State protection and identification in Hellboy: of reformed devils and other Others in the Pentagon

“Think, creature! Think! If you kill me you will never know WHO you are!” “Yeah, you’re right. But I can LIVE with it!” retorts Hellboy before crushing Rasputin’s skull. Yet the sorcerer’s words recur only a few pages later, this time as an ominous memory ending the story with the promise that there will be more to come and also retaining a mild degree of ambiguity regarding the protagonist’s character, which renders him both intriguing and human. On the other hand acquiring a normal, human identity or even comprehending their origins remains an impossibility for Hellboy and his friends. Appearing in the early 90s, Hellboy or Anung un Rama is far from being the first monstrous superhero with a dark past - Hulk and the X-Men appeared decades ago and Spawn, another former denizen of Hell, only a year earlier. Hellboy however stands apart due to his direct incorporation into the US defense system, in the Bureau of Paranormal Research and Defense. An ex-demon with a grudge against Rasputin and the Nazis who summoned him in 1944 as a surrogate weapon of mass destruction and who ended up being raised by the eventual head of the BPRD, the character and its universe provide an intriguing pop-cultural reflection on the notions of others, enemy, friend and protection in the American context. Although to be taken with more than a grain of salt, the pop-cultural tendencies of amalgamation and simplification can reflect the socio-political context of their creation while simultaneously being a part of it in a haphazard manner similar to Deleuze and Guattari’s rhizome. Hellboy can be seen as making significant comments regarding the nature of the enemy as well as those defending and protecting the State, which in the diegeses becomes synonymous with all that is just in the world. The enemy in Hellboy’s storyworld is not merely a coalition of well-preserved Nazis and a malevolent monk, but - as is often the case in the superhero genre - is also a representative of Evil warring against Good, both of which in turn subsume political, social and religious features from the real world. But Hellboy has several twists, not only due to Hellboy’s original abode in Hell but also his abnormality which is somewhat uncomfortably combined with his indispensability for the US Government in the combat against the forces of darkness. Facing not only regular human armies but also spiritual, ancient ones with dangerously high claims to supernatural powers, the State is forced to resort to unusual solutions such as Hellboy, Abe and Liz. The merging of several imaginaries on the level of the image of the US Government as well as the religious and historical symbols of fear not only forms a fertile plan for adventures along the good-evil axis and highlights the similarities between religious and patriotic cults but also calls for a reconsideration of unusual beings, outcasts or simply others à la X-Men (complete with its allusions to the civil rights movement in America and elsewhere). Hence on a secondary level Hellboy can be read as commenting on xenophobia while also highlighting the problem of integrating immigrants and justifying the use of unconventional methods against the enemy. The proposed paper will analyse the interweaving of social, political and religious imaginaries to delineate possible identity constructions of the US government and the Others in the series, concentrating on their relationships and implications.