I wasn't too hyped-up about Hellboy 2. The first one was... Entertaining at best. The second, however, pleased me. In the same way vegetarian mince does when it actually turns out to be nice.
The beginning was surreal. Actually, saying that the whole film was pretty surreal. And there was something uncannily fimiliar about the mythology behind it... A golden crown created by goblins for the elves that enables the wearer to control a golden army so that they can wage bloody war against humanity. The plot may not have been totally original, but it allowed Guillermo Del Torro to do what he does best... Make really wierd monsters. And they just suit the Hellboy universe so well.
Needless to say, the elves realise that their crown possesses too much power and so it is broken into three pieces and 'scattered'. I use the inverted-commas because I don't think hiding two of the pieces in the same place really counts as scattering the pieces. Anywho. Obviously the son of the king decides that he wants possession of the crown and from then a wonderful time is had by all.
The pace of the film is nice and the acting generally good with only a few, not bad, just odd moments by Ron Perlman (Hellboy) and Jeffrey Tambor (Manning). The stand-out characters really have to be Abe (who I was sure was voiced by David Hyde Pierce (Niles from Frasier) but having checked IMDB it doesn't look like that's the case...) and the rather brilliant Jahann Krauss, a german ghost held in a containment suit played by none other than Seth MacFarlane! Pure genius!
The film really came to a head, not with an epic battle scene, nor is it in a conversation with some strange monster dreamt up by Del Torro or Mike Mignola (the original brains behind that brilliance that is Hellboy). It's actually in the few minutes we spend with Abe and Hellboy drinking beer and singing 'Can't Smile Without You'. After that, you really can't help but love them...
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