Hellboy Animated: The Sword of Storms

The gang at the B.P.R.D. stumble across another paranormal mystery in this action packed animated feature complete with swords, demons, Asian folklore, and everyone’s favorite big red demonic hero; Hellboy…

A professor of Asian folklore receives a scroll in a mysterious package. This scroll holds the spirits of two demon brothers who have the powers of lightning and thunder. These spirits posses the professor in hopes of figuring a way out of their prison and back into the real world where they will release their dragon brethren and rule the world. The B.P.R.D., Bureau for Paranormal Research and Defense, is called in to investigate and Hellboy discovers a katana. Upon touching the katana Hellboy is immediately taken to an alternate world where he goes through demonic trials on his way to solving the mystery and getting back home. He first faces six floating head demons, then a half woman half spider, then a demonic turtle like creature with water in its head, then a whole host of monsters that end up tricking him into breaking the sword and freeing the demons. He frees the demons and then is taken back to the normal world where the demons seek to dominate, but Hellboy doesn’t see eye to eye with them. Hellboy finally figures a way to defeat the demon brothers and trap them once more for all eternity.
This is a great add on adventure for all Hellboy fans out there. It does not have some spectacular animation in it but it is well put together. The whole style and feel of it reminds me of a cross between the Gargoyles cartoons and Scooby Doo. The design of everything is pretty seamless with both the movie and the comics. It is not as stylized as the comics only because to harness such style in animation would take a lot more work, time, and money. However to keep the continuity from the movie they kept the same cast and actually added one or two more to the lineup. Peri Gilpin voices the Field Director of the B.P.R.D.; we may remember Peri from Frasier where she played Roz. Even though you cannot see the people behind the voices, having the same cast makes it a better film. The look of the monsters and demons of this were cool looking as well. There really weren’t that many squid like creatures in this like there were in the first movie.
Besides the design being cool, the story was interesting as well. The Sword of Storms has its own story behind it that is revealed over time through the course of this flick. Just like in the movie all the things that happen throughout the film eventually come together to wrap up the mystery of this story. This was also written by the creator of the comics so it had a good chance to be pretty successful from the get go, at least with the fans of the comic books. Unfortunately it was a straight to DVD release so it was not some big theatrical extravaganza but that is okay because it is not on par with being an animated feature otherwise it would have been more stylized and so on. There really isn’t anything too special about this except that it sheds more light onto Hellboy and brings him to a new form of media. It really is a cool animation to watch though since it is Hellboy and is just another action packed supernatural film. So if you are feeling the need for more Hellboy besides the comics and movies then I suggest the animated Hellboy movies as well.

Run-time: 73 mins
Written by: Mike Mignola, Karen Inwood Somers, Tad Stones, Matt Wayne
Directed by: Phil Weinstein and Tad Stones
Starring: Ron Perlman, Doug Jones, Selma Blair, Peri Gilpin