Oh, occasionally you had a television show like "Wonder Woman" or "Batman", but mostly these were modest budget Hollywood-ized adaptations that missed a lot of what made the comics so entertaining. When other properties like "The Incredible Hulk" made it to the small screen, they were altered dramatically from the way they were presented in their original medium.
Eventually, that began to change, first with "Superman: The Movie", which was an almost straight forward, sometimes tongue in cheek, respectful adaptation of the Man of Steel. However, as each Superman film progressed, they became less and less like the comics.
With the critical and financial success of such films as "300", "Sin City" and this summer's "Iron Man", comic book adaptations have come full circle and are now, in fact, a very popular genre in and of itself, just like the western once was.
This summer alone, we have witnessed "Iron Man", "The Incredible Hulk," "Wanted", "Hellboy II: The Golden Army" and now, this Friday, possibly the most anticipated comics-to-film blockbuster - ever - Christian Bale's "The Dark Knight."
The Fountain Place Cinema 8 will have a sneak preview tonight at midnight for what may be THE big summer movie. Media buzz around "The Dark Knight" had been very intense prior to the untimely death of actor Heath Ledger, who portrays a punk rock anarchist version of the Joker in "The Dark Knight" and, since his untimely passing, it has gone through the stratosphere. One can't help but wonder if it will live up to the hype, but with the director and writers of "Batman Begins" coming back for this sequel, it looks like it might eclipse all expectations.
There is still time to enjoy some comic book influenced movie fun with "Hellboy II: The Golden Army" and "Hancock." In fact, you don't have to be a comic-book geek to enjoy visionary director Guillermo del Toro's lavish "Hellboy II" which, in my opinion, has to be the most original fantasy film since the original "Star Wars" hit movie theaters back in the 1970s.
"Hellboy II" begins in the 1950s with a young, Howdy Doody-obsessed Hellboy listening to his human father, played by John Hurt, tell him a fairy tale about the war between the elven folk and human beings at the dawn of time. The faery folk and their allies the goblins create an indestructible military force of robots known as The Golden Army. After much warfare a truce is drawn between King Balor of the faery realm and the human beings, with the elven folk moving underground.
Half a century later, Prince Nuada (played by Luke Goss), the warlike son of King Balor, decides his people have been abused and neglected long enough by having to live in sewers and abandoned subway stations and decides to restart the war utilizing the Golden Army.
In the meantime, Hellboy (Ron Perlman) is having relationship problems with his fellow teammates Liz (Selma Blair) as the true love is going everywhich way but straight. Hellboy's boss, Tom Manning (Jeffrey Tambor), is even more upset because his attempts to cover up the fact that Hellboy exists and is working for the FBI is getting harder in the era of cell phone cameras and YouTube. The Bureau for Paranormal Research and Defense gets a new boss in the form of Johann Krause, a ghost who exists as a cloud of ether inside a sort of deep sea diving suit. Hellboy and Krause don't get along any better than he and Manning did.
Prince Nuada attacks an antiques auction to retrieve a part of the special crown which will allow its user to control the Golden Army with a veritable horde of tooth fairies, disgusting little creatures that live on calcium. During the battle with the Tooth Faeries, Hellboy winds up getting exposed on nationwide television. Unfortunately for the likable big lug, instant celebrity is not all it's cracked up to be, as the typical man on the street finds him ugly.
The team invades the Troll Marketplace thanks to the judicious use of some 19th century technology, and while Hellboy is busy slugging it out with Nuada's titanic troll henchman, his friend and fellow BPRD member Abe Sapien (Doug Jones) meets Princess Nuala (Anna Walton), Nuada's good-hearted sister. An empath like Abe, she senses that the BPRD team are the good guys and goes with them. Nuala has the missing piece of the crown and the map showing the location of the Golden Army. She and Abe also begin falling in love, which is fairly comical as Abe is half man, half fish. This leads to the movie's most bizarre sequence, not the fantastic troll marketplace (which puts the cantina in Star Wars to shame) but a hilarious scene featuring agents Red and Blue crooning a Barry Manilow tune.
Nuada comes looking for Nuala and he and Hellboy close in on each other in mortal combat, whereupon Hellboy is wounded by Nuada's magic spear. The team decides to try and find the Golden Army and see if there is someway they can get the magic spearpoint out of Big Red. They travel to Northern Ireland to the Giant's Causeway where they meet with the goblin who actually created the Golden Army and who knows a way to get the spearpoint out of Hellboy.
I can honestly say this is the most original film I have seen in a decade and I literally did not expect most of what happened in it. Del Toro received some Oscar nods from his last film, "Pan's Labyrinth" and I guess the studio decided to turn him loose with a big budget and let him do what he does best - create cinematic magic. Hellboy II is a cinematic wonder.
Also still playing is "Hancock" which is about a very flawed superhero played by Will Smith and his efforts at self redemption through someone he rescues.
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