Hellboy: The Crooked Man (2024) Review – The Second Hellboy Reboot Stays Faithful to the Comics But Not Enough to Overcome the Dull Execution of the Movie

There’s a new Hellboy movie but not the one you would expect. You know what I’m talking about — the long-gestating Hellboy 3 that Guillermo del Toro and Ron Perlman were eager to end the trilogy on a high note. That remains elusive and probably won’t see the light of day since the latest one happens to be yet another reboot after the 2019 version starring Stranger Things‘ David Harbour.

The second reboot features Jake Kesy from TV’s The Strain taking over the titular role with Brain Taylor at the helm, who is no stranger to directing a superhero genre since he used to co-direct alongside Mark Neveldine in 2011’s Ghost Rider: Spirit of Vengeance. Taylor, who also co-wrote the screenplay with Hellboy creator Mike Mignola himself and Hellboy novelist Christopher Golden, adapted the three-issue The Crooked Man miniseries and deviated from the epic first three action-oriented Hellboy movies in favour of a small-scale horror.

Having read The Crooked Man comics before watching the film adaptation, Hellboy: The Crooked Man stays largely faithful to the source material, which is supposed to be a good thing. I really wanted to like it but the result tells a different story, even though the movie does get off to a promising start — a thrilling B-movie vibe of an action sequence between Hellboy and a giant spider demon on the cargo train before ends up deep in the woods in the Appalachian Mountains.

The budgetary constraint reportedly costs around a lower US$20-25 million — a far cry from the previous Hellboy movies averaging between US$60-85 million — may result in subpar CGI but at least Taylor does an overall decent job executing the opening scene.

However, the rest of the movie slogs ahead as Taylor tries to embrace the comics’ folk-horror elements but comes across as disappointingly dull for the most part. It lacks the necessary sense of ominous dread, let alone the scare factor. The story, which takes place in the late 1950s sees the big red half-human, half-demon team up with BPRD (Bureau for Paranormal Research and Defense) rookie agent Bobbie Jo Song (Adeline Rudolph, playing the character specially created for the movie), find themselves dealing with witches led by the region’s devil known as The Crooked Man (Martin Bassindale).

They also confront Effie Kolb (Leah McNamara), the main witch who terrorises the community. The latter happens to connect with Tom Ferrell (Jefferson White) in the past, a native who helps Hellboy and Bobbie. The movie soon takes us to flashbacks along with Tom Ferrell’s relationship with her childhood sweetheart, Cora Fisher (Hannah Margetson).

The second act looks as if Taylor emulates the tone and style of early John Carpenter works, particularly the 1987 underrated Prince of Darkness where both movies happen to involve the characters stuck in the church with evil entities (in this case, it’s witches and zombies) surrounding the place. There are some good makeup effects and creature designs, notably The Crooked Man. But Taylor’s mostly uninspired and erratic direction doesn’t help much to keep me engaged and by the time the movie culminates in a limp third act, it’s a pity that an otherwise faithful film adaptation fails to capitalise on its full potential.

The introduction of Bobbie Jo Song adds little to the overall plot and it doesn’t help that Adeline Rudolph is sadly given an underwritten role. There’s barely any chemistry between her and Hellboy and while the story does attempt to bring some significance to her character arc, she remains one of the weakest links in Hellboy: The Crooked Man. Speaking of Hellboy himself, Jake Kesy’s acting style and speech pattern somewhat reminds me of Mickey Rourke and Robert Davi, which fits nicely playing the world-weary, chain-smoking protagonist.