Hellboy II: The Golden Army

The failure of R.I.P.D. is a failure of intention.

But the truly fascinating failures of this era, the ones that expose the deep structural flaws of the Hollywood franchise machine, are the sequels to the auteur era's biggest hits.

Oh, this is where it gets really messy.

In 2014, we got 300: Rise of an Empire and Sin City: A Dame to Kill For.

And these should've been massive slam dunks.

You have established audiences, proven visual aesthetics, and you have returning creative talent.

How do both of these sequels manage to feel so remarkably hollow compared to their predecessors?

Because in both cases, the Hollywood production schedule completely outpaced the organic creation of the art.

You know, the Subway Jared guy, the Got Milk, Got Milk ad, Hancock poster, Blackberry billboard, iPad billboard.

I remember Hancock, and also "Hellboy II."

"Hellboy II" was my next one.

I remember it was called.

[chuckles]

I saw that.

I was like, "Oh, wow.

Hellboy."

He

has over 130 credits, including he was King Balor in Hellboy 2, probably most known, honestly, as Emton Pachenko in The Cutting Edge, the coach, the Russian coach or whatever.

Oh,

okay, okay.

So there are two movies I can cite in particular, right, that I've actually done research on.

And it's Hellboy 2, right? Hellboy the Golden Army and John Carter.

So those are two movies.

I guess you could say they kind of bombed in the box office, right? But then if you look at how much they made in home video sales, and the numbers are...

I think Pan's Labyrinth is brilliant.

I've said about Del Toro before, I sat down to watch things like Blade II and Hellboy, expecting to love them and only like them, if you see what I mean.

Yeah.

yeah

We could do like a fantasy reality theme.

Yeah, we could do that.

Hellboy 2, The Golden Army from 2008.

Birdman from 2014.