The Hellboy reboot, now titled Hellboy: Rise Of The Blood Queen, is set to head over to Lionsgate, which would mean each Hellboy film will have been distributed by a different studio.
The first film was made by Revolution Studios and released by Sony back in 2004, while 2008’s sequel, The Golden Army, was made by Relativity Media and distributed by Universal.
Although neither film was a box office success, the first film had enough of an audience on home video for a sequel to be greenlit. With the home movie market now dried up, no studio was willing to make Guillermo Del Toro‘s Hellboy III.
Thus here we are at the latest reboot, which is set to be directed by Neil Marshall (The Descent) and star David Harbour (Stranger Things).
Lionsgate should be a rather good home for the new incarnation of Hellboy, though. They’ve excelled over the past decade with intriguing genre pictures willing to push boundaries, such as John Wick and Crank, as well R-rated superhero movie Punisher: War Zone.
While Marshall’s Hellboy will likely have a lower budget than Del Toro’s original films, he overcame a low budget on The Descent to create something chilling, so fans should have very little to worry about. While the visual panache of Del Toro will be missed, the fact any Hellboy film is being made at all is a pleasant surprise.
When the film is eventually released, it will be interesting to see how it performs. While there’s already a bunch of Hellboy fans, Lionsgate will be depending on new ones to drive ticket sales and a potential franchise. While the films underperformed slightly in the 2000s, with comic book adaptations being more popular than ever, there’s a chance this could be a big hit.
#Peace.Love.Hellboy
