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Hellboy 2 – The Golden Army review
The big red demon is back with a bigger stage, a bigger budget and just as big an attitude as first time round. Hellboy 2 – The Golden Army is the sequel to the 2004 original with most of the surviving cast returning along with some newcomers. The main story follows the story of Prince Nuada who is an elf played by Luke Goss. Nuada is leading a revolt against the humans who have took over the world after an ancient battle where a truce was called and the fantastical creatures are now living a secretive underground life which was not part of their original agreement. The Prince hopes to revive the Golden Army an ancient mechanical force that he will wage war on the humans with, this requires him to find 3 pieces of the ancient Elven crown so that he alone can command them. Hellboy once again played by the excellent Ron Perlman gets embroiled in the action while working for the secretive government agency the BPRD, that fights to keep the balance between the Demons and the human population and is now involved in the ruckus that Prince Nuada is causing.
Along with Hellboy this time round we have Abe Sapien back again, played and voiced by Doug Jones, we have Liz Sherman played by Selma Blair, along with Agent Manning played by Jeffrey Tambor and newcomer to the team Johann Krauss voiced by Seth MacFarlane.
Ok, that’s enough of the story, Hellboy 2 pretty much explains what’s going on itself, so for me to ramble on about it any longer would be pointless. Suffice to say this time round Del Toro has once again produced an entertaining and human nature focused movie, despite all the special effects and action scenes that battle for screen time. The cast are mostly excellent, with Selma Blair and Jeffrey Tambour getting more screen time, Anna Walton and Luke Goss are great as the Elvin twins and Seth MacFarlane does an awesome job with Johann Krauss voice. Of course Perlman is great as Hellboy and Doug Jones is good as the contrast to Hellboy’s reckless attitude.
With likeable characters and lots of rich visuals Hellboy 2 is definitely entertaining and has lots of subplots that all muddle together to form a nice tightly crafted plotline that doesn’t take to long to get going, and doesn’t take to long to wrap itself up. If the visuals put you off you should try and look past it because there are plenty of comedy moments and the acting and humor is perfectly suited to the tone of the movie. My favorite comic book adaptation movie series so far, bring on Hellboy Three.
