Hellboy, Vol. 10: The Crooked Man and Others

Hellboy

by Mike Mignola, Joshua Dysart, Richard Corben (Artist)

The Eisner Award-winning mini-series The Crooked Man, by Mignola and Richard Corben, teams Hellboy with a wandering hillman in a devilish tale of Appalachian witchcraft. This volume also includes the rare "They Who Go Down to the Sea in Ships" by Mignola, Josh Dysart (B.P.R.D.: 1947), and Jason Shawn Alexander (Abe Sapien: The Drowning), never before available for purchase; Mignola and Duncan Fegredo's "The Mole," from Free Comic Book Day 2008; and Mignola's most recent solo outing, "In the Chapel of Moloch."

Genres: Comics, Graphic Novels, Horror, Fantasy, Fiction, Comic Book, Graphic Novels Comics

160 pages, Paperback

First published June 9, 2010

About the author

Mike Mignola was born September 16, 1960 in Berkeley, California and grew up in nearby Oakland. His fascination with ghosts and monsters began at an early age (he doesn't remember why) and reading Dracula at age 13 introduced him to Victorian literature and folklore from which he has never recovered.

In 1982, hoping to find a way to draw monsters for a living, he moved to New York City and began working for Marvel Comics, first as a (very terrible) inker and then as an artist on comics like Rocket Raccoon, Alpha Flight and The Hulk. By the late 80s he had begun to develop his signature style (thin lines, clunky shapes and lots of black) and moved onto higher profile commercial projects like Cosmic Odyssey (1988) and Gotham by Gaslight (1989) for DC Comics, and the not-so-commercial Fafhrd and the Grey Mouser (1990) for Marvel. In 1992, he drew the comic book adaptation of the film Bram Stoker's Dracula for Topps Comics.

In 1993, Mike moved to Dark Horse comics and created Hellboy, a half-demon occult detective who may or may not be the Beast of the Apocalypse. While the first story line (Seed of Destruction, 1994) was co-written by John Byrne, Mike has continued writing the series himself. There are, at this moment, 13 Hellboy graphic novel collections (with more on the way), several spin-off titles (B.P.R.D., Lobster Johnson, Abe Sapien and Witchfinder), three anthologies of prose stories, several novels, two animated films and two live-action films staring Ron Perlman. Hellboy has earned numerous comic industry awards and is published in a great many countries.

Mike also created the award-winning comic book The Amazing Screw-on Head and has co-written two novels (Baltimore, or, the Steadfast Tin Soldier and the Vampire and Joe Golem and the Drowning City) with best-selling author Christopher Golden.

Mike worked (very briefly) with Francis Ford Coppola on his film Bram Stoker's Dracula (1992), was a production designer on the Disney film Atlantis: The Lost Empire (2001) and was visual consultant to director Guillermo del Toro on Blade II (2002), Hellboy (2004) and Hellboy II: The Golden Army (2008). He lives somewhere in Southern California with his wife, daughter, a lot of books and a cat.

Reviews

[Chad · Rating 5 out of 5]

Worth the price of admission for The Crooked Man alone. These are just a collection of great Hellboy short stories without the larger story building of the ongoing overarching Hellboy plot.

[Drew Canole · Rating 5 out of 5]

One of the best standalone Hellboy tales. Corben is in top form here. Super creepy tale with lots of things going for it. The setting, the skin bag, the starving horse, a flying witch, the reverend, witch balls, Crooked Man, evil undead zombie hordes. So cool. Mignola really does a great job of weaving all this cool stuff together into an effective tale.

They Made A Movie
It has a lot of promise for a straight-to-streaming movie. I really liked Jack Kesy as Hellboy. Just needed a bit more to it. The zombie fights are a bit dull (I just watched Evil Dead trilogy, so I was thinking they could have had so much more fun with it). I liked the Crooked Man design.

I liked that they added the character Bobbie Jo - she helps shine light on Hellboy's character and introduce us to the universe. I liked that they added the story of Hellboy's mother, but it convolutes the plot. Maybe instead just have a scene where the characters talk and Hellboy shares some of his stories, if we need to pad out the run time. All the other deviations from the comic was poor - especially the ending. This should have just been a 45 minute short. I think a few of these lower budget made for streaming Hellboy adaptations could be cool if they're faithful to the material.

