The X-Men’s Magik as an Inspiration for Hellboy

Hellboy draws upon an incredible lexicon of diverse visual and narrative precursors. Relatively undiscussed amongst inspirations for the cigar-chomping, decades old paranormal detective, however, is another important pop-culture figure: the X-Men’s Magik. #Hellboy 1/9

Despite an aesthetic shift from teenage girl to cigar-chomping demon, the character of Illyana Rasputin has a great deal in common with the character Hellboy, and actually exhibits a lot of the attributes for which Hellboy was praised, years ahead of its release. 2/9

Hellboy debuts in 1993 and would quickly become one of the greatest comics of all-time thanks to a dense mythology, a compelling hero’s journey, and, most of all, Mike Mignola’s artwork – some of the finest and most dynamic draftsmanship in comics history. 3/9

Illyana debuts as Magik a decade earlier. Like Hellboy, Illyana is a demonic being choosing to live among humans within a found family while working with them to fight her ilk, hiding her true form in fear of fulfilling a prophecy that will open a portal to the demonic realm. 4/9

On the artwork side, Magik has some pedigree to boast as well with prominent depictions of the character’s story illustrated by Bill Sienkiewicz, Brett Blevins, Art Adams, Rick Leonardi and at least 2 Buscemas! 5/9

On a smaller scale, both hide their horns, both battle sorcerers determined to open said hell portal, and both carry enchanted weapons in their right hand (technically it IS his right hand in Hellboy’s case) that hold the key to the power balance between the two worlds. 6/9

Plus there’s the whole Rasputin of it all, with both characters evoking, in one form or another, the historical figure of Grigori Rasputin. The point of all this is just that the parallels here are many, enough to warrant a comparative reading. 7/9

Mignola even had cause to know Magik. He did a lot of work for the X-line during the late 1980s, a time when Illyana’s demon storyline was culminating. He illustrated the cover of the “Classic X-Men” issue that retells Magik’s first encounter with the hell-dimension of Limbo. 8/9

To be clear, we’re not accusing Mignola of a swipe, though perhaps there is some influence. More importantly, it’s worth noting that a lot of the character attributes that made Hellboy’s story so compelling were also exhibited by Magik, a great character in her own right. 9/9