'Hellboy' Star David Harbour Reveals How He Was Cast

The Hellboy reboot hits theaters next month, bringing general audiences a completely new take on the horn-wielding antihero. For David Harbour, who will be stepping into the fan-favorite role, the process of getting the job was pretty unexpected.

In a recent interview with Joblo, Harbour spoke about how he got brought on for the role, and just how surprised he was to be getting the initial call. As Harbour explained, his scene-stealing role as Jim Hopper on Stranger Things proved to be surprisingly instrumental in landing him the Hellboy gig.

"I got a call like almost completely randomly." Harbour revealed. "We were shooting the second season of Stranger Things. I think it was very early in the shooting process. And I got a call from my agents just saying they want to remake Hellboy and they want you to be the new Hellboy and here's the script. And the movie wasn't completely like, green lit. It wasn't completely like, we didn't have a studio, we didn't have, blah, blah, but it was just Lloyd Levin and Larry Gordon had this script, they wanted to re-do the whole thing, and they had Neil Marshall at that point and they were all very keen on me doing it. And I read the script. So they sent it to me, and I was like, very confused and terrified at that prospect and excited. I mean, like who the fuck am I? You know what I mean?"

"I've been like a character guy for years doing these little things, and then sort of Stranger Things came out, and I think that Neil, Lloyd and Mike Mignola, I guess they all had sort of watched it around that first month." Harbour continued. "And upon watching it, I think they all called each other and like, 'Wouldn't David Harbour be a great Hellboy?' And like, I was like, ah, that's very flattering and very horrifying that you guys would think that I would be like this angry demon, but it seems to fit."

Once Harbour realized he was being sought after for the role, the script was ultimately what drew him in, as well as the sort of tone the movie was wanting to strike in the comic book adaptation world.

"So yeah, so I read the script and it was a very early draft of the script." Harbour explained. "And it was like not terrible. And I was like, really excited about that, because the script has gone through a lot of iterations. We've done a lot of work on it, but to me, I have the super hero mythos is so big in our culture now, and I of course, want to be a part of that. I mean, I almost consider it like the Greeks had Achilles and Agamemnon, like we have like, Captain America and Iron Man and like, it's the same shit, right?"

Hellboy will land in theaters on April 12th.