Hello again! I'll dispense with the usual excuses as to why I haven't posted in, like, forever. Just know that I got a new job and that's taking up most of my time that isn't also filled with baseball and Netflix.
Anyway, here we go.
I am slowly catching up on Hellboy via the trades. Most recently I finished Book 6, "Strange Places" and I was reminded once again just how good Hellboy is.
Let's compare Hellboy to a standard story by the Big Two. There is almost no comparison. As I was reading somewhere (I think in an interview with Mignola) the Big Two offer the illusion of change. It happens every month. Plastered on the cover of Brightest Seige: Frontlines: The Return (or whatever) are scrawled the words "Nothing will ever be same again!" Except it always is the same again. Batman or Captain America 'die' for awhile, but then they get better.
In Hellboy, as far as I have read (no spoilers please) Professor Bruttenholm dies, and stays dead. Roger the Homunculus sacrifices himself and it actually means something. It haunts the characters years later. Hellboy discovers more and more about who he is on his journey, and we feel that it has weight, that it is all leading to something. Real change and growth in characters as the status quo is allowed to shift.
This may mean that at some point the story may come to an end, but I'm ok with that. Ultimately, at the end, I think it will all feel more rewarding.
