Product Description: The second collection of short stories by award-winning cartoonist Mike Mignola includes the 1999 hit series Box Full of Evil; "The Right Hand of Doom," which concisely and thoroughly examines Hellboy's history; and "Pancakes," Mignola's most hilarious and surprising story to date; and others - many presented here in color for the first time.
Great Horror Comic Hellboy is probably the best horror comic on the market. Definitely buy it if you like horror, or are trying to get into a different kind of comic.
Hellboy, Vol. 4: The Right Hand Of Doom Mike Mignola is a revolutionary comic author with a unique style in both artwork and storytelling. If you are a fan of mythology based detective adventure (because everybody is :)) then you want to check out Hellboy graphic novels, you will not be disappointed.
Hand of doom, crown of fire When Hellboy isn't saving the world from imminent destruction, he's doing a lot of little odd jobs across the world.
And by "odd jobs," I mean brief paranormal cases involving vampires, flying hunters, homunculi, "pamcakes" and disembodied heads. "Hellboy Volume 4: The Right Hand of Doom" collects a number of the demon anti-hero's assorted adventures, ranging from a new and unknown breakfast to a devilish plot to conquer the world. All in a day's work.
It opens with a baby Hellboy being given a plate of "pamcakes," which he pronounces to be "yucky." But when a general sternly orders him to eat one bite, the consequences are literally hell-raising.
Seriously, isn't that the cutest thing ever?
Many years later, Hellboy is called on to deal with mythological creatures large and small -- the Saint Leonard worm (a dragon) running amuck in a forest, a spectral huntsman followed by berserkers in wolf pelts, a Japanese house full of bouncing heads, a seance gone horribly wrong (with Lovecraftian tentacles!), and the supervampire Varcolac who is so large he can "eat the moon."
And though Hellboy tries to ignore his past and supposed destiny, he learns something quite disturbing when a kindly priest gives him an ancient, mysterious drawing of the "right hand of doom" -- which looks suspiciously like Hellboy's big rocky hand.
And a demon (which looks suspiciously like a housefly) sealed into a box is stolen from a secret compartment, and is soon "serving" a human master. Turns out they want to lure Hellboy to that place, in the hopes of stealing the evil, apocalyptic powers that he has already renounced.
Mike Mignola is awesome at full-length graphic novels, but his shorter works are even better -- these are lean, compact little action stories with nothing more or less than they need. And it's sort of nice to see Hellboy's more ordinary cases -- if you can call these ordinary -- with foes like a "Wild Huntesque" horseman, a dragon and even some traditional Japanese hobgoblins.
And Mignola's writing doesn't suffer from the shorter format, especially since he happily adapts some folktales to fit his world (legends, folk tales, saints). There's wonderfully sick moments ("Hey, that's not my spine!") and some poignant moments (Hellboy musing on his "destiny"). Naturally, also plenty of nastier moments including bouncing heads, giant monstrous tentacles from the "deep end of the pool," a vampire that can "eat the moon," and a man turning into a giant lizard.
Hellboy is basically your average investigator in most of these stories -- he goes in, gets the job done and fixes things (although sometimes he can't quite fix EVERYTHING). He's a nice straightforward kind of guy with a gruff manner, but Mignola reminds us at times that he has some unhappier facets ("You know how I live? I never deal with what I am"), and a destiny he keeps rejecting.
"Hellboy: The Right Hand of Doom" follows the example of the prior collection -- lots of solid standalone adventures for our horned anti-hero. Lovely read.
Insanely entertaining This series has inspired me to start saving money to tattoo my body red, get a stone hand, and surgically attach broken horns to my head. Thank you Hellboy.
Graphic SF Reader The Right Hand of Doom is also a collection of stories, with the final few dealing with who and what Hellboy actually is, and why he is important to those on this earth, and those not.
To balance that at the beginning is a young Hellboy story, and through Hellboy versus a variety of supernaturals, from dragons to floating heads.
Anything Goes Trivia
Trevor
Megaton Man
