Hellboy is one of Hollywood's favorite characters. So why aren't they aware that a new movie has been made?

A1 Digital India News: Even casual movie buffs might have expected one of film's most iconic characters to return to the big screen.

Instead, a bizarre and messy marketing campaign left even industry insiders unaware of the film's existence, as fans wondered why the studio released it ahead of its release.

Guillermo del Toro's 2005 and 2008 "Hellboy" films, in which comedian Mike Mignola brought the beloved monster detective to life, are cult classics. So far, fans have been pleading with del Toro and lead actor Ron Perlman to make a third installment. But the sequel never happened, and Perlman told Business Insider earlier this year that he had agreed to never play Hellboy again.

Instead, fans are getting a 2019 reboot of the much-criticized "Hellboy" led by "Stranger Things" actor David Harbour. This led to fans wanting production company Millennium Media to save and bring justice to one of the most recognizable comic book heroes outside of Marvel and DC.

When Millennium Media announced in February 2023 that it was working on a second Hellboy film, "The Crooked Man," fans were eager to see how director Brian Taylor - who has a passion for making action films with Zaha's visual style - would continue to make the film excellent - what are we going to bring to the franchise?

"Hellboy: The Crooked Man" takes the hero back to Mignola's comic book horror roots. In it, Hellboy (Jack Kesy) follows a dangerous spirit named the Crooked Man (Martin Bassindale) to a small town in the Appalachian Mountains in 1959.

But after filming finished in Bulgaria in May 2023, Millennium Media opted for radio silence for a year, instead of teasing audiences with photos from the set, a countdown trailer, and the actors doing a press tour.

No one knew what Casey Hellboy looked like until a surprise teaser dropped on YouTube in early July this year, and he's definitely not one of the "hot" guys as you might expect. Fans were disappointed by the poor CGI and bad dialogue in the teaser.

When a higher-quality trailer with more scary scenes arrived in late July, fans were pleasantly surprised.

But surprise turned to confusion when a Vietnamese poster was shared on social media in August. Its release dates in different countries range from August 29 in Portugal to November 22 in Spain. Usually, releases in different countries are divided based on days or weeks rather than months.

As of July 18, the film still has no release date in the United States, which is often the highlight of an English-language film from an American studio.

All of this suggests there is no solid plan for marketing the film.

Perhaps most surprising is that "Hellboy: The Crooked Man" is not as disastrous as its marketing might suggest. It's not perfect, but it's a great horror movie with Hellboy that warms the idea of ​​a cinematic and spinoff universe.

Fans wondered if Millennial Media made 'Hellboy: The Twisted Man' to retain the rights to the character

Ethan Baird, a video game animator who runs HellboyNews, one of the X character's biggest fan accounts, told BI that the studio's half-hearted approach to marketing was "a missed opportunity because they had so many IPs that it was getting exhausting."

"It's a low-budget horror movie, we don't see that in this genre anymore. It's very disappointing because the 2019 movie is very bad, but they put a lot of effort into marketing it." He added, "This time, it's the exact opposite: Nobody knew this movie was coming." The question is why? It's unknown, and that void of information is filled with speculation and rumors. Some believe Millennium Media made "The Twisted Man" on a small budget with the sole intention of retaining the rights to Hellboy. "I think they probably did it to keep the rights because the movie was made in a year on a low budget and that's a pretty long time to start filming," Baird said. "I feel bad saying that because obviously this is a passion project for Brian Taylor, and it feels dirty to put this stamp on it. But from a studio perspective, it makes a lot of sense."

Even Rob Mitchell, director of theatrical insights at Gower Street Analytics, told BI he didn't know the film existed until the trailer was released.

He said studios sometimes rush movies to avoid losing rights to characters or franchises, but "The Twisted Man" isn't known that way because "the rights are changing hands between studios. They're changing hands." Previous films were produced by Revolution Studios, Universal Pictures and Millennium Media.

Similarly, Millennium Media and its U.S. distributor, Ketchup Entertainment, may hope to turn a profit by selling the film on streaming services, making marketing potentially less important than the release itself.