Tagged: Hellboy RSS

  • F 1:11 am on January 27, 2009 Permalink | Reply
    Tags: Hellboy, how to read hellboy,   

    How to Read Hellboy 

    Hellboy: Darkness CallsFirst, read each comic book twice. On your initial reading, you needn’t bother to try and capture every little detail. Soak up the story instead, letting the excited kid inside of you race through the panels simply to find out what happens. Then, when you go back for round two, you’ll have the luxury of pausing over each frame. Not only will you notice more (since you now know what to look for), but you’ll enjoy both readings immensely.

    Second, start at the beginning: don’t try to break into the middle of the story. (Trust me, it doesn’t work, and it’ll spoil your future Hellboy reading.) Mignola is a deliberate writer who unveils the Hellboy myth slowly, story by story. Ignoring his chronology would be like reading The Two Towers without first reading The Fellowship of the Ring. Why would you want to do that to yourself?

    Third, always remember what you’ve read before. Nearly every story stands on its own, but when you read the tales in light of everything else that came before, details and layers will come to light. Characters who appeared briefly at first will be given pivotal scenes. Stories you once considered “throw-aways” turn out to be integral to the overarching plot. Until the series is finished, it’s unlikely anyone will be able to truly judge these stories.

    Fourth, pay attention to what is said about Hellboy and what he is told to do. He always does and proves the opposite.

    Fifth, have fun. Enjoy the monsters. Laugh whenever Hellboy says, “Crap” or “Son of a –” (it happens a lot). It’s a comic book, for Pete’s sake. If you can’t follow the previous steps and enjoy yourself at the same time, then practice some more and learn how.

     

    • D 12:04 pm on January 27, 2009 Permalink

      Is Mignola a practicing Catholic?

    • F 12:28 pm on January 27, 2009 Permalink

      I have looked but never found anything conclusive about Mignola. Catholic imagery abounds (and I’ve even stumbled across a website analyzing Hellboy as a Catholic character), but Mignola seems pretty tight-lipped about it. It could simply be that Mignola finds the Catholic imagery fascinating (much like he does Russian folklore or other such stories that make their way into the comics).

  • F 9:52 pm on January 25, 2009 Permalink | Reply
    Tags: fulfillment, Hellboy, , , true hope   

    Fulfillment Comes by Hope 

    Wright’s Surprised by Hope continues to delight me, putting into words ideas that were mere, shapeless bubbles in my mind. Take this passage, for instance:

    If Thomas represents an epistemology of faith, which transcends but also includes historical and scientific knowing, we might suggest that Paul represents at this point an epistemology of hope. In 1 Corinthians 15 he sketches his argument that there will be a future resurrection as part of God’s new creation, the redemption of the entire cosmos as in Romans 8. Hope, for the Christians, is not wishful thinking or blind optimism. It is a mode of knowing, a mode within which new things are possible, options are not shut down, new creation can happen.
    – N.T. Wright, Surprised by Hope, page 72.

    Yes! This is *exactly* what stories ought to do. We wholeheartedly affirm that “Christ did not come to abolish, but to fulfill the law.” But do we have any idea what it really looks like?

    Fulfillment is not simply filling in the right typological dots, checking off all the appropriate stories. Fulfillment is a bursting forth, eucatastrophe, an unthinkable happening that all at once becomes the norm.

    And it’s also why Hellboy rules. (More on that later.)

     

  • F 1:54 pm on December 26, 2008 Permalink | Reply
    Tags: Christopher Golden, Dark Horse Comics, Hellboy, , The God Machine, Thomas Sniegoski   

    Hellboy: The Novels 

    hellboygodmachineFor the past month or so, most of my reading time has been devoted to exploring the world of Hellboy. (And yes, my friends are worried.) I’m fascinated by much of what Mike Mignola has crafted with this badass demonic hero: he’s funny, powerful, and consistently overcomes his doomsday destiny. That last part especially gets me. Hellboy is destined for absolute terror, and yet he is not bound by this “destiny.” It’s the kind of story only possible in a Christian world (just imagine the outrage it would give Sophocles and other ancient tragedians!), and I love watching it play out.