All that said, I do think it shows a lot of promise and it's more Hellboy than the petulant manchild depicted in the del Toro movies.

[Artemy · Rating 5 out of 5]

Now that's a brilliant volume! Four short stories, all of them excellent. Rural American horror, pirates, Moloch-worshipping talentless artists, poker games with ghosts — The Crooked Man and Others is a quintessential Hellboy collection, and an absolute blast to read.


First read: October 30, 2015
Rating: ★★★★★

Second read: October 17, 2017
Rating: ★★★★★

[Sam Quixote · Rating 5 out of 5]

"The Crooked Man", despite being Vol 10 in the Hellboy series, isn't a continuation of the events of the previous book but rather a collection of shorts written by Mignola and illustrated by the best comics artists around. While I would've liked to see what happened after Vol 9, "The Crooked Man" more than makes up for it by providing story after story of high quality, brilliant storytelling and art.

"The Crooked Man" showcases Richard Corben's artwork as Mignola takes Hellboy into rural North America to fight mountain witches and the devil himself. The depiction of the devil, or "The Crooked Man", is truly amazing as are panel after panel of ruined churches, idyllic countryside, and horrifying creatures. If you're a Discworld fan and always wondered what Granny Weatherwax entering the body of an animal might look like, you get to see the graphic depiction here. It's the best story in the book and can easily see why it won an Eisner award in 2009.

Jason Shawn Alexander (the guy who drew "Abe Sapien: The Drowning") lends his talents to a tale of a headless pirate Blackbeard, while Mignola himself draws "In the Chapel of Moloch", a Goya-esque tale of demon worship. The fanciful strip "The Mole" rounds out this superb collection with the inimitable Duncan Fegredo drawing beautiful countryside vistas, a ghostly poker game, and a derelict house with equal skill.

Totally worth reading whether you're new to Hellboy or not, it's an amazing book and a fantastic contribution to one of the best comic series around.

[Sesana · Rating 4 out of 5]

It was a little jarring to come right off a Hellboy collection with a single storyline that ended on a bit of a cliffhanger (The Wild Hunt) to this one, which has three unrelated short stories. The thing of it is, they're good enough I didn't mind for long. Especially when it comes to the title story, which is (oddly, for Mignola) based on American folklore. It's a solid, believable piece of work, with one of the most twisted and disturbing looking creations that I believe I've seen in the pages of Hellboy. Which is really saying something, let me tell you. The other stories are good enough, but this collection is more than worth it for The Crooked Man alone.

[Himanshu Karmacharya · Rating 4 out of 5]

A collection of fantastic short stories that are cleverly written and beautifully drawn. Although each story has been drawn by a separate artist, each one of them is a treat to look at.

[David · Rating 4 out of 5]

Another short story collection, or more accurately, a collection of one medium sized story and three short stories. This volume contains a couple of bona fide classics. It also contains two other stories that exist and can be read should one choose to do so.

The Crooked Man starts things out here. This one’s an all timer. The art is handled by Richard Corben and while the writing is up to Mignola’s usual high standards, Corben’s art is really the primary reason to check this story out. He kills it here. Everything is creepy, grotesque, and disturbing, while also looking cartoony, which I think is a tough balancing trick for a lot of artists to pull off. The Crooked Man himself is a great example of Corben’s whole dynamic at work. Goofy looking as hell, but also creepy as hell. Just an awesome design. There’s another reviewer here who compares Corben to Harvey Pekar and that’s a really apt comparison. Once that line got drawn in my head I couldn’t unsee the similarities in their style.

I guess if you were so inclined you could criticize this one for being a Hellboy story that Hellboy is almost a background character in. He really doesn’t do much here besides watch horrible things happen to other people and then go “damn, that’s really fucked up.” But as Mignola himself says in the introduction his reason for doing The Crooked Man in the first place was that he wanted to play around with Appalachian horror inspired by Manley Wade Wellman. With that in mind I can live with Hellboy taking a back seat to the Wellman pastiche character who’s the main focus of the story here.

