'Hellboy' Featurette: Creator Mike Mignola Hypes Up Loyalty To The Original Comics

The celebration of Hellboy Day took place over the weekend, and with it came a new featurette taking us behind the scenes of Lionsgate's reboot of the Dark Horse Comics property created by Mike Mignola. The new Hellboy featurette puts the focus on the comic material, touting more loyalty to the comics than Guillermo del Toro's adaptation. Even star David Harbour (Stranger Things) is talking about how this movie is inspired by a specific storyline.

Since Mike Mignola and Guillermo del Toro seem to have parted ways after working together on the previous Hellboy movies, it only makes sense that the comic creator wants to push this reboot as being the adaptation that truly captures his original vision. Even on Twitter, Mignola has been hyping up even the most mundane details as being more true to the comics:

Some people are going to love this movie and some have already decided they hate it, but one thing is for sure–That is exactly how I always imagined Hellboy would hold a gun. #hellboy #hellboymovie pic.twitter.com/4JX7y25WXA

— Mike Mignola (@artofmmignola) March 20, 2019

How is the way Hellboy is holding a gun any different from how Ron Perlman did it in Guillermo del Toro's movies? Mignola certainly seems to be going a long way to convince fans that this adaptation will somehow be better, even though nothing in the marketing indicates that so far. That's surprising, too, since there have been over a dozen posters released for the movie.

The new Hellboy has a bit of an uphill battle to distance itself from what Guillermo del Toro did with the character the first time around. Not even David Harbour's presence is making this feel remarkably different in tone, and the film is lacking the visual style which made Hellboy stand out against the array of other comic book movies. But maybe when we see the full movie, it will be something that tickles our fancy. We shall see.

Anyway, here's the official synopsis for the reboot of Hellboy, directed by Neil Marshall.

Hellboy is back, and he's on fire. From the pages of Mike Mignola's seminal work, this action packed story sees the legendary half-demon superhero (David Harbour, "Stranger Things") called to the English countryside to battle a trio of rampaging giants. There he discovers The Blood Queen, Nimue (Milla Jovovich, Resident Evil series), a resurrected ancient sorceress thirsting to avenge a past betrayal. Suddenly caught in a clash between the supernatural and the human, Hellboy is now hell-bent on stopping Nimue without triggering the end of the world.

Hellboy opens on April 12, 2019.