The new poster of Hellboy : The Crooked Man has a strange surprise in store for fans.
The first two big-screen versions of Hellboy, directed by Guillermo Del Toro, were great successes. With a fully inhabited Ron Perlman, bringing to life ” Anung Un Rama » (a nice name from a hellish birth), and an approach that is both uninhibited and very romantic. comics Mike Mignola’s original, one might have expected to see the birth of a long-running film franchise. Not so. The third film, titled Hellboydirected by Neil Marshall (The Descent) was a complete failure, and we thought it would bury the license.
This was without taking into account Hollywood’s appetite for comic book adaptations, since here is this fourth film that is emerging, this time directed by Brian Taylor. A director experienced in comic books, sinceHe wrote the screenplay for the awful Jonah Hex, and directed the atrocious Ghost Rider: Spirit of Vengeance. Also out goes David Harbour, who took over the role of Hellboy after Perlman, this time we will have Jack Kesy in the role of the Horned One. This bodes well for this Hellboy : The Crooked Manwhose latest poster attempts to catch up with the other films, by stroking the fans in the right direction.
Hellboy: The Cursed (Fan) Legions
The latest promotional poster for Hellboyif it is a nightmare for colorblind people with its shades of red and its slogan that smells of reheated food ” Witness the origin of all Evil“, enjoys throwing out a sentence that is neither entirely a lie, nor really a truth. This is the phrase “The fourth entry in the global franchise » which makes teeth grind.
In fact, the third film, directed by Neil Marshall, was a reboot of the saga in cinema, and made a clean slate of the two Del Toro films. In February 2023, when this Hellboy : The Crooked Manthe director had explained to Collider that it was a new beginning for the saga, that he did not want to look back, and that he wanted the film to be rated R to be faithful to the ” dark, scary, violent and adult » from the BD.
Liar, liar
In absolute terms, the poster does not lie. This is indeed the fourth film. Hellboy at the cinema. However, it is very rare that a reboot loudly proclaims its affiliation with the previous films that it wishes to make people forget. We can then ask ourselves whether the communication campaign is not aimed at making the public believe that The Crooked Man would be the continuation of a sagain order to attract viewers and benefit from the aura of the first films. A legally irreproachable process, but morally a little dubious.
Let’s not put Hellboy down until we’ve endured The Crooked ManThe film still benefited from the writing of Mike Mignola, creator of the eponymous comic, and aims to be an almost pure and simple adaptation of The Crooked Manone of the most beloved stories among fans.
Where Del Toro’s films were a very loose adaptation for the first film, an unpublished story for the second, and a kind of failed patchwork of four stories for the Hellboy the Marshall (Darkness Calls, The Wild Hunt, The Storm and the Fury, et Hellboy in Mexico), Brian Taylor seems to want to focus on the sole story of the Crooked Man. A sordid tale, perhaps the most terrifying narrative arc in the Hellboy mythos… Which makes us even more afraid that it’s all just a huge fiasco.
At least the strange poster recently unveiled had a good idea: that of delivering a release date for Brian Taylor’s film. Hellboy : The Crooked Man will be released in theaters on September 27, 2024.
