Hellboy Creator Praises Crooked Man Movie Script for Actually Being a Horror Movie

The cult favorite comic book Hellboy is getting another feature film very soon. Hellboy: The Crooked Man came about very quickly with Millennium Media confirming the project just weeks ago ahead of a summer production start. Jack Kesy is set to star as the title hero with Brian Taylor set to direct the movie. Creator Mike Mignola helped pen the screenplay for the film alongside frequent collaborator Christopher Golden, basing it on his own Hellboy comic storyline Speaking in a new interview, the Eisner Award-winning scribe/artist opened up about the film and how he thinks it’s already off to a good start in a big way. 

“His intention is to make a horror movie, so that’ll be nice. That’ll be interesting.” Mignola told Variety of Taylor’s new draft of The Crooked Man. “I read the new draft of the screenplay yesterday, and yes, it is definitely R. It’s the first Hellboy script that I read and I went, ‘Oh, it’s a horror movie,’ which is what I wanted. Taylor does not have a reputation as a horror movie director. But, so far, we’ve had two horror movie directors make Hellboy movies and we’ve never gotten a horror movie.”

He added, “For years, we’ve been saying, if you’re going to make a Hellboy movie, make it small. And the perfect story to do that with is my personal favorite, ‘The Crooked Man.’ I think it’s one of the best things I’ve ever written. It’s beautifully illustrated by Richard Corben, and it’s a solid story that doesn’t involve a million different characters. Everybody actually agreed from the very beginning, ‘Yes, we want to do that one.’ Budget-wise, it’s good because it’s a lower budget kind of a story. It’s not the Hellboy origin. It’s not Hellboy saving the world. It’s not huge. It’s a subtle, dark, little folk horror story.”

Taylor’s work as a director was previously defined by his collaborations with former creative partner Mark Neveldine. The pair, credited as “Neveldine/Taylor” in the 2000s, directed the two Jason Statham-starring Crank movies, plus the Ghost Rider sequel, and the Gerard Butler-starring sci-fi thriller Gamer. They also previously wrote the script for the Jonah Hex movie. After the two went off to work on their own, Taylor collaborated with Grant Morrison on the television adaptation of Happy! for SYFY. Despite the varied success with their projects, that they have history with comic book adaptations is a plus.

Yellowstone‘s Jefferson White and Resident Evil‘s Adeline Rudolph will also star in Hellboy: The Crooked Man. The film is officially described as follows:  “Stranded in 1950s rural Appalachia, Hellboy and a rookie BPRD agent discover a small community haunted by witches, led by the Crooked Man, a local devil with a troubling connection to Hellboy’s past.”