Hellboy Review: 3 Ups & 7 Downs

3. The Wildly Inconsistent Visual Effects

Now, to be completely fair to this film, its $50 million budget means that audiences shouldn't ever have expected to see Avengers-calibre visual effects, nor even necessarily visuals quite on par with del Toro's films (both of which were priced higher than this).

But even so, the lack of consistency between CGI elements is pretty shocking throughout the film. Some digital effects look quite terrific - the blend of practical and VFX for Gruagach is actually surprisingly effective, especially when he's speaking, and some of the cartoonish gore hits the right level of crude artistry (but more on that later).

Yet sequences that rely heavily on CGI - that is, most of the action - frequently look quite hideous, especially Hellboy's battle against three giants, and a sequence near the end of the film involving Ian McShane that's sure to generate a lot of cringe-induced laughter.