Deliver them to evil
Hellbenders is a 2012 American Horror Comedy film starring Clancy Brown and Clifton Collins Jr..
The Augustine Interfaith Order of Hellbound Saints is a demon hunter organization with... Unorthodox methods. You see, they live a life of constant sin, breaking every part of their vows they can, in the hopes of attracting demons to them so they can be sent back to Hell where they belong. One day, they learn a rabbi accidentally awakened an Ancient Evil out to destroy the world. Now, the Hellbound Saints must prevent Hell on Earth.
The film was distributed on DVD by Lionsgate. It's not to be confused with Hellbinders or Hellbender.
This film provides examples of:
- Badass Preacher: The Hellbound Saints not only partake in Demon Slaying, they deliberately sin to attract the demons to them.
- Big Bad: Surtr, a Destroyer Deity trying to kickstart the apocalypse.
- Black and Nerdy: Stephen, the Order's bookkeeper, is a black man, and is so nerdy that he has one of every kind of pencil at all times.
- Country Matters: Larry uses the Urban Legend of L's and I's bleeding together in old comics to call Clint this.
- Destroyer Deity: The Big Bad is Surtr, the Nordic god tasked with burning the world during Ragnarok.
- The End... Or Is It?: The Hellbound Saints manage to banish Surtr and aver the apocalypse, but a post-credit scene has one of the experts interviewed for exposition mention that the Hell vortex was mistakenly left slightly open.
- Hate Sink: Clint LaPierre starts off as a stuffy Straight Man who doesn't understand the Hellbound Saints' unusual ways of Demon Slaying, but eventually evolves into an obnoxious Obstructive Bureaucrat who tries to shut the Order down in the middle of their fight against the Apocalypse because he refuses to believe in the forces of Hell. It takes Clint's nose getting ripped off by Surtr for him to accept the existence of demons.
- Horror Doesn't Settle for Simple Tuesday: Birthday
- Kill the God: Surtr is known as the God-Killer, and his end goal is to destroy the Christian God.
- Mockumentary: A lot of the film's exposition is done via In-Universe interviews after the fact.
- Obstructive Bureaucrat: The Hellbound Saints have to deal with a stuffy Vatican representative inspecting everything for the new Pope. He explicitly states he doesn't believe in Hell, directly contradicting mainstream Catholic doctrine, and ends up cutting ties between the Church and the Order during the second act.
- The Old Gods: The plot concerns a Nordic deity returning to destroy the Earth. The trope is even referred to by name to describe him.
- Omnicidal Maniac: Surtr explicitly states that his end goal is to "murder the world." As it turns out this includes God and his angels, a total Cessation of Existence for everything.
- One-Word Title
- Our Demons Are Different: These are incorporeal beings that interact with the world by possessing morally compromised humans. When they transfer bodies, they resemble a swarm of flies. They are weak to holy things, and are sent back to Hell when their host body is killed.
- Public Domain Character: The Big Bad is the Norse deity Surtr.
- Rules Lawyer: Stephen is mentioned as having once used the Levitican ban on shellfish to claim he's been more sinful.
- Sadist: Surtr, a mad god who exists entirely to destroy all existence. While seeking to do so, he toys with mortals, acting like those he possessed in order to torment their loved ones and poking at people's greatest insecurities, when he doesn't just brutally kill them.
- Sealed Inside a Person-Shaped Can: Surtr has spent the last 30 years locked in a boy he possessed and locked in a basement. Now he's escaped.
- Throw the Book at Them: Larry beats a demon with a Bible to rescue Angus.