    I’ll write more about what’s struck me in the comic books later; for now, I wanted to offer a few comments on the offshoot novels that I’ve managed to read so far.

    First, I don’t think the three novels I’ve picked up (two by Christopher Golden—The Lost Army and Bones of Giants—and then The God Machine by Thomas E. Sniegoski) add anything of value to the Hellboy story. As Mignola notes in the introduction to The Lost Army, Golden has given Hellboy something of sex/relationship life; that is in my opinion their biggest contribution. Instead of sticking to the recurring themes and characters of the comic books, the novels depict a world full of demonic and otherworldly bad guys eager to tap into Hellboy’s power; they are wholly unrelated to the grand story that connects Mignola’s stories. The result is that the Hellboy myth is battered, scattered, and thinned out. It robs both the reader and the character of purpose, replacing it with cheap, worn-out formulas.

    The comic books are wonderful because they don’t try to tell us every moment of Hellboy’s lives. What they offer is a simple ongoing storyline communicated in a series of stories that develop Hellboy’s character by focusing on his destiny and his wrestling with that. Each short story teaches Hellboy something new about himself (or, if he won’t listen, at least the reader). The novels, on the other hand, are little more than displays of just how good Hellboy is at destroying spiritual powers. But we already knew that, so why bother?

    Second (and I’ll keep this very brief), the novels are poorly written. Especially Golden’s first two. Way too much information about what people are feeling or thinking, which really defeats the purpose of action and dialogue. If somebody is speaking angrily, you shouldn’t have to tell it to me like that: the words coming out of his mouth can communicate that emotion. Same goes for actions.

    Third, the novels make a weakness of the stories in general very explicit: God is far too silent. Take this passage from The God Machine:

    Accursed humanity.

    The more he saw, the more his anger grew. Here was a species that did not deserve the wonders their Lord had bestowed upon them. Murder, poverty and war, the befouling of the planet itself; these were not the faithful creatures that the Almighty believed them to be. They were a blight, a pestilence, defying His wishes at every turn.

    The Creator was blind to this, smitten by humanity’s supposed charms. With every passing millennium the angel watched, anticipating the call. He expected to hear the voice of his God, ordering the Destroyers forth from their murky prison and unleashing them upon His failure. How Qemu’el longed to see their cities crumble, the tortured faces of the human race turned up to the heavens in desperate prayer as the skies were turned to fire, and they were expunged from the world—a horrible mistake erased, never to be heard from again. (page 163)

    If you’re going to write something like this—that is, describe a character’s violent anger toward God, his complaint about the Creator—then it becomes something that must be resolved by the end of the book. And yet, when Hellboy shows up to kick butt and keep humanity alive, resolution to this is nowhere to be found.

    I’m not suggesting that every novel needs to be an explicitly “Christian” novel. However, if a character’s prime motivation is anger against God’s “blindness,” and that character is obviously evil and wrong, then the resolution (in this case, the declaration that God is not blind) needs to be just as obvious. God, of course, uses physical means to deal with evil men and evil powers. But then, it’s the writer’s job to acknowledge Who is actually in charge. Instead, Sniegoski offers a world where God is silent, inactive, the picture of a blind watchmaker observing how things are working out. Oh, and thank goodness for Hellboy, since we can’t thank God for him: where would we be without his self-sufficient, self-saving power?

     

    • Kelly 10:08 pm on December 26, 2008 Permalink

      Frank, even though I don’t quite get it, I enjoy your enthusiasm for all-things-Hellboy. That’s really all I want to say. Is it ok to leave dumb comments like this?

    • F 12:05 am on December 27, 2008 Permalink

      Kelly,

      Of course. We welcome all genuine and authentic comments. They make us feel loved.

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