Ron Perlman is back in action as the big, cranky red demon in Hellboy II: The Golden Army, and it’s about time. The long-awaited sequel reunites Perlman with writer-director Guillermo del Toro, and pits our hero against Prince Nuada (Luke Goss), a baddie with a fiendish plot to rule Earth from above and below. Ian Spelling recently spoke with Perlman about The Golden Army and his other upcoming sci-fi and horror projects, including The Mutant Chronicles, Bunraku and – just possibly - The Hobbit.

Were you starting to doubt that Hellboy II would ever happen?

I’m a pretty superstitious guy and very cautious. But with regard to Hellboy, I think I was maybe the only one who never uttered a negative word about the fact that there’d be a second one because of the response the first one got from the public and especially the Hellboy fans. I knew there was unfinished business. And then, after Guillermo did Pan’s Labyrinth, there was nothing outlandish about the idea of him revisiting Hellboy. I wouldn’t exactly say he could do anything he wanted, but after Pan’s Labyrinth people really wanted to work with him, and he wanted to make Hellboy II.

What do you think Guillermo learned from doing Hellboy that carried over to Hellboy II?

Guillermo has a running theme, I think, in all of his films, where the monsters are the most human because they’re the outcasts and they understand the loneliness that comes with being an outcast, that comes with being so unaccepted. And there’s a poignancy he always revisits in all of his work, whereby the monsters have the most human traits, the ones that the audience might most want to aspire to, and the humans behave in the most monstrous ways possible under the guise of piety and political correctness and the fact that they're number one on the food chain. Being number one doesn’t necessarily mean that you’re right or moral or ethical, and that’s something that Guillermo tries to put in his storytelling as often as possible.

The reason Hellboy is such a hero to Guillermo is because he truly embodies the idea that this is somebody who comes into the world with so much baggage, who’s truly monstrous, a spawn of Hell, created to wreak havoc on humankind, but who was nurtured in such a way that he truly understands the beauty of humanity rather than the ugliness of it. He’s the champion of that beauty.

It was great to see Roy Dotrice in Hellboy II…

There are two guys in the world I call “Pops”. Roy is one of them, because he played Father during my old Beauty and the Beast days. And one is John Hurt, because he plays Father in the Hellboy series. They were both on this movie, though I had nothing to do with either of them.

I was thrilled Guillermo had them come in. I considered it a personal gift because they’re two of the most beautiful men I’ve ever worked with or known in life. Roy and I didn’t have any scenes together in Hellboy II, but we intersected in Budapest and we went out and had a lot of dinners and a really good time. I passed over a lot of my team to him, the people who’d worked closely with me on make-up, wardrobe, etc. So he got treated in high fashion once he started work.

If there’s a third Hellboy film, what would you like to see?

I don’t want to count my chickens before they hatch, but [Del Toro] did share with me the idea for the closing of the trilogy. It’s so compelling and epic and cinematic that it almost has to happen because all of the elements have been introduced. Hellboy is an uber-myth, a truly epic, iconic, heroic character, and all of the elements that went into making him that would be closed and answered in a third film.

I wouldn’t be surprised if Guillermo writes it and - because he’s so involved with The Hobbit films - asks someone else to direct it. Let me put it this way - if we wait until after Guillermo finishes The Hobbit, I’ll be collecting Social Security, and I’m not sure how heroic I’ll be able to be at 66 years old!

You’ve also recently starred in The Mutant Chronicles…

The Mutant Chronicles is done and I just read some reviews of it, so I guess it’s played in some markets in Europe [Click here for the Total Sci-Fi review]. We’re looking for a studio [in America].

It’s another post-apocalyptic film, but this one takes place hundreds of years in the future. There are no more governments. There are only corporations. There’s an enemy that was neutralised thousands of years ago, not unlike the enemy in Hellboy, and this enemy is somehow, as a result of bombs dropping and warfare being waged, unlocked and is determined to eradicate mankind. My character, Brother Samuel, is a monk who happens to preside over a monastery that has the secret of how the enemy was neutralised. He assembles a band of characters, sort of like a Dirty Dozen, to go on this suicide mission to try to save mankind. Brother Samuel is a great combination of spirituality and faith, but he’s actually got warfare in his genes, because he presides over this group that’s called upon to put this endgame plan into action.

What can you tell us about Bunraku?

I’m done shooting, but they’re still in principal photography. It’s an incredibly stylized film, another post-apocalyptic story. I play a warlord who kind of owns everyone and everything as far as the eye can see. He’s a real badass dude.

The rumour is that Guillermo del Toro plans to find something for you in The Hobbit. Any truth to that?

He mentioned that to me and I just hope it comes to pass. There’s nothing like being on a set with Guillermo del Toro. As great as everything is I’m doing, being with Guillermo is my number one guilty pleasure. I think he’s perfect for The Hobbit, and if he has something for me, I sure hope it comes to pass and that I can be of service to him.

Hellboy II: The Golden Army is released in UK cinemas on 22 August 2008.