From left, pyrokinetic Liz (Selma Blair), Hellboy (Ron Perlman), protoplasmic mystic Johann (voiced by Seth MacFarlane), aquatic empath Abe (Doug Jones) and a Bethmoora Goblin (John Alexander) outside the entrance to the Golden Army chamber in Hellboy II: The Golden Army.

Universal Studios / Double Negative

Thanks to the wild screen success of Hellboy four years ago, Red is back to save mankind anew in Hellboy II: The Golden Army, a fantasy-adventure that’s filled with galloping action, bizarre creatures and — surprise! — romance.

Mexican writer-director Guillermo del Toro is back, too, following his own wild success with the art-house smash Pan’s Labyrinth. So is most of the cast of the first film, who must deal with a whole new crop of monsters this time around.

But this time they and Del Toro seem to be having more fun than in the first film, which was sometimes overwhelmed by its overloaded mayhem. The results? Despite a tendency to allow Hellboy II to run on too long at the end and thus delay the inevitable, this sequel is lots more fun for the audience as well.

Just to refresh everyone’s memory, especially for those who aren’t so familiar with Mike Mingola’s Dark Horse Comic series on which the movie is loosely based, there’s a prologue featuring Hellboy as a lad under the tutelage of his human adopted father (John Hurt). The story that Hurt’s Dr. Trevor Broom tells the youngster is about a long ago war between humans and the original wizards and fairies that inhabited Earth and created an army of enormous golden warriors. But a truce was declared before these leviathans got to see battle and they have been locked away ever since in a secret cave until ….

Well, blond and white-faced Prince Nuada (rocker-turned-actor Luke Goss) has other ideas. Still smarting that his underworld legions are, well, still underworld, he wrests power from his father in hopes of taking over the world. All he needs to do it is awaken the Golden Army, composed of super-strong mechanical figures crafted in gold that are three times the size of a normal soldier. But Nuada is stymied until he can find the missing piece of a magical gold crown … the piece being held by his twin sister, Princess Nuala (Anna Walton). She’s just as blonde and white-faced as her twin brother, yet is sympathetic to humans and is now on the run from him and his ogres.

Of course this is all a lot of mystical baloney, but it plays well on screen, what with all those leaping monsters cavorting across the screen while Hellboy and his cohorts keep the story with one foot in the real world … sort of.

Ron Perlman, once of TV’s Beauty and the Beast (he was the Beast), is back again in that familiar comic book role — a being with super powers who doesn’t quite fit in. In fact, until he’s called out of his home at the top-secret Bureau for Paranormal Research and Defense in New Jersey to investigate some horrible doings in New York City, the public barely remembers him, despite his enormous size and musculature, his fire-engine redness, his broken horns and his tail. Although he’s a super-hero, like Will Smith’s Hancock he is not beloved. When he rescues a baby from a not-so-jolly plant-based Green Giant, his actions are misunderstood.

Perlman, despite being encased in the Hellboy suit and layers of makeup, manages to create a sensitive being that is torn between the human world and the otherworldly beings of Prince Nuada, to whom he is a close cousin. Perlman gives Red a playful, mischievous quality, helped by Del Toro’s script, which relishes the insane moments of the plot.

The monsters are truly fantastic critters, especially the “Tooth Fairies.” These speedy, flying, white-bodied, bat-like creatures have wide mouths and ominous rows of teeth and are the “stars” of Hellboy II’s most frightening and memorable sequence. Flocking to cover a human in seconds, they can pick a body clean, starting with the victim’s teeth. For they love calcium, which is why they’re called “Tooth Fairies.” The CGI department must have worked overtime creating these toothy horrors. They are wonderfully icky and promise to give the impressionable nightmares for a week.

But there are equally wondrous beings at the BPRD, who seem like escapees from an offshoot of the X-Men. Most of them are holdovers from the first film, including Selma Blair as Liz, a pyrokinetic creature who can burst into flame when she’s riled. She’s in love with Red and vice-versa, although despite her fire, their romance could use a little more heat. Also back is Doug Jones as Abraham Sapien, a gill-man who is a sort of cross between the Creature from the Black Lagoon and Star Wars’ fuss-budget C3PO. He’s infatuated with Princess Nuala and vice-versa, which makes for a surprisingly touching subplot, something the relationship between Red and Liz could have used more of.

The new kid on the block is the German ectoplasm expert Johann Krauss (voiced by Seth MacFarlane). An officious creature, he lives inside a sort of deep-sea diving suit from whose helmet white, smoky ectoplasm escapes. Eerie, especially when some of it is released to accomplish some impossible feat.

The Prince Nuada-Princess Nuala subplot has the stuff of Grand Opera in its passions, a nice touch, especially with the heartsick Abe Sapien fretting on the sidelines. But as Prince Nuada gets closer to his goal of finding that missing piece of golden crown, thoughts of the Golden Army, long relegated to the sidelines, resurface.

Will they come alive? Well, they are part of the title. Yet, disappointingly, they are one of the least interesting elements of Hellboy II, clanking and clinking their way across the screen like some early-day Transformers. They have a distinct lack of grace and personality, while dragging out the film as well. Too much of a good thing perhaps.

Yet most of the rest of Hellboy II is good-natured fun, at least if you like your action on the violent and grisly side.

*** 1/2Hellboy II: The Golden Army

Starring: Ron Perlman, Selma Blair, Doug Jones, Jeffrey Tambor, Luke Goss, Anna Walton, Seth MacFarlane, John Hurt.

Rated: PG-13, contains violence, gore.

mjanuson@projo.com