Mike Mignola Says HELLBOY: THE CROOKED MAN Is the Most Faithful Hellboy Adaptation Yet
The new Hellboy movie Hellboy: The Crooked Man has completed shooting, and as the film wrapped production, franchise creator Mike Mignola shared his thoughts on the movie, calling it one of the most faithful adaptations yet. He shared on Instagram:
"I wasn't on set for this one but they have been nice enough to send me dailies and I have to say I have loved what I've been seeing. If fans have been waiting for a Hellboy film that is actually an adaptation of one of my stories I think they are finally going to get one.
"Congratulations to director Brian Taylor and a really wonderful cast – and to co-writer Chris Golden who did so much to figure out how to give the studio what they wanted and still keep true to the heart and soul of THE CROOKED MAN, my favorite of the Hellboy stories."
That’s pretty exciting to hear from the creator of Hellboy! I hope that he’s right because I believe he said the same thing about the last Hellboy movie that was made, and that movie wasn’t good at all.
Mignola and Chris Golden wrote the script for the movie and the story is based on the comic of the same name, and in that story, Hellboy teams up with a rookie BPRD agent named Tom Ferrell, and find themselves stranded in 1950s rural Appalachia. “There, they discover a small community haunted by witches, led by a local devil with a troubling connection to Hellboy’s past: the Crooked Man.” The story will “expand Hellboy’s world through one of the most beloved issues of the comic series.”
Brian Taylor (Crank, Ghost Rider: Spirit of Vengeance, Gamer) is directing the movie and when previously talking about the director, Mignola said:
“His intention is to make a horror movie, so that’ll be nice. That’ll be interesting. I read the new draft of the screenplay yesterday, and yes, it is definitely R. It’s the first Hellboy script that I read and I went, ‘Oh, it’s a horror movie,’ which is what I wanted. Taylor does not have a reputation as a horror movie director. But, so far, we’ve had two horror movie directors make Hellboy movies and we’ve never gotten a horror movie.
“For years, we’ve been saying, if you’re going to make a Hellboy movie, make it small. And the perfect story to do that with is my personal favorite, ‘The Crooked Man.’ I think it’s one of the best things I’ve ever written. It’s beautifully illustrated by Richard Corben, and it’s a solid story that doesn’t involve a million different characters. Everybody actually agreed from the very beginning, ‘Yes, we want to do that one.’ Budget-wise, it’s good because it’s a lower budget kind of a story. It’s not the Hellboy origin. It’s not Hellboy saving the world. It’s not huge. It’s a subtle, dark, little folk horror story.”
The movie stars Jack Kesy as Hellboy, Jefferson White, Adeline Rudolph, and Leah McNamara. When sharing his thoughts on Kesy as Hellboy, Mignola said: “I’ve never met him [Kesy]. I’ve only seen pictures, and I’ve seen him a little bit in films. He certainly has the look. Everybody who has worked with him says he’s fantastic. This thing’s being done very fast, so I think the fact that he’s great and he’s available, that’s me being a little bit of smart-ass about it, but I just have to trust that everybody is right.”
Hellboy: The Crooked Man will land an R-rating, and when talking about that rating, the director said: “We’ve definitely had a discussion of, you know, it doesn’t really serve anybody to make something R for R’s sake. To say it has to be R so we have to add A, B and C. But this material, this original material is dark and scary and violent and adult. So in order to really embrace that, we just don’t wanna have any handcuffs on.”
Are you excited about this new Hellboy movie? Do you think it might actually breathe life back into the franchise?