Hellboy commits unforgivable sins.

***This review of Hellboy has a Spoiler Section***

A Far Too Long Discussion of Blade - 2:01

How Does This Retrospective Work? - 3:23

Cast and Crew - 4:00

Story Inception/Production Notes - 10:15

Specs - 10:50

Plot Synopsis/Expectations - 15:14

Production Design:

Bests: Sight - 17:14

Sound - 20:06

Bests: Performances - 20:44

Script Thoughts - 22:54

Bests: Oscar Lens (Believe it or Not) - 23:57

Spoiler Warning Dance Break - 24:29

Worsts:

John Meyers as a Whole - 25:57

Mentor Issues + GDT Issues - 28:01

Misplaced Conflicts - 30:38

It’s a Given - 36:07

Where Are the Stakes? - 37:33

GDT v. GDT; Comic Movie v. Comic Movie - 39:20

Is There Hope for Hellboy 2? - 43:08

HOMEWORK FOR YOU!/Words of Wisdom - 44:16

We scheduled these retrospective on the two Hellboy films after the excellent trailers for the remake. One Mike has never seen them. The other Mike recalled them fondly. But things changed. MMO forces us to watch hundreds of movies a year, and many of them (thankfully) are of the critically acclaimed variety. We LOVE to love movies, but unfortunately, we can’t love them all.

Now we do give 2004’s Hellboy credit where it’s due. From future Oscar winner, Guillermo Del Toro, the production values are mostly top notch and foreshadow so many nominations to come in the years ahead of GDT’s career. But we have severe issues with the script that we break down in the spoiler section, and we don’t apologize for it.

Bottom Line: we gotta call em’ like we see em,’ and like we told you in our very first episodes, we want to be honest with you, our wonderful listeners. If we don’t love a movie, then so be it. We tell you, and we still manage to have a boatload of fun doing it.

So this review of Hellboy is a bit of a rollercoaster. There’s the usual format including a non-spoiler review filled with cast & crew filmographies and background discussions before we complete spoiler free reviews of the production values, performances, and screenplay. Then we break down the plot with our carryovers, bests, worsts, and final grades. It’s another retrospective loaded with piping hot takes fitting the Dad joke I just could have made while writing these show notes, but didn’t - because I have some restraint.

If you still wanna listen to us after we trash this film, do enjoy many other retrospectives. They exist throughout our back catalog of episodes and grouped in many playlists. We have reviews of all the major nominees from the past two awards seasons called Oscar Sprint Profiles. We cover movie events such as blockbusters like Star Wars: The Last Jedi to genre films like Overlord. Then we’ve reviewed many of our favorite film series like the entire Halloween franchise, the MCU, Mission Impossibles, Conjuring Universe, and as you may know from our recent releases, we love to review original films headed for a remake like 1977’s Suspiria, 1964’s Mary Poppins, and 1989’s Pet Sematary. Of course, we have many former Oscar winners and nominees covered as well. So even if we may disagree on this film, do please keep watching other movies with us.

If you do think we got this one wrong, let us know. We’re at MMandOscar on Twitter, and we are on Instagram, Facebook, Reddit, and Gmail. You can subscribe / rate / review / like / share / & listen to us on iTunes, Soundcloud, Stitcher, Google Play, Tune In, Spotify, and just about wherever you listen to podcasts. When reality sucks, keep watching movies with us. We’re Mike, Mike, & Oscar!