Next up is They Who Go Down to the Sea in Ships, a story centered around Blackbeard’s ghost. Plot wise I like it a lot but I’m really not a fan of the art in this one. In general I’m not wild about comic artists whose work skews more towards realism. I prefer something more stylized looking. Which means I bounced off of this one pretty hard.

I essentially had the opposite reaction to The Mole. Visually it’s a treat, I’m never going to complain about having to look at Duncan Fegredo’s art, but plot wise this is kind of a nothing story and the whole “Hellboy sits around playing cards and getting drunk with ghosts” motif has been done better both before and after this.

Finally there’s In The Chapel of Moloch, a dark, twisted, macabre tale that dares to ask the terrifying question “what if every time you went to work a weird little guy showed up and fucked with you?” This one’s great. The whole thing takes place inside an artist’s studio, and Mignola uses all the paintings around the place to great effect when he does his random-cutaways-to-objects-scattered-around-the-environment trick.

Four stars overall. The Crooked Man and Chapel of Moloch are top tier Hellboy stories for me, but the collection as a whole is dragged down by the other two entries here.

[Wing Kee · Rating 5 out of 5]

I'm a Mignola fanboy so my review will be biased.

Man, I've been reading BPRD for a while and it feels so good to see Big Red and also do some one and done issues. With BPRD going full steam ahead with world building and character buildling (not to mention monster fights) it's been a while since I've read HB just walk into a situation unprepared and beat the shit out of weird folklore, mythological monsters. This is what it was that hooked me on the Mignolaverse:

World: Not a lot of world building, all of of it is done in service of the title and the setting of the stories. We travel all over the place with this arc, from Italy, American South, Caribbean...just all over. The art is all over the place, with different artists taking different approached on telling a HB story, and of course there is the wonderful Mignola illustrated Temple of Moloch. As I said, the world building is minor, serving mostly the tale that the writer is telling, but man is it ever cool to have a monster of the issue books again. I especially liked the setting of The Crooked Man as it is a world and lore that I am not too familiar with and it made for a very fresh read.

Story: One and done are great when you just want to throw multiple ideas and stories towards the reader. These tales are simple, paced well and fun. There are still hints of a darker grander arc that will be for Hellboy but mostly this is just a collection of him doing him: Being called in, running head first, getting the shit knocked out of him, then hitting hard back. It's fun, the dialog is crisp and glib it's just fun. I especially liked Crooked Man and for some reason the Mole. Crooked Man for the unfamiliar terrain that I get to experience plus the super odd and unsettling art style, while the Mole is just ridiculous and the art made for some panels that made me smirk. Good fun!

Characters: Not a lot in terms of character development, but wow we got a whole slew of characters introduced (for one and dones) this time around. All are bigger than life, odd and just interesting. The Crooked Man was interesting as was the witches in that tale. I also really like Blackbeard as I found him utterly ridiculous. It's a fun collection of characters you'll laugh and smile at, see them die and have fun reading it.

Nothing too deep this time around, just getting back the essence of HB single issue books. Fun, short, well paced and him beating the shit out of monsters. What more do you want?

Onward to the next book!

[Daniel · Rating 4 out of 5]

Typically, I cannot stand the art of Richard Corben. It reminds me too closely of Harvey Pekar and Harry Crumb, which, to me, have no place in the art galleries of Hellboy & B.R.P.D. However, in this such instance, the story was compelling and every so often a glimpse of a good-looking Hellboy would pop into a panel. Otherwise, most the characters look kind of dreadful to me. I get over it, though. And just accept it. I just really prefer the art of Mike Mignola, Duncan Fegredo, Guy Davis, and even Jason Shawn Alexander suits the material much more appropriately. But Mignola seems to like Corben, so there's no way around it. Overall, a great book, great read. I give it only 4 stars because of Corben's art for "The Crooked Man." Everything else represents Hellboy/B.P.R.D. very well.

