Yup. I'm going to need a beer.

Among the pantheon of modern directors, few present their visions with as much clarity as Guillermo Del Toro. The man works on countless projects and he doesn't show any signs of stopping or slowing down. As such, it is disappointing whenever one of his potential projects is shelved or unrealized. My heart has rarely known a heavier feeling than the official 100% declaration from Del Toro himself that Hellboy 3 will not happen. It’s not just a side project we’re losing, it’s the closing chapter of what had the potential to be one of the defining movie trilogies of the new millennium. The template for Del Toro's style of pulpy action and color palette is present in films like Blade II, but it's in the Hellboy series where things are kicked up a notch.

Hellboy brings a gothic, dieselpunk, Lovecraftian sensibility to the superhero game. Elder godlike monsters from darker realities pour through portals and dark books. Creepy constructs of slime and tentacles make their way through the murky labyrinths beneath New York. Nazis get eviscerated, blown up, dismembered, and in classic Indiana Jones fashion - destroyed by the otherworldly temperaments they seek to control.