Hellboy fans alot of will know that the character has starred in a bunch of movies and video games as well as originally being a comic book character. However what many of you will not know is that there are some animated movies out there and well I thought that i'll take a look at the first one since it's the only one that I actually own and so then Hellboy fans here is my review of the first animated movie "Hellboy: Sword Of Storms" enjoy.
The plot of the movie is Hellboy finds himself transported to feudal Japan when investigating a case involving a missing sword and possesed professor and so Hellboy has to find a way back home before to evil gods destroy the world. In terms of what I thought of the plot it's was honestly really fun and it was something that I would have liked to have seen done in any of the movies that being said the plot does feel a bit rushed and bit formulaic at times.
Reprising their roles from the live action films are Ron Perlman as Hellboy , Selma Blair as Liz Sherman and Doug Jones as Abe Sapien. Jojning them for this film are Peri Gilpin as Professor Kate Corrigan , Dee Bradley Baker as Lightning , Kappa and a Pilot , Phil LaMarr as Bureau of Paranormal Research and Defense Member and a Pilot , Mitchell Whitfield as Russell Thorn and Gwendoline Yeo as Kitsune.
In terms of what I the acting it was honestly really good which is something that I honestly wasn't expecting from a direct to DVD movie. Of course Ron Perlman is perfect as Hellboy I honestly think that he's the only one who can play the character at this point and while Doug Jones didn't play Abe in the first movie he did do the voice for the character on set so yeah he was reprising the role here and he killed it as did Selma Blair.
Doing the animation for the film is Film Roman who as far as I can tell are mistly known for there work on 1980's Garfiekld And Friends. As for what I thought about the animation it was honestly pretty decent again this is a direct to DVD movie so you can't expect the animation to be on the same level as say Disney and so what i'm assuming little budget that they had to work with the animation team did a good job.
However there is one creative choice that I take issue with and that's the fact that they give all of the human characters huge pupils. That choice makes all of the human characters look creepy as hell which for the villains works fine but it doesn't work for the good guys and so I have to wonder why did they choose to give the human character huge pupils since it's very off putting and doesn't work well withy the design of the human characters.
I have to wonder if Hellboy creator Mike Mignola came up with the designs for the creatures present in the film. Since there are some freaking cool looking creatures in this film like the fact that as you can see in the above picture there's a woman who's top half is human and her bottom half is that of a spider that in my opinion is just so cool , don't get me wrong there are a few lame looking villains like the headless people don't look that good but the vast majority of thye creatres that we see look so freaking awesome.
Now if your like me and you own this film on DVD then you'll know that it comes with a free comic book Hellboy: Phantom Limbs. I have no idea why those involved with either the making of the film or it's distribution chose to do this but I have to wonder why I mean it's not a bad idea but who honestly is going to by a DVD for a comic book it's pointless but at the same time it could also be a good way to get people who don't read comics into them espically if they like this film since it uses the same designs and is set in the sake world as the movie.
This film is an hour and seventeen minuets long and if i'm being honest it really should have been a but longer then that. Simply because the amount of story that they have in this film could very easily have filled up an hour and a half maybe an hour and forty minuet movie but for some reason they chose to make it just under and hour and twenty minuets and because of that scenes and plot points in the movie that would have worked if in a longer movie here feel rushed because the movie has to hit all of these plot points.
Now then since this is an action film that does mean that we have to talk about the action that's in the film itself. Which I feel was honestly really good and was easily the best part of the movie which is honestly saying something since when this film wants to it can be really fun and alot of this fun scenes do come in the action sequences which is every bit as awesome and as cool as you'd want them to be in my opinion.
Overall this was honestly I really good film and it's one that i'm glad that I own it's just a shame that the film is far to short. The fact that the film is to short is for me a big issues as is the fact that the human characters have really large and really off putting pupils but at the same time this movie can be really fun espically when it comes to it's action sequences as such this film gets a 6.5 out of 10 from me and if you guys givbe this review enough love i'll look into doing the sequel Blood And Iron as well as the live action films i'll make a few days of reviews out of it.