[Tom Ewing · Rating 5 out of 5]

The best of the later Hellboy short story collections, this has two of my very favourite Hellboy tales. First - taking up most of the book - is the Richard Corben illustrated The Crooked Man, one of those stories where Mignola digs into the folklore of a particular region (the Appalachians, in this case) and has a heap of creepy fun with it. Corben’s art, sensual and grotesque, is a treat, and the script is great too, with a laconic second protagonist who’s convinced he’s damned himself (and may be right).

Even better is In The Chapel Of Moloch, which might be my favourite single Hellboy issue of them all. At the time it was Mignola’s first art on the strip in years - it’s a tribute to Goya, a story of the anxiety of influence, and a waspish self-satire about the preciousness of artists and the demands made on them. It’s gothically effective, occasionally very funny, and absolutely gorgeous, with Mignola’s signature technique of using panels of background detail as punctuation brilliantly deployed. Two minor but enjoyable tales round the collection out. Terrific stuff, and basically unattached to the wider Hellboy continuity.

[Paz · Rating 4 out of 5]

The Crooked Man is one of the best Hellboy stories so far. The beginning is creepy as fuck, I fucking loved it! Gimme that twisted details. I mean, the horror of the witch story worked pretty well in my opinion. Especially the artwork. Well, all four short stories had different artists, but the change was not jarring, in fact all of them (the last one was drawn by Mignola though) add to their respective stories. I always thought Mignola's art WAS Hellboy, but nah, I actually enjoyed all the different takes.
Now to the last two volumes, this one was a great short story collection after the heavy tone of the last volume, with Hellboy realizing his own violent and dark side.
Hopefully, I'll love the ending, but the fact that there is SO much Hellboy/B.P.R.D content makes me so excited. I just love the dark fairytales and different mythologies and even real people we encounter in this world.

[Jakub Polák · Rating 4 out of 5]

Zatiaľ asi najhorší book tejto série. Úvodný príbeh bol ľahký nadpriemer, avšak vizuál v podaní Richarda Corbena sa naozaj vydaril( obzvlášť Paskřivec). Ďalej príbehy o Černovousovy, Molochovi a zvláštnom znamienku boli priemerné. Čo jednoznačne podzdvihuje tento komiks sú úžasné kresby. Celkovo ma tento komiks sklamal a bol to priemer-ľahký nadpriemer(hlavne kvôli úžasným kresbám). Za mňa je to takých 3-3,5*.

[Володимир Кузнєцов · Rating 5 out of 5]

Гарна добірка коротких горорних мальсторій, звісно, з найбільш відомим "Горбанем", що здобув свого часу Айзнера.
А я вже почав був забувати, наскільки Геллбой класний)

[Orrin Grey · Rating 5 out of 5]

For a Hellboy book with only one story illustrated by Mike Mignola, this one's a classic. Prior to receiving this I'd only read two of the stories in it ("In the Chapel of Moloch" and the Free Comic Book Day installment "The Mole"), so it was mostly new territory for me. Even if it hadn't been, John Pelan's essay on Manly Wade Wellman would've been enough to make me glad to have this volume, and it has also convinced me that I need to bridge the huge gaps in my reading of Wellman.

I'll tackle the stories one-at-a-time:

"The Crooked Man"
The title story and roughly half the collection, "The Crooked Man" also marks Hellboy's first foray into the Appalachian folklore of great pulp author Manly Wade Wellman, who has long been a favorite of mine even though I've only managed to read a handful of his stuff. This is also the second major Hellboy feature to be drawn by Richard Corben. Unlike the earlier story "Makoma," which I was less happy with, Corben's work fit this story perfectly. And while I'm hesitant to ever suggest that any Hellboy story shouldn't be drawn by Mike Mignola, I'm not sure anyone but Corben could've done this story in quite this way. (Which doesn't mean I wouldn't kill to see Mignola's take on the material, especially after that cover.)

For an even better example (in my opinion) of a Hellboy story that is exactly suited to Corben's particular genius, check out the as-yet-uncollected single issue "Hellboy In Mexico," which is also one of the best Hellboy short stories to date, for my money. (Also, given the rate at which Corben has been turning out Hellboy stories there'll probably be an all-Corben collection in the not-too-distant future.)

