 Hellboy and the B.P.R.D. always seem to have an infinite amount of assignments seeing as how many demons, monsters, ghosts and magic users there seem to be around. It’s worse when a book containing spells and rituals gets published which is where the one-shot “Hellboy and the B.P.R.D. 1957: Family Ties†by Mike Mignola and Chris Roberson with artists Laurence Campbell and Dave Stewart.
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Someone thought it was a good idea to publish Gustav Strobl’s “Witchcraft and Demonology†so Hellboy and Susan have to look for every copy of the book. They find themselves in Dayton, Ohio where a bookstore owner sold a copy to someone in a small neighborhood. Apparently, the book isn’t the only thing Hellboy and Susan find.
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The book being published and sold commercially is many times more interesting than this one-shot. The mystery of who published that book and why sounds like the perfect setup for a “Hellboy and the B.P.R.D.†story that hopefully Dark Horse is planning on making.
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That’s not to say the story in the one-shot is terrible. It’s just that the story itself and what happens seems a bit too predictable, even for a “Hellboy†story. How the monster gets defeated in this comic can be a precursor to the big story about the book. The one-shot does make the reader want to know more about the book and the background to that can be taken as a plus for this one-shot.
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The art is OK. It’s not the best the series has to offer, but there are some positives. The Hellboy’s design is badass as is the monster. One of the best panels is of a closeup of a boy. That closeup is about as freaky as it gets. It’s unnerving and shows that Campbell and Stewart can do creepy stuff well.
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“Hellboy and the B.P.R.D. 1957: Family Ties†is an OK one-shot but what it lacks in story and art it more than makes up for it by creating a setup for a story that sounds amazing. Hopefully Dark Horse does something with that story because there’s so much you can do with it.
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