–For the set’s metallic finish refer to Chichone.

–Sammael attacks Left-Right and then vice-versa, in serious ass-kicking mode.

–He stabs his arm.

^{The final design.}

GDT: This page [opposite] is from a visit to Japan to promote Blade II, with my daughter and my wife. I love those concrete shapes in the tunnel. They ended up being in the BPRD in Hellboy.

Then I saw a Japanese mask that had no bottom, and I thought, “Wouldn’t it be great to give Kroenen a mask like that, but full of tubes that are red in the bottom, maybe kind of gory?” And he basically has the mask.

On the right is a sculptural detail, and in the middle is a Japanese sign that says “natarekoko,” which is a dessert that I was eating at the time.

Then on the right-hand page [above], in the middle, I wanted Sammael to stab Hellboy, and I didn’t do it—PG-13.

On the top, I wanted Sammael to be eating a corpse, backlit against the steam of the intestines of the corpse. But at the end of the day, two things prevented that: PG-13 and the fact that the horns and the protruding bones in the shoulder blades had to go. Backlighting the silhouette we ended up with would have been very boring, so I hung him upside down instead.

^{NOTEBOOK 3, PAGE 42A}

Dust rearrange

–The device HB uses to find the corpse. GEIGER.

They move up and down like switchblades

Long snout, skull with no skin on it

His snout pulls back like a lion’s mane revealing the bone below

Bladder

Ear or not?

Abe’s mouth hyperextends like a fish’s mouth.

Fish mouth at rest.

GDT: These pages [opposite] are from the same visit to Japan. While I was there, I tried to meet with my heroes: Katsuya Terada and Yasushi Nirasawa. I love their work, so we went to dinner at a sushi place that Nirasawa’s father owns, and he drew the three of us on a chopstick cover, and I glued it to the notebook [right].

MSZ: So this is his drawing of you?

GDT: Yeah. It’s really good! I look like a Miyazaki character.

MSZ: This is the only time I’ve seen a page where your writing goes in this direction.

GDT: That’s probably because I put in the chopstick-cover illustration. I didn’t start writing until after I put it there. And what I tried to do, in this particular notebook, was to finish all my thoughts at one time on a single page. I didn’t want anything continuing on the next page. I knew that if I did it vertically, I would run out of space, so I did it like that.

MSZ: So each page is self-contained?

GDT: Yeah, I’m pretty sure. I mean, there may be an exception. That’s why facing pages have their own subjects. On the left [opposite], for example, there are multiple ideas for Hellboy, but none of them bleed over to the next page.

Here, I was thinking of an amulet that Hellboy could have to awaken the corpse, which affects the dust particles in the air.

Then I came up with an idea that was too expensive, which was to have Rasputin frozen in a statue like in the comic, and then to have a series of mirrors that were clockwork-operated, which would beam the light into him.

Then, at the bottom, I wanted Abe to have an articulated mouth like a fish. You can still see the old Abe, which is a bit like Moebius’s Silver Surfer. The mouth was going to project out like a fish mouth. And Mignola was so horrified by this idea. He said, “That’s the worst idea!” He was so horrified by the idea of the mouth that he said to me, “If you don’t do that, I’ll give you four pages of any of my stories you like.” And I have the four pages upstairs. I’m a cheap man.

Then you see Sammael, again, attempting the same thing. This drawing is a little more similar to what we ended up with. And the claw—I wanted it to look like a lobster claw in the air. That didn’t make it.

MSZ: Now, as we’re going through these pages and seeing the designs of Sammael, it’s becoming refined. Were you working with your design team at this point?

GDT: I was already talking to Mike at this point. I think Wayne Barlowe was already on board, and I started to send him these things, but these were still my own musings.

MSZ: What’s this bladder?

GDT: The idea was that the neck would inflate like a bladder, and the tentacles around his mouth would do a “Brrrr!” and expand to reveal his teeth.

^{NOTEBOOK 3, PAGE 42B}

Terna © Terada san Katsuya Terada © chopsticks for sushi.

Drawing of Terada, Nirazawa, and Hellboy with me below them. 5/29/02 Tokyo

MASTERPIECE

SOLD OUT

Ton of pus!

Masterpiece!! Dinner with two Japanese buddies, both very friendly and talkative.

–Floor and murals on the walls

–[?] digital lines for punch

–Vibrating shine in the eye a la ANIME

–Medieval architecture mixed with industrial

–Blue set, blue character, blue days

–The eggs shine, acrylic nest

–The [?] for the tentacle BW.

–Build the outside space (eye).

–Dry leaves around him (a la O).

–Cloud from above, see tentacles

–Nest with eggs made from acrylic.

–Theatrical effects for water [?].

–No baby [?] to No Abe injured.

–Tongue design should be bigger than the mouthspace visible outside (7 feet).

–Steadicam guy should be Varomia. Tell Patrick ASAP.

^{NOTEBOOK 3, PAGE 44A}

–clak clacks clikty-clack, clack clack, then grows silent. The mouth smiles.

Try to keep Sammael changing his silhouette whenever possible.

His bones dislocate. This helps

–Broom’s autopsy: “a piece of nail split his spine in two, the impact pulverized two vertebrae.

–The idol on the altar should be a highly stylized Behemoth

octopus’s

pupil

–When we film Sammael, we should vary the speed and perhaps use a long lens for detail.

Lower teeth are bigger than upper.

Backlit Fog

–Hair implants for one of the agents.

–[?]

–The “little hand” establishes the episode CBL.

–The “Marita” establishes the episode CBL.

–Wax cylinder for the recordings of memories in a journal, in AMOM.

–Use ribbons or climbing ropes to come and go in the areas of temporal distortion. Movement sensors.

^{Hellboy’s jaw, with its distinct under bite, was a mixture of Mike Mignola’s original character.}

^{Ron Perlman’s bone structure.}

GDT: The eye here [opposite, top] is me exploring the idea that Sammael would have an egg-shaped pupil that would dilate. And I thought, “One of the eyes could have flies on it,” which is very disgusting.

At the bottom of the page is me reflecting on how to fit vertical information in a 1:85 frame.