Oh Hell…

[timbolton]

Crazy fan theory time and I’m not sure if this one has been proposed before, I can’t remember reading it.

SPOILERS FOR: all current series, especially Frankenstein Underground #5, any Hellboy in Hell and current arcs of BPRD and Abe Sapien.




Here we go…




I think two things were made clear in Frankenstein Underground #5 (and possibly with the teasers for the upcoming linking of all series) –

One) The Earth, at least above ground, will be devastated to an extent mankind as it is will not be able to survive on it. Hell on Earth. It’s been pointed to with Mayan prophecies in Abe and elsewhere, the Earth will be destroyed to be recreated again. Now in Frankenstein Underground we get the prophecy clearly stated from Tefnut Trionus – Earth above ground will be destroyed. The Mignolaverse has been leading to this from the start and it’s been hinted at in just about every series (Hellboy, BPRD, Abe, Frankenstein – definitely, probably even Lobster, Witchfinder, etc).

Two) Tefnut states it clearly in issue five of Frankenstein Underground – humanity will have to find somewhere else to survive whilst the world goes through the transformation it needs to or humanity will be wiped out. The destruction being Earth fully destroyed by the Ogdru Jahad and then rebirth into the next world – the Viking Ragnarok / Mayan mythology fulfilled. Her answer is to hide underground and sends people down to find this hiding place. We know now that the mission goes wrong but possibly through Frankenstein that place could be a safe haven. But…
Didn’t Liz destroy all the underground realm which in turn led to the Hell on Earth series? So what remains of Frankenstein’s hidden world after Liz’s world burn? That is unknown, though I’d like to think he’s still there.

So where does this lead us? I believe one place…

Hellboy, as our hero and the one to save us, had to go ahead (of the rest of humanity) and to do that he had to die to get there, because there is no alternative way really for the living to go normally. The place I am suggesting for humanity’s salvation? That’s right… Hell.

From the current series we are learning that the big cities of Hell are emptying out after actions by Hellboy in Hell itself, i.e. the killing of Lucifer which led to the underling revolt, death of a lot of Hell’s royalty and their fleeing to remote palaces. Lot of empty space for people to “live.”

We’ve heard time and again about the Right Hand of Doom and the crown upon his head – legacies he has denied a lot of times. But… only he has the power to open the “wall” between Hell and Earth – that is the power of the Right Hand of Doom. So Hellboy could open the way for humanity to escape the destruction of Earth via entering the realm of Hell. And Hellboy can then lead the charge back to Earth with the armies he controls with his crown.

Where is the Black Flame in all of this? I think he is just an agent to bring about the change on Earth. He said it to Abe himself he is not the key. Black Flame is the opposite of Abe/Hellboy – the anti-version of them. He destroys, they rebuild.

And the final key… Abe. We have been nudged towards this time and again, Abe will be the key to rebuilding after the end of the world. Abe will be there, hopefully with Hellboy, to remove the last remnants of evil (if they even exist) so that humanity can return to the new world, to begin again, to restart the cycle. Abe will welcome the people in and teach them anew – the Oannes part of his mythology. And, maybe stretching here, I am hoping it is to that garden in England that they return to, since it was in Hellboy that it was said people will return here eventually.

In the Abe ongoing series it was stated a while back that it was necessary to have the gods and heroes to bring about this death and rebirth. Everything has come together for this.




A final wish – hope that we see the realm that Morgana and Gruagach went to and there is some absolution. I really love the idea of these other realms alongside Earth, Hell, etc. I think with Hellboy being in Hell right now I really miss that side to the Mignolaverse.


Final thought - I really have to disagree with the letter by Gary O. in Frankenstein Underground #5 - if the Mignolaverse kept its status quo then it would never be reaching the heights it is reaching now. I absolutely LOVE where the series is going, whether my above theory is on the right track or not, and it's the fact things DO change that makes the Mignolaverse a step above Marvel and DC. This IS the best comic series right now, it's keeping me very happy! Thank you Mike and team.

Post note - And oh my gosh, John eventually stepping down as writer is really making me sad. John... I wish you would see it through to the end, you and Mike are the BEST team, partners in crime, it will end on a high whether you leave it together, but to not see it through to the end really makes me sad, you have forged it together even if Mike started it. I wish there could be a change of mind. But, I wish you all the luck with wherever your path takes you!

Edit: I'm going to go through the published Hellboy in Hell books/comics because I just remembered there is a lot of ominous prophecy regarding Hellboy from Sir Edward and the other character(s) he was talking to, which may affect all or parts of the above theory.

Over to you...

[highlandhellboy]

I also had to disagree with Gary O. I love the fact that everything is going so wrong for everybody in these stories, having people killed off and then resurrected constantly isn't really my thing. The characters in the Mignolaverse have lots of problems and die which is a something i can relate to, maybe we don't face the same issues as these characters but i can relate that they have their up's and downs and lose friends and family along the way.

