Dark Horse Comics has announced that creator Mike Mignola, co-writer Tom Sniegoski, artist Craig Rousseau, colorist Dave Stewart, and letterer Clem Robins will explore an untold chapter of Hellboy’s childhood this February with the launch of the four-issue miniseries Young Hellboy: The Hidden Land.
“Awhile back (when you could still do such things) I was at a convention in Boston and ducked out for lunch with Tom Sniegoski,” said Mignola. “Years earlier we co-wrote a more-than-slightly insane novel together, Grim Death and Joe the Electrocuted Criminal, and I brought up the idea of the maybe slightly insane globetrotting adventures of a very young Hellboy. Tom’s eyes lit up, as I kind of knew they would. So there was half the battle won, but we would need a special kind of artist to bring Tom’s madman energy to the page—and artist Craig Rousseau just happens to be that artist. And Craig just happened to be at that same convention, and when I told him the idea his eyes lit up just the way Tom’s had. It was almost too easy, and I’m happy to say the results are everything I could have hoped for.”
“Young Hellboy: The Hidden Land is another look into our red-skinned paranormal investigator’s childhood,” added Sniegoski. “The events in the series take place in May of 1947, before the events depicted in Hellboy: The Midnight Circus. Lighter in tone, Young Hellboy: The Hidden Land is an exhilarating adventure that embraces the thrills and chills of the pulp adventure stories of the 1930s. Mysterious islands, vampire queens, dinosaurs, giant ape gods, and a new and exciting addition to the Hellboy Universe—Scarlett Santiago, the Sky Devil. I’ve always been fascinated by the glimpses into Hellboy’s childhood that Mike has given us, and to be asked to contribute to these stories, along with Mike, Craig, and Dave, is a dream come true.”
In Young Hellboy: The Hidden Land, Hellboy and Professor Bruttenholm are stranded on a strange island after a mishap on their way to a South American dig site. They soon find themselves confronted by all manner of monsters, and even when the stranger who rescues them turns out to be one of Hellboy’s heroes, they aren’t as safe as they think they are.
Young Hellboy: The Hidden Land #1 will go on sale in February 2021.