"They That Go Down to the Sea in Ships"
As Mignola says in his author's note, "who doesn't love a headless pirate?" The ghost of Blackbeard in this story is pretty great, but Jason Shawn Alexander is not at the top of my favorite Hellboy/B.P.R.D. artists. Still, this is a solid story, and a nice look at one of the rarest Hellboy shorts around.

"In the Chapel of Moloch"
The first Mignola-illustrated Hellboy story in several years, and a personal favorite of mine (love those Goya references!), this was one that I'd previously read (and own), but I'm very happy to have it in a collected format. "You've gotta let him smash it, Jerry. It's evil."

"The Mole"
The shortest story here, and one of the slightest of all Hellboy shorts, the mostly dialogue-free dream sequence story of "The Mole" still has a lot to recommend it, not least of which being Duncan Fegredo's great art and the even-more-wonderful-than-usual coloring job.

[Adam Shaeffer · Rating 3 out of 5]

A quick recap of the four stories collected in this volume:

The Crooked Man: Cool story, drawing from Appalachian folklore, but the art just didn't work for me. 2 stars

They That Go Down to the Sea in Ships: Blackbeard the pirate! Great story, loved the art. Jason Shawn Alexander's is a very different style from Mignola's, but some of the frames are simply perfect. 4.5 stars

In the Chapel of Moloch: Pretty much your run of the mill Hellboy story here with the great, subdued Mignola art I've so enjoyed for 10 volumes. 3 stars

The Mole: A fun little story illustrated by Duncan Fegredo. Of all the Hellboy artists I've seen to date, Fegredo sticks the closest to Mignola's style, but he adds embellishments to the scenery and characters that draw me in. Don't get me wrong, I love Mignola's artwork, but Fegredo's is pretty awesome too. 4 stars

[Melissa McShane · Rating 4 out of 5]

Another collection of short works, reminding me of why I'm so glad I can read this series one after another instead of having to wait. Five stars for "The Crooked Man," four stars for the others, though Duncan Fegredo remains my favorite Hellboy illustrator (after Mignola himself, of course), and those four stars might just be because "The Crooked Man" is so very good that the others suffer by comparison. The feeling of Appalachian folklore is incredibly strong without losing the essential nature of this series. Still not better than "Makoma," but it comes close.

[Courtney · Rating 4 out of 5]

A group of short stories taking place in various eras. The best one of the lot seemed to be the first one, "The Crooked Man", which was an interesting take on Appalachian folklore. It definitely make me curious to read more on the topic.

The Hellboy series definitely has a unique art style - not my favourite, but it definitely stands out and seems unique to the series.

[Siona Adams · Rating 4 out of 5]

Actual rating: 4.5

I think the key to Hellboy is that I prefer the volumes that have a continuous story more than the ones that collect one-offs. I mean, I love all things Hellboy-related, but I love some more than others.

Still, I recommend every volume of Hellboy ever :P

[Little Timmy · Rating 4 out of 5]

If you thought the Hellboy movies were good then you will love the comics. Much more story on the monsters and the history of hellboys origin. Great reads, Very recommended

[Jiro Dreams of Suchy · Rating 4 out of 5]

The crooked man is an iconic Hellboy story that captures all the best parts of the Hellboy universe. Really great art that always feels so damn creepy (I mean, just LOOK at the crooked man!) The cast of characters who can wander in and out of the story- a young man returns to his Appalachian home to deal with some witches he ran away from as a teen. Hellboy doesn’t back down and tries his best to fight the problem. An iconic story!

The other stories in are short and interesting enough to pair with the crooked man- but they all feel like lesser stories (one’s a video game tie in). None of them would be must reads but all of them are good enough.

[Chris · Rating 4 out of 5]

I do miss Mignola's art, but Richard Corben's style fits this story (and Hellboy in general) pretty well.

This is a cool little ghost story set in Appalachia, and I get why they adapted this into the most recent Hellboy movie. Just Hellboy bumming around, looking at weird stuff and occasionally punching a ghost or a witch, what more could you want?

[Jon Feigen · Rating 5 out of 5]

Never got to read much Hellboy as a kid. this book has a few great self contained stories and a nice blurb before each story on the making of it and inspirations. the crooked man is a great story and sufficiently drawn spooky. all the stories are good, love hellboy taking on the supernatural with the big stick mentality.

