“Oh look,” the average AiPT! reader says – “Patrick HELLen is going to write another Hellboy review, where he blathers on about how great it is, and how we should grab it.”
Yep. I am. Feel free to hit that lil old back button and go check out me savaging another book in this week’s reviews. This one was AWESOME.
Hellboy and the B.P.R.D. 1954 #2 (Dark Horse Comics)
This is a quick hit of Hellboy–a bump of the behorned investigator–and one that I didn’t realize was only two issues long. After issue 1 last month, I figured this was another 4-7 issue stretch of a quaint 1950’s Hellboy tale, with some mystery, some intrigue, and some laughs.
Boy was I wrong. This was a kind of okay first issue, and then a full-throated Nazi-punching second issue that is a god damn delight to read.
When the dude with horns is ANNOYED at you shooting him? Run the hell away.
In short, Hellboy found a flying saucer in the remote wasteland of Antartica that, when he investigated, transported him to a hanger full of saucers, soldiers, and Nazi death machines. His usual reaction? Bring it on.
Is It Good?
It’s great. It’s too damn short, and not enough besides punching happens for a 10/10, but with a great slow unfolding of action, the cliche bad-guy who talks too long, and Hellboy’s hilarious method for stopping him, I was grinning when I finished this.
He’s been shot like 11 times at this point, and he’s just laughing at Nazis. Who’s better than Hellboy?
If you’ve read my reviews on here, you might have noticed a certain fondness for issues with a little slower pace at times, so the narrative can catch up with itself, and then a great glee at an action issue where it’s fists not panels. This is certainly the latter on Hellboy’s side, with a pretty entertaining Nazi soliloquy. Guaranteed that’s a sentence that’s never been written before.
Go grab both of these. Give ’em a read while you’re on a bus, then roll ’em up and stick ’em in your pocket like a kid in 1954. It’ll make you feel young again.
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