Plus the Art is always fantastic and epic storytelling which just blows me away each time i pick up an issue.

[thwhtGuardian]

If the story never developed and just maintained the status quo Hellboy would perhaps be an interesting comic but never a great comic like it is now.

[middenway]

I haven't read the letters column yet, so I should reserve judgement... but I have zero interest in any story that preserves the status quo. Story is change and big stories have seismic changes. I wouldn't have it any other way.

[Kees_L]

So where does this lead us? I believe one place…

Hellboy, as our hero and the one to save us, had to go ahead (of the rest of humanity) and to do that he had to die to get there, because there is no alternative way really for the living to go normally. The place I am suggesting for humanity’s salvation? That’s right… Hell.

From the current series we are learning that the big cities of Hell are emptying out after actions by Hellboy in Hell itself, i.e. the killing of Lucifer which led to the underling revolt, death of a lot of Hell’s royalty and their fleeing to remote palaces. Lot of empty space for people to “live.”

We’ve heard time and again about the Right Hand of Doom and the crown upon his head – legacies he has denied a lot of times. But… only he has the power to open the “wall” between Hell and Earth – that is the power of the Right Hand of Doom. So Hellboy could open the way for humanity to escape the destruction of Earth via entering the realm of Hell. And Hellboy can then lead the charge back to Earth with the armies he controls with his crown.

I think that folklore and the Mignolaverse have in common that as fiction both propose a playful imaginativeness toward 'our own true world' or 'the earth as we know it'.
But any of that doesn't mean that Hellboy hàs to be this or that as the one savior of mankind or whatever.

I believe you need to flip all that, with keeping in mind that for a story to say anything it has to say something without immediately coloring in whatever consequences!

Because in the reading or as the stories develop, it hasn't become a certainty or form of absolution that Hellboy MUST be either a savior or a bane or a pawn necessarily at all.
If only because the story is still continuing and Hellboy - just like any persona or character within the Mignolaverse, they all can pretty much be their own person in all this.

Meaning that they are telling both as living the story as persons truely - with having their own mind in things, in the face or despite whatever realities or consequences, constantly.

So as a reader I do not agree that Hellboy or Abe would need to act a certain way as to not 'weaken' or 'spoil' the plots. They will MAKE the plot by acting the way they do.

And reality or how the Mignolaverse pertains to it really isn't affected (negatively) by how the story is developing, since it's developing so well.

Hellboy has never changed from acting on his gut, as much as possible trying to NOT be thinking of consequences, like all heroes really. If heroes would try to be conscious of whatever consequences, they'd be doing it wrong, because how could they.

It's like Moby Dick: no matter whether it's stupid to try and catch that fish Ahab tries to.

Or Greek gods and their archaic pop star lifestyles: they aren't minding the existence of man, but more rather they stretch yet appoint whatever man's realities could be to mean!

About the Right Hand of Doom, or at least my personal reading of it, as yet,
is that I'd be inclined to think the Hand is capable of guiding or unlocking the Ogdru Jahad and with it Doom or The Apocalypse itself. As to undo or cleanse away creation when any new creation would need arising (without any old bits surviving or technically only the Ogdru Jahad itself!).

I believe it has been hinted the Hand came with two of the earliest beings as spawning off of the Ogrdru Jahad itself and that the Hand resembles that of a giant statue amid the kingdom of Thoth (near the garden the two beings had once arrived), King Thoth who's wife would become the Goddess Hecate.

Which may or may not resemble for instance things in the first Hellboy movie, but the whole key-thing fitting a hole or shape such as a wall seems more rather movie than the actual comics to me.

But all of that seems merely one reading, since what *hand in all this* would Azzael have played in wanting such a fate upon his favorite son?
I for one don't feel to know what all the Hell-nobility has been going through with Hellboy's coming or how any of that would or should pan out.

I feel I can't even be sure how important the RHoD would still be of late. But to me that seems the fun of it all, that the reading of the Mignolaverse could be consisting of more than one reading (Hellboy's but also Sir Edward Grey's or either Azzael's or Hecate's or any of such characters in part, as combining into a vast and intricate puzzling story world!

Post note - And oh my gosh, John eventually stepping down as writer is really making me sad. John... I wish you would see it through to the end, you and Mike are the BEST team, partners in crime, it will end on a high whether you leave it together, but to not see it through to the end really makes me sad, you have forged it together even if Mike started it. I wish there could be a change of mind. But, I wish you all the luck with wherever your path takes you!

I feel mr Mike and mr Scott and mr John all described the situation poignantly differently then you seem to, since it wouldn't have to be any kind of sudden or ill-fated halt in mr John's contributes to it all.

It would seem possible that the stories reached a point - or either are to reach a point - where what mr John was asked to develop and maintain is to reach its full bloom or capacity?

Of course like any reader I don't have a part in the making or developing since only the actual creatives do, but what I'm saying is that it doesn't have to be so that mr John couldn't finish things, since I for one think he may have done just that as things are!