It’s that time of year once again folks. Time for the Summer Blockbusters. They’re bigger, more epic, and hopefully better then any other movie in the year and being an animation guy I find it’s always cool to see an animated movie get just as much publicity as any of the super cereal action movies. But saying How To Train Your Dragon 2 had some publicity would be a vast understatement. The sequel to Dreamwork’s 2010 How to Train Your Dragon has been hyped to the max and in traditional Dreamworks fashion if one IP did well then you need to pump an unhealthy amount of sequels out of it until it withers and dies.
That may sound like I’m already revealing my hand in this poker game of critique but stick with me. To give my basic thoughts on the original, I absolutely loved it. I loved the focused and surprisingly mature story of the struggle between father and son. I loved the relationship between main character Hiccup and his dragon Toothless. I loved the animation, conveying what Dreamworks convey best, motion and speed. And I even liked how the writers actually permanently wounded Hiccup by having him lose his foot at the end of the last movie, showing both a mature conclusion as well as adding a clever mirror effect between Hiccup and Toothless’s injuries.
How To Train Your Dragon was definitely one of the best films of 2008 and ever since the trailer I’ve been hyped for How To Train Your Dragon 2. How was the sequel? How to Train Your Dragon 2 is exactly like it was advertised. Bigger, and more epic, making it a kick ass movie that I’d recommend to anyone. But even after watching it and taking a few days to digest the film I still can’t distinguish whether I like the sequel or the original better.
*Note: I haven’t read any of the books that how To Train Your Dragon is based off of and I’m looking at these movies as self-contained movies*
On a tiny little island in the middle of nowhere sites the little Viking island of Berk and in the 5 years since the last movie Berk has become dragon central, everyone owning dragons and living in harmony with them. But a great shift in power is coming as Stoick (Gerard Butler) is planning on retiring as chief and appointing Hiccup. But Hiccup (Jay Baruchel) now older, wiser and with a cool dragon glider suit doesn't want to be chief, in fact he has no idea what he wants to be, but experiments by trying to be a dragon peacekeeper and fly around discovering all the new land they can reach now thanks to their dragons.
However when an EVIL Viking named Drago (Djimon Hounsou) starts forming a dragon army, Hiccup is caught between two worlds. His responsibilities to Berk and his responsibilities to protect the dragons and he has to decide whether to walk in the footsteps of his proud warrior father or in the footsteps of his long lost mother as a dragon peacekeeper.
Now this is exactly the type of story that a sequel should bring up. Instead of rehashing the original, How To Train Your Dragon 2 grows up and plays with a more mature struggle for Hiccup and what makes the conflict more believable is that it is rooted in his primary character flaw, his lack of confidence in himself. Everything in this movie seems to have grown up, and in a very believable way especially with the characters’ designs. Harnessing more subtle aging tricks rather than having the actors change their voices for each character to make them more “mature.”
Although taking a much more mature tone under its belt, How To Train Your Dragon 2 also expands on its more mystical element the Dragons. Primarily focusing on expanding on the hierarchy of dragons and the various training techniques developed by the movie’s three major dragon trainers; Hiccup, Hiccup’s mother Valka (Cate Blanchett), and the EVIL villain Drago. But before we get into the adults, let’s talk about Toothless and Hiccup. The two are still a fantastic duo, playing off each other beautifully and showing plenty of personality and chemistry. The movie pulls this off so well it helps create one of the movie’s crowning achievements of dramatic storytelling.
The moment when Drago pits Hiccup and Toothless against each other. These two have been so close throughout these movies and you got to like them, so it makes the scene almost disturbing to see the two pitted against each other which I’m all for. Creating such an uncomfortable scene creates an unsure atmosphere and mixed that unsure feeling with the current intrigue of the story and characters and you got a hook that will keep dragging people back for years to come.
Speaking of relationships, we had father and son last time so now we have the conflict of a long separated family coming back together. I wasn’t sure how Dreamworks would pull this off, hoping we weren’t going to go the big teary eye reunion route but to my relief the reunion is played more softly, focusing on the subtle body language and limited dialogue, WITH the exception of a song and dance sequence that I felt was 70% out of place and completely silly. Although the family conflict was well done, because of how they hammered it in it created the side effect of making the resulting twist almost hilariously obvious. Now spoiler here but I want to make this point so it’s necessary, so SOMEBODY dies in this movie, and Toothless is the perpetrator and that is a brilliant twist only marred by the predictability of the setup. While contemplating my thoughts on the movie I did come up with a slight fix that would’ve made the scene more powerful. At the moment before the death, whether it be bad timing or a twist of fate but what I propose could of happened is having both of the likely death candidates caught in Toothless’s attack and nearly die. That way their is an air of a misdirect giving you hope that one survives but in truth the other is stone cold dead.
Moving from a less grim subject, like the first movie How to Train Your Dragon 2 has beautiful animation. From the forceful and action packed action scenes to the majestic and free flowing flying Dreamworks motion with animation hasn’t lost its touched and it still top quality. Although I haven’t seen it in 3D but with the great detail and camera it should be a treat.
But now it’s time for the worst part of the movie for last, our villain Drago. On the surface Drago should be a perfect villain for Hiccup, training dragons through fear and intimidation and treating them as weapons, the complete opposite of Hiccup’s beliefs concerning dragons. Yes. Drago could’ve been a really awesome, intimidating villain but instead we get a complete one-note, contrived, and blisteringly stupid moron of a villain. It all stems form his root problem, his plan makes zero sense in context with his motives. Dragons destroyed everything and everyone I ever loved so I shall use dragons to enslave people. His motives and actions just don’t correlate. For Drago to have worked his hatred of dragons should’ve been scraped completely and instead replaced with the same intrigue that Hiccup and Valka hold.
Have Drago believe that dragons are the greatest and most powerful, and have him despise humans for being so weak and trying to kill them. His plan could be to enslave humans to protect dragons and that’s why he needs the dragon army so he can accomplish that. Like Valka if Drago went native with the dragons on one level we could have a very sinister mirror for hiccup to look at seeing what his affection for dragons could turn into if all his peacekeeping focus was all on bettering dragons and on another level Drago would be more sympathetic. From his point of view he would be doing the right thing and that dichotomy of moral guidelines and his cruel nature would make him more three dimensional. Unfortunately that’s not what we got, he’s a great villain in concept but his execution was garbage.
Overall, I am still debating with myself whether this was better or worst then the first. Although the first was more centered on Berk and the initial discovery of the dragon mythos, the sequel expands on the world and the mythos making it feel more vast and epic. Although the sequel did have a great triangle of conflict when Hiccup's family was brought together, the original's conflict of father and son felt more deep and impactful. And although I love both movies, they still have the weakest villains; big dragon in the first and Dragon in the second. As I've pondered which was better I kept coming back to a single comparison. Portal and Portal 2. Both games are excellent in their own way. Portal being a really funny puzzle game and Portal 2 being a really fun story with a puzzle game connecting everything. It boils down to apples or oranges if you like a more focused narrative and conflict then the original How To Train Your Dragon is for you but if you love a more expansive and epic movie then definitely check out How To Train Your Dragon 2.
Illustrations by Nero Angelus
Written By: Taylor "Whyboy" Wyatt
