Does it count as unfortunate news if you already knew on an instinctive level that such was the case anyway? Guillermo del Toro has done a fantastic job of breathing life into Mike Mignola's Hellboy -- with no small amount of thanks due to Ron Perlman -- but his time with the series seems to be done, at least as far as the comic's creator sees it.

"Last I heard he said he would not make it," Mignola told The Daily Blam over the weekend at the Calgary Comic & Entertainment Expo. "Guillermo -- who I love -- in every interview there's a new story on what his next movie is and he honestly believes he's going to do all these things. But last I heard, he said 'I'm never gonna get back to Hellboy.' I'm not surprised because he won't live long enough to do a tenth of the movies he's told me he's going to make."

"I can't imagine him (del Toro) making a Hellboy 3. He's very enthusiastic and says he's going to do all these things ... ummm ... he's cute [laughs]."

So basically ... what Mignola is saying ... is that del Toro is a huge, raving fanboy. We all knew that, right? I love hearing him get enthusiastic about this stuff, even if a fair percentage of it is never going to happen. It shows that he's keyed in. That's why he was such a tremendous choice for The Hobbit and that's why Hellboy felt so faithful. Del Toro is one of us.