Trivia / Hellboy (2004)

• Acclaimed Flop: The film was well-received by critics and audiences, but only made $59.6 million domestically on a $66 million budget. It took another $40 million from the international box office to recover the expenses.
• Acting for Two: Doug Jones has a cameo appearance out of make-up, as one of the patients at Bellamie Psychiatric Hospital.
• Awesome, Dear Boy: Ron Perlman signed up because he loved the idea of doing a Beast and Beauty love story again, and he would get to kiss a beautiful woman half his age in the process.
• Cameo Prop: In the hall of antiquities of the Paranormal Research and Defense Facility, you can see one of the jar babies from The Devil's Backbone.
• Completely Different Title:
  • The film as released in Malaysia as Super Sapiens to avoid being banned like Daredevil for the use of 'devil' or 'hell' in the title.
  • Hungary: Hell Race
  • Lithuania: Child of Hell
  • Taiwan: Hell Monster
  • Vietnam: Red Devil
• Creator-Chosen Casting: When discussing who should play Hellboy, Guillermo del Toro and Mike Mignola wrote down their first choice on a napkin. They unanimously picked Ron Perlman.
• Creator Couple: Husband-and-wife singers Ed Bogas and Desirée Goyette were two of the featured choir members on the score.
• Creator's Favorite: Del Toro's favorite character is Abe Sapien, due to his deep love of Fish People.
• Dawson Casting: A weird case, as Hellboy is technically older than Ron Perlman, who plays him. Except that Hellboy is supposed to be Older Than He Looks and in his 30s appearance wise. Ron Perlman was in his 50s when he played the character, meaning he was a man in his 50s playing a man in his 60s who looks like a man in his 30s.
• Doing It for the Art: Guillermo del Toro for years considered this film a dream project, and had always wanted to cast Ron Perlman in the lead, but could never secure a budget or studio approval. After the massive success of Blade II, del Toro was offered Blade: Trinity or this, and though he briefly considered trying to schedule both in, he chose this.
• Dyeing for Your Art: To prepare for his role, Ron Perlman read all of the Hellboy comics, and worked out three hours a day, five to seven days a week (varied). He also worked out while shooting, every day he had off from filming, he would work out.
• Executive Meddling:
  • Executives originally wanted to cast Vin Diesel as Hellboy and make him a human who can transform into a demon, a la The Incredible Hulk. Putting aside the fact that this would most likely have gotten them sued by Marvel Comics, del Toro and Mike Mignola did not like this, and they had both independently decided that Ron Perlman was the only casting choice for the part that either of them would support. Hellboy remained a big red guy in a coat, and Perlman was cast. The film took a significant budget cut as a result, though given del Toro's talented directing, it's hard to tell- although it also meant the advertising budget was almost nothing, and since the film was released when The Passion of the Christ came out and many theaters refused to show the film due to that fact, as well as having the word "Hell" in the title, having no ad budget really hurt this movie.
  • The studio also wanted more "name" actors attached to the film, so they asked David Hyde Pierce to provide the voice for Abe Sapien. This ended up back-firing though, as Pierce had such respect for Doug Jones' performance he refused to be credited. In the sequel, Doug Jones just voices Abe on his own.
• Fake American: Rupert Evans as John Myers.
• On-Set Injury: Ron Perlman broke a rib while filming the subway scene. He jumped onto a train that was coming towards him at about forty-five miles per hour.
• The Other Marty: Jeffrey Tambor stepped in to the production a week before filming kicked off, because the actor previously cast in the part of Manning didn't show up.
• Throw It In!: Hellboy's cigars were added after Perlman was allowed to smoke during a makeup test, and del Toro liked how it looked.
• Uncredited Role: Doug Jones' voice was dubbed by David Hyde Pierce, but Pierce refused a credit because he felt that Abe was entirely Doug's creation, and did not wish to detract from his performance.
• Wag the Director: Ron Perlman insisted on doing the scene where Hellboy and Liz speak after the funeral with no shirt even though it meant spending several extra hours in make-up to apply the torso prosthetics.
• What Could Have Been:
  • In the Minor Kidroduction, Baby Hellboy was going to be an animatronic, but they didn't like how it looked, so they went with CG instead.
  • Hellboy was originally going to have cloven hooves for feet, like in the comics, but it was decided that it would be easier and safer for Ron Perlman to perform his stunts with normal, booted feet.
  • The studio wanted either Vin Diesel or Dwayne Johnson as Hellboy. Furthermore they wanted a more Hulk-like Hellboy, being a normal person who became a demon when angered.
  • Early in pre-production the crew considered switching Hellboy's stone hand from his right to his left to accommodate whoever was cast in the role. The idea was dropped when Ron Perlman was cast as he's already left-handed.

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