It seemed like the ‘Hellboy‘ reboot came out of nowhere but it actually took a long road towards a very quick development time. Series creator Mike Mignola shares that he was helping work on a script for the third movie in Guillermo del Toro‘s ‘Hellboy’ trilogy when all of a sudden he and writing partner Chris Golden realized that a reboot was the way to go. In the blink of an eye, they went from Ron Perlman as the character and closing out his story to a completely different style of storytelling with David Harbour suddenly becoming the Right Hand of Doom.
Here is how the process broke down:
“It’s been in the planning stages for more than three years. I have been involved in various stages along the way … It’s a very bizzare one because at some point I brought Chris [Golden] in because our regular writer was kind of going in circles, so Chris and I took a stab at it. I don’t want to write this stuff, but Chris and I would work together and we’d talk about it on the phone and he would write it up, and we would bang specifics back and forth. So Chris got involved for a little while, then he had other things he had to do, so it went back to the other writer, and then another writer came in eventually, and I assumed it was never gonna happen. It would get almost done—when Chris and I were working on it everyone was like, “Yes! Now! We’re really happy. It’s great. This is what we want to do,” and then suddenly, “Why don’t we make it a reboot?””
Once a reboot was an option everything changed. This is an interesting piece of news with Mignola previously stating that he won’t be that involved in the movie. From the script to casting to demands of the film and what direction they really wanted to go with it:
“‘Once it became a reboot, at first we thought we’d just take out the little details that pertain to the del Toro stuff. But once you start doing that then the whole thing starts coming apart, and then you start putting it together differently, and I just thought it would never end. Then when Millennium Films agreed to make the movie, suddenly it went from, “This is never going to happen” to “Oh, we’re making it tomorrow.” That’s been crazy. That’s a big thing for [2017]. It’s gone from this thing that you kind of don’t pay attention to to “Oh shit, we suddenly gotta cast a movie because it’s starting to film in two months.”
There really is nothing like a deadline to make things come together and that seems to be the case as to what happened with the new ‘Hellboy’ movie. It still isn’t clear if they just have a trilogy planned or are looking to spawn an entirely new cinematic universe. Either way could work though I’m secretly hoping for the latter of the two options.
How much of Mignola and Golden’s original concept do you think will end up on the big screen when the new film debuts? Shares your thoughts below!
Source: Multiversity Comics
