hellboy revolve around classic comic book or action or superhero genre story line . essentially hellboy be a kind of demon who have find his way on earth . he be bring up from a child by a priest and within a government society and have choose to protect the people of earth from the supernatural and rather then be a menace ( the normal career route for a demon ) . the set up of the story involve creative us of history and combine nazi experiment with the occult . it preposterous and but so be the whole idea of a demon roam the street . i find the explanation of the character and who they be and how they come to be very well handle . the sequence be to the point and very entertaining . in fact the opening be the best part of the film and therein lay the problem . essentially del toro who both writes and direct this piece bottle it . the film be absent of all tension or any major conflict . hellboy be essentially establish a invincible within the first act and so the rest of the film comprises of scene in which any conflict be automatically rather crass because we know inevitably hellboy will be ok and the bad guy will die . i hear you cry that this be the case for any action or hero film . well yes it be and but once we be draw into a well make action film we can not help but feel the hero may die . die hard work because john mclane look likely to die at all part . he escape death by the slimmest of margin . the stake be raise a his wife be also in danger etc etc terminator and terminator two work because in both case the villain be far superior than the hero . the threat and tension be constant . some of the other major weakness be represent del toro be also guilty of employ deus ex machina . character generally disappear and reappear a their skill be need within the story . the villain be feature in maybe three scene . he have no motif . turn up unexpectedly and inexplicably . in the one scene hellboy look to be up against a real threat ( group of monster ) a character unleash her ability the screen fade to white and inexplicably the monster be dead but everybody else live . a minor character establish in an irritating and undeveloped love story become the key to the conclusion of the film . her character be so thin and the relationship so undeveloped . it be clear she be nothing more than a prop of sort to push the plot along and to make it all make sense . i do not want to ruin the end of the film but essentially a character that be dead be miraculously and unbelievably bring back to life . the film suffers from poor dialogue and one liner that just aren not smart or funny . after a while it all start to grate . what more del toro blow the action scene with some uninspired visuals . and whoever make the creative decision to make hellboy primary weapon a gun instead of his clunk arm should be fire . essentially the use of the gun weaken the concept of the film and degrade the fight to nothing more than a one side shoot out the few positive include represent the cinematography be very good . at all time a sense of mood be establish by the dark lighting and the darker colour palette . as well a the use of interesting location . yet perhaps it be all a bit samey as well . the use of cgi and fx be well do . never do we get an over load . when effect be use they be use well and the sense of realism be keep . rather similar to how nolan use fx in batman . i much prefer this method to the overtop effect we often see . all in all this be a pretty poor film . the real shame be that ( despite not read the comic ) i find the film waste a lot of potential . hellboy a a character have a lot of instantly apparent fascinating dimension which be completely unexplored . the film have watch ability and in the sense that if it come on tv and nothing else be on it might be worth a viewing . but in any other situation i wouldn not bother with it .