A Brief History of the Hellboy Comic Series
First appearing as a black and white illustration of a demon with a belt that donned the Hellboy name in a program at the Great Salt Lake Comic-Con in 1991, is when this character’s history began. Since then, Hellboy as an individual character was created and published on the front cover of Dime Press # 4 in 1993, and in an Italian Fanzine with his name written at the bottom of the cover and his image which is much like the image we have come to know today. Hellboys popularity in the comic world began to increase with these earlier images and mentions of his name.
Hellboy as an idea, was first taken to DC Comics who liked the idea itself of the character but didn’t like the association with hell. Later, Hellboy was published independently by Dark Horse Comics. The first stories were conceived by Mike Mignola and John Byrne and featured the character’s first full feature appearance in a story. The character was drawn by Mike Mignola and the script was written by John Byrne, it was published by Dark Horse Comics in San Diego Comic Con Comics # 2 in August of 1993. Some of the Hellboy stories have been created by other artists who include; Duncan Fregedo, Guy Davis, Christopher Golden, and Ryan Sook.
The first mini-series to feature the Hellboy character was in “Hellboy: Seed of Destruction” and the series ran from March to June of 1994 and included four issues by Mike Mignola and John Byrne.
The trade publication collection was awarded two Eisner Awards and was the basis for the first Hellboy motion picture. Hellboy as a character has gone through an interesting history and evolved into a loveable character that fights for the side of good instead of evil, which makes the character all the more unique and adored by fans.
Hellboyhas seen a rich history is a short amount of time and has gone through some transformations but the image of the character pretty much remains the same as the earlier versions. He is a red colored demon with a tail, an abnormally large right hand made of stone, and horns which he saws off to make his appearance more normal. He was brought to Earth by Nazi occultists, who wanted to use him to win the war. He was rescued by the United States Armed Forces and raised by Dr. Trevor Bruttenholm who dubbed him Hellboy.
After the success that was brought about by the release of the 2 full length motion picture films, the next logical progression for Hellboy was to make it’s way into the online gaming scene, this is seen in the debut of the slot machine Hellboy.