[Ευθυμία Δεσποτάκη · Rating 4 out of 5]

Τρίτη ανάγνωση και νομίζω πια πως ο Χέλμποϊ είναι για μένα ο Λάβκραφτ των κόμιξ: τον διαβάζω μια φορά κάθε 4-5 χρόνια, να έρχονται τα μέσα μου στα ίσα τους.

Επιμέρους αστέρια, μιας και μπορώ:
The Crooked Man ****
They Who Go Down to the Sea in Ships****
The Mole
In the Chapel of Moloch

==========

Σε δεύτερη ανάγνωση, προτιμώ το σχέδιο του Μαυρογένη (για την ακρίβεια το θεωρώ απολαυστικά ρεαλιστικό) από το φολκ-αμερικάνα του Crooked Man.

[Spencer · Rating 4 out of 5]

Usually I'm a big fan of story arcs and continuing plotlines but this collection of short stories (in comic form) was really good, they're well written and worthwhile additions to the hellboy universe. The art was perfect for each tale and complimented the stories well.
The Crooked Man and Moloch were my favourites and both were brilliantly creepy and steeped in mythology.

[Tara · Rating 2 out of 5]

2.5 stars. Both the artwork and the storyline of The Crooked Man (which takes up half the book) were just completely and utterly terrible. Fortunately, the other three short stories were fairly decent. I really liked In the Chapel of Moloch, which features—thank god!—artwork by Mignola himself.

[Dan · Rating 4 out of 5]

Fun stories and nice art. I liked the tribute to Goya in one of the stories.

[Jeff Morgan · Rating 4 out of 5]

After a while all of the Hellboy stories start running together for me, but vol. 10 has good stories that stand above many of the others:

“The Crooked Man” - This is the first Hellboy story set in America! Mignola mines some Appalachian folklore about “The Crooked Man,” a white settler who stirred up trouble between the natives and the colonists, fought with the British during the Revolution, and fought on both sides of the Civil War. He was truly a creepy villain (and now I’m interested in looking into the folklore!).

“They That Go Down to the Sea in Ships” - Another American story. The ghost of Black Beard roams the coast looking for his lost head.

“In the Chapel of Moloch” - This is the weakest of the four stories, in my opinion. The cult of Moloch (from the Bible) is still alive and well in Portugal, of all places.


“The Mole” - In the foreword, Mignola writes about a time when he had concerning mole on his foot. Therefore, he wrote a story about Hellboy having a monstrous mole on his hand. This one was short, weird, and darkly humorous.

[Jana P. · Rating 5 out of 5]

Už jsem to u některých svazků s Hellboyem zmínila - většinou mne více baví delší příběhy zabírající jeden samostatný svazek než svazky povídkové. Ale tento povídkový svazek se mi dost trefil do noty.
Každá povídka měla v sobě něco, čím mne zaujala a připoutala si mne k sobě. Ať už to byl svižný napínavý děj (Paskřivec), zajímavé postavy (Ti, kteří se vydávají v lodích na moře), výborné hlášky (V kapli Molochově) či nečekaná, ale hodně silná pointa (Mateřské znaménko).
Styl jednotlivých kreslířů se mi hodně líbil. Byť byl každý v něčem trochu jiný, tu atmosféru hellboyovských příběhů a Hellboye samotného vystihli všichni podle mne na výbornou.
Já jsem rozhodně spokojená a těším se na další svazek.

[Mariano · Rating 5 out of 5]

If this isn't the best short story collection from the series it's right there. Especially The Crooked Man, of course. More towards horror than fantasy and with Corben on fire, leaving everything on the page. Usually this kind of projects loose steam after the first couple of year, but Hellboy keeps getting better and better.

[Stano Várady · Rating 5 out of 5]

Narozdiel od Mignolu nepovažujem Corbena za jedného z najlepších komiksových kresličov vôbec, no jeho podivný štýl a hororové portfólio ma naozaj fascinujú. Ak ide navyše o poviedku The Crooked Man, ako vystrihnutú z K. J. Erbena, tak sa naozaj bavím.

A zvyšok je tiež fajn.