Wednesday, February 20, 2019

MOVIE REVIEW: How to Train Your Dragon: The Hidden World




The end of an era happens on February 22, 2019. How to Train Your Dragon: The Hidden World is the final film in that franchise. All twelve books of Cressida Cowell’s series have been condensed and changed into just three films. Well, there were also four short films and an eight season television series. If that comes as a shock, that’s okay because the film doesn’t address them.

Dean DeBlois once again writes and directs as he’s done for all three films. The love for the characters he’s spent 11 years with is evident in how they’re portrayed. It would have been so easy in different hands for the filmmakers to have forgotten that six years have passed for the characters since that first film. Instead, DeBlois allows them to be young adults struggling with being too old to act like teenagers but not feeling ready enough to take on the adult roles expected of them. It’s the worst for Hiccup (Jay Baruchel); still mourning his father’s death after a year yet still expected to lead his people as Chief. He’s expected to have all the answers. He’s expected to marry Astrid (America Ferrera) and have the next heir to the Chiefdom. He’s expected to be an expert in all things Viking. The pressure is too much, causing him to depend more and more on his dragon, Toothless, instead of Astrid or others around him. Maybe in a way he hasn't let Toothless live up to his true potential either. It’s a realistic portrayal in a film many would dismiss as a children’s film and it’s refreshing to have this realism without depressing the audience. Emotional downbeats are tempered by humor from the dragons or various characters. The only misstep would be Snotlout (Jonah Hill) pursuing Valka (Cate Blanchett) as a M.I.L.F. Valka only had eyes for Hiccup’s father but Snotlout still spends the whole film pursuing her and making overtures that felt uncomfortable to watch. It also would have been nice to pass the Bechdel-Wallace Test especially with such strong female characters like Astrid and Valka.



As with most sequels, How to Train Your Dragon: The Hidden World ups the ante on everything. With a whole previously unseen utopia of the creatures, there are far more dragons than the last two films combined. Dragons of all shapes and sizes and abilities fill the screen; making the most out of that 3D Imax screen. The newest dragon, dubbed the Light Fury, is capable of bamfing and teaches Toothless to do the same complete with lightning powers that require a new tail and features just in time for Build-a-Bear to have new plushies. Still, it’s amazing to be able to see the iridescent sheen on each individual scale of Light Fury’s body. The backgrounds are so real that it’s impossible to tell whether they were painstakingly crafted or actual footage from up north.

When it’s the end of something, there is always trepidation about how it will go. Will the characters leave you with a smile or an ugly cry? For those familiar with the How to Train Your Dragon book series. It’s hard to get past Hiccup’s haunting line, “There were dragons when I was a boy…
Would it be ignored by the film? Would Hiccup leave Toothless behind just as Christopher Robin once did to Winnie the Pooh? Happily, the answer lies in between. The very last scene is exactly how Hiccup and Toothless should be remembered. It’s a rare feat when a trilogy has the perfect ending to everything that has come before it. How to Train Your Dragon: The Hidden World deserves the praise and is well worth your time.

9.5 out of 10

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