Fan Side Musing – How To Train Your Dragon

This is the first musing on a ‘western’ production on the blog. ^-^ I was aware of How To Train Your

Dragon back in 2010 when it originally came out, but I didn’t become a true fan of the franchise until either 2012 when the mini-series came out or 2015 when I first got to watch the 2nd film… I can’t actually remember.

I have mixed feelings about How To Train Your Dragon (henceforth to be referenced as HTTYD…). Most of the time, I really love watching the stories, but… there are certain moments where I get really irritated with something or it’s a little too dramatic for me (most of the drama is to do with Stoick ~ where he ‘disowns’ Hiccup in the first movie and where he dies in the second movie…).

There’s also a fair bit of ‘disconnect’ between the movies, series and online game which irks me just a tiny bit, but… anyway. Let’s not focus on the negatives. ^-^

My favourite thing about HTTYD is the dragons. Being someone who grew up on nature documentaries and was more than a little keen to become a zookeeper or get involved in other animal related jobs when I left high school; wanting to learn more about these animals is kind of like second nature to me. CX Some dragons have more information on them than others, but either way I’m glad that the creators took the time to create that information for us.

My favourite species of dragon is one we see in the series: the dramillion. There are several other species of dragon that I’m particularly fond of, such as the night terrors, thunderdrum, scauldron, speed stingers, boneknapper, rumblehorn and skrill. (The skrill was actually my favourite dragon until they brought out the dramillion.)

Having the ‘classes’ of dragons was also a nice little touch. I do wish they had changed the symbols for sharp and tracker classes when they decided to change the Deadly Nadder to tracker class instead of sharp and the Hideous Zippleback to mystery instead of fear, but anyway.

The design that went into the world of HTTYD was also very well done, particularly for Berk, Dragons’ Edge and New Berk. I also enjoyed the other islands we got to ‘explore’ in the series, like the islands that were home to the Defenders of the Wing and the Wing Maidens.

Character design-wise, I was glad to see that the characters were not super polished – at least initially. They had crooked teeth, imperfect skin and were more ‘human’ than other cartoons at the time. As things have progressed, I feel they’ve made the characters a little more ‘polished’ and less ‘normal person’-like, but it doesn’t detract from the story for me. This is just a personal observation/opinion. ^-^

I really liked the dragon inspired armour they had in the 3rd film. So cool!

In regards to the characters themselves… I honestly don’t have much to say about them. They’re okay and I’m fond of them. I can identify a lot with Hiccup; his being an inventor and his excitement at learning more about dragons.

My favourite character is Eret. I initially didn’t like him, but as I watched the 2nd movie a couple more times, he began to grow on me and, ultimately, became my top favourite. ^-^

In the series, I felt we got one of the best villains – Viggo. He’s scary because he’s so smart. The other best villain was Grimmel from the 3rd movie; again, scary because he uses his intelligence and not just brawn.

All-in-all, HTTYD is a fun story which I do recommend looking into if you haven’t already. If you love dragons, you’ll more than likely enjoy the movies and series. If you want to know about my thoughts on the online game – School of Dragons – I’ll be putting up a post on that fairly soon.

Well, that’s all from me for now. Who/what are your favourites from How To Train Your Dragon? Which dragon species do you like the most? Let me know by contacting me. ^-^

Favourites:

• Human Character: Eret.

• Dragon Character: Hookfang. (Skullcrusher is a close 2nd.)

• Dragon Species: Dramillion.

• Movie: How To Train Your Dragon 2.

• Episode: 109/S06E04 – Loyal Order of Ingerman.

Recommendation Rating:

8/10.

One last thing, don’t forget to check out the Downloads page for the How To Train Your Dragon PC and phone backgrounds I made for you.

Until next time, keep enjoying your fan side of life!