New Hellboy Series Finally Uncovers a Missing Chapter in Guillermo del Toro’s Film Saga

1 week ago 21

Published Jun 1, 2026, 8:00 PM EDT

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Guillermo del Toro's unfinished Hellboy trilogy would leave audiences longing to see an unexplored period of his life, which, of course, is his adolescence. Luckily, fans curious about what the big, red paranormal investigator was like growing up can see for themselves with a new comic book.

On May 20, 2026, Dark Horse Comics released the first issue of a miniseries called Young Hellboy: Thrilling Sky Adventures, which is a uniquely meta slice of the beloved character's childhood.

The four-part comic is meta in that the eponymous adolescent — a living, horned demon born in the underworld but raised on Earth after an accidental dimensional transfer — is not the one fighting evil in this story. In fact, he really only serves as the narrator.

The true hero of Young Hellboy: Thrilling Sky Adventures #1 is Scarlett Santiago, an ace pilot otherwise known as The Sky Devil, who finds herself teaming with an unexpected ally while struggling to hide from her enemies. This story-within-a-story, titled "The Devil's Plateau," is read aloud by little HB to his dog, Mac, during breakfast at the Bureau for Paranormal Research and Defense in 1947.

The demon actually crossed paths with his comic book hero in person in a previous edition of Young Hellboy from 2021 subtitled The Hidden Land. It is another four-parter that sees the eponymous child and his adoptive father, Professor Trevor "Broom" Bruttenholm, stranded on a mysterious island overrun with dangerous primitive creatures, where Scarlett Santiago comes to their rescue.

Young Hellboy: Thrilling Sky Adventures #1 comes from Hellboy's creator, Mike Mignola, and his co-writer, Thomas Sniegoski, who also collaborated with Mignola on previous Young Hellboy adventures, as well as Dark Horse's Frankenstein: New World. Craig Rousseau, co-creator of Perhapanauts, serves as the penciler, along with colorist Chris O'Halloran (known for the unsettling horror anthology comic, Ice Cream Man) and letterer Clem Robins.

Guillermo del Toro Briefly Explored Hellboy's Early Years

Young Hellboy has only been a comic for about five years. However, anyone who has seen Academy Award winner Guillermo del Toro's films based on the Dark Horse character, starring Ron Perlman in the title role, is already somewhat familiar with him as a youngster.

The first adaptation from 2004 begins with Hellboy's origin story, showing him being brought to Earth via a portal opened by the Nazis at the height of World War II. Overhead narration by John Hurt's Prof. Broom, portrayed as a younger man in the flashback by Kevin Trainor, reveals that he would then accept the responsibility of raising the unusual boy.

del Toro would offer a glimpse into the early days of that father-son relationship in the opening scene of the 2008 sequel, Hellboy II: The Golden Army. Set on Christmas Eve 1955, it sees Broom entertaining the adolescent "Red" with a story of the eponymous ancient entities of destruction before bedtime.

So, while the Hellboy movies did, indeed, show some of their main heroes as children, there is one aspect of his legacy that, in truth, would go unexplored, much to fans' chagrin. That would be the much-discussed prophecy suggesting HB would be the harbinger of Earth's demise, which would have actually been the premise of del Toro's third film.

Perlman revealed in an interview for the podcast The Joe Vulpis Show that Hellboy 3 would have addressed the character's dark destiny, as well as show him raising twin children with his pyrokinetic girlfriend, Liz Sherman (Selma Blair). However, del Toro's vision for the sequel required a larger budget than the powers that be were willing to allow.

As a result, del Toro's Hellboy trilogy would remain unfinished, resulting in two divisive cinematic reboots. Maybe one day, Mignola will finally work with the filmmaker to bring the unmade movie to life as a comic book. If he was willing to show more of his most iconic character as a child, why not give fans what they really want, too?

Young Hellboy: Thrilling Sky Adventures #1 is now available in comic book stores and most digital reading platforms.