Worth: $14.50
FilmInk rates movies out of $20 — the score indicates the amount we believe a ticket to the movie to be worth
Cast:
Mike Mignola, Ron Perlman, Guillermo del Toro, Neil Gaiman, Patton Oswalt, Doug Jones
Intro:
... fans of comics, movies, pulp fiction and Mignola’s iconic, unique art will enjoy this breezy, lightweight look at a legend.
The character of Hellboy has become so ubiquitous in popular culture that it’s almost hard to remember a time without him. First created by artist Mike Mignola in 1993, the red-hued pancake loving, evil punching monster with a heart of gold has featured in comics, video games, cartoons, two good movies (by Guillermo del Toro) and one middling effort (by Neil Marshall). Drawing Monsters, the niche but engaging documentary about the horned one’s creator, showcases how remarkable it is that the character ended up existing at all and what it meant to the talented misfit known as Mike Mignola.
Mike Mignola: Drawing Monsters is a pretty straight forward documentary, taking a mostly linear stab at describing the timeline of Mike’s career. He was, it has to be said, ill suited to working for any of the big comic houses, doing art for both Marvel and DC that went mostly underappreciated. His problem wasn’t so much that he didn’t have talent, he had bags of the stuff, it was more that he couldn’t work out how to apply it to other people’s work. Eventually, and with a lot of help from a supportive partner and Dark Horse Comics, he unleashed Hellboy onto the world and then the real adventure began.
Drawing Monsters benefits from having numerous famous nerds and creative types chiming in on the greatness of Mignola. Neil Gaiman, Guillermo del Toro, Patton Oswalt, Ron Perlman (and many more), it’s a veritable buffet of geek culture luminaries. The fact that Mike himself, often known to be a bit of a grumpy old man to work with, comes off as a shy, modest and rather affable gent also lends a certain charm to the proceedings.
Like a lot of nerd culture documentaries, Mike Mignola: Drawing Monsters is probably a little too niche for the uninitiated and possibly about fifteen minutes too long. However, fans of comics, movies, pulp fiction and Mignola’s iconic, unique art will enjoy this breezy, lightweight look at a legend.
