot had aspirations of greatness, with Good vs. Evil, pseudo-religious overtones, and the concept of free will all stuck out there front-and-center, but it never got beyond mediocrity. I got to the point that I kept looking at my watch, wondering how so little could happen in so much time.

It doesn’t quite match the depths of stupidity that Starship Troopers mined – I was actually mad that I paid to see that one – but beyond maybe 5 minutes worth of special effects, there wasn’t much worth watching in this film. I’m glad I caught it on TV and didn’t shell out the rental money.

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