It’s a shame this movie is so awful because it looks fantastic.
Hellboy 2 has an astounding 88% rating at Rotten Tomatoes with everyone and their mother saying good things about the film. I gave the film a D+ review when it hit theaters and after watching it again on Blu-ray I am convinced that is a perfect grade for a film that looks absolutely stunning but has a story that takes its audience for a group of fools not willing to ask the “whys” and the “how’s its” necessary to make sense of why some decisions weren’t made over and over again.
Since I can’t review this title without spoiling the plot (sorry, I just have to get these things out of my system) I am going to tell you right now spoilers lie ahead and you should read with caution if you have not yet seen this film. You have been warned.
Back on July 15 I wrote an article headlined “Why Wasn’t ‘Hellboy 2’ Only 20 Minutes Long?” which a lot of people read, but I was surprised I didn’t receive an overwhelming amount of vitriol sent my way by fans of the film. As it turns out, I was in fact wrong, the film shouldn’t have been only 20 minutes long. It should have only been 32:20 long. It is at that moment the elf king sentences his son Prince Nuada to death because he wants to rebel against the humans making up for an age old grievance. The king doesn’t want this and is cool with living underground and out of sight and since he realizes his son is a danger to society he orders him dead.
After his dad tells him he will be executed Nuada turns to his twin sister, Princess Nuala, and asks if she agrees with the decision. It’s an important moment because the two are tied together by more than just the bunk beds they shared growing up. You see, what happens to one happens to the other, which means that if Nuada is killed Nuala will die too. Therefore, she has just said she is cool with dying.
Instead of offering his head for decapitation Nuada fights and kills everyone including his father. Nuala runs as she holds the final piece to a crown that will allow Nuada to bring the famed Golden Army to life and destroy the humans.
It is at this moment I can’t help but wonder
Now we have Nuala on the run with the third piece to the crown as well as the only map to the Golden Army. A logical person would say the solution is simple: Nuada needs the third piece and the map to find and command the Golden Army, let’s get rid of both of them.
Instead of tossing the piece in a river or trying to melt it down or anything smart,
Are you still cool with this? If so, let’s move on…
We now come to the moment where Hellboy, Liz, Abe and Johann confront Nuada as he is holding Nuala captive. Now, before I go into the lunacy that follows I want you to understand that by holding Nuala captive he is accomplishing nothing because a threat to kill her is of no consequence since it basically means he is threatening to kill himself, a move that may be troublesome if he plans on getting into Heaven, but as far as the good guys are concerned that shouldn’t be much of a worry, moving on…
It turns out Abe has fallen in love with Nuala after knowing her for about two days, so much so that he is willing to hand over the third piece of the crown, a move assumed to be the final straw in destroying all humans. Thanks Abe!
Now Nuada controls the Golden Army and Hellboy decides to challenge him or control of said Army. Loopholes are great!
Hellboy wins, but he doesn’t kill Nuada because Hellboy ain’t no murderer. Taking advantage of the situation Nuada slyly pulls a knife out and just before he can stab Hellboy in the back he stops and jerks. Blood comes out of his chest. What is going on? Then.. The big reveal…
Yup, rewind back to the beginning. Remember that 32:20 mark where I said she should have killed herself and didn’t? From that 32:20 mark on she could have killed herself at any moment and ended the whole mess, but she decided to wait almost another 90 minutes of movie time to do what she could have done all along. She also could have just tossed out the third piece of the crown, but we will let bygones be bygones.
In the audio commentary Guillermo del Toro makes a good point saying that it was at this moment Nuala realized her brother would never stop and decided she had to end it. That would be a valid point had he NOT KILLED HIS FATHER!!!! On top of that, her father knew Nuada would never stop, Nuala agreed he should be executed, but only now does she realize he won’t stop? DUMB!
If you think I am making too big of a deal about all of this then run out and buy up this Blu-ray because other than the problems I have just laid out above it is extremely impressive. The second disc is a wealth of behind-the-scenes information, Luke Goss is fantastic as Nuada, there are a couple of commentaries, a cool U-Control feature and an animated epilogue to the film that leads me to believe del Toro’s idea for the third film in the trilogy brings back Rasputin as the villain and based on the scene with the Angel of Death in Hellboy 2 I think we all know Hellboy is going to have to die in order to save the world. I mean, this isn’t a franchise built on holding your cards close to your chest.
Overall, I will never watch this movie again and am shocked so many people fell in love with it in theaters. My gut tells me a lot of people were making their judgment of the film based on its terrific art design and how much they enjoyed Pan’s Labyrinth, but as I have pointed out there are some serious story flaws in this film that, for me, make it unwatchable.
