- Released: May 21 2019
- Directed by: Dean DeBlois
- Running time: 1 h 44 min
- Rating 4/5
Synopsis
Hiccup and Toothless face a new dragon-hunting villain, all the while slowly but surely Toothless is heeding the call of the wild when being seduced by a female of a Fury subspecies.
My Thoughts
About time I made an MT on this one. I did a Short Thoughts on it before, but never made it a full post, so let’s just dive right into my review of How to Train your Dragon: The Hidden World.
My first thought is this: this is a good movie. Much better than the second. I do still doubt whether or not it’s as great as the first, but it’s at least coming closer to being on the same level.
Why don’t I like the second movie that much? Don’t get me wrong, I still think it’s decent, but I have my reasons. But I did a Movie Thoughts on that film that should explain it. For now, if you’re really interested, you can read my Movie Thoughts on that movie linked below.
Now, for The Hidden World, where do I begin? I guess the story is a good one. While maybe not the most original one, since I’ve watched the series, and those deal with dragon hunters 90% of the time, it’s still executed in a new manner. The Berkians haven’t permanently abandoned their home before, nor let all of their dragons go at once. It does have a much bigger impact than the quarrels with Viggo.
Speaking of Viggo…yeah, the villain. Okay, so one thing I absolutely cannot stand is the villain of the second movie, Drago. He’s just your bland bombastic evil guy and screams a lot but aside from that doesn’t come across as all that threatening. In this movie, we get Grimmel, an experienced dragon hunter who is supposedly responsible for killing all Night Furies but Toothless. I will say this, as a villain, Grimmel is an improvement over Drago. He’s the more calculating and subtle type, which is usually the kind of villain I think works better. However, I still think that the best villain in the How To Train Your Dragon franchise was actually Viggo, who appeared in Race to the Edge. He was nearly always one step ahead of Hiccup and his gang, and even more cunning. But I do know it’s not entirely fair to compare the two, since we got an entire series to dedicated to Viggo as a villain, while Grimmel just has one movie. But still, I’m a big Viggo fan. Don’t judge me.
The other characters were pretty nice. One of the downsides is that we now have a huge cast, since we have the characters from the first movie plus some of the new ones introduced in the sequel, as well as the new ones introduced in this one. But at least some of the side characters like Hiccup’s band end up all having a tiny subplot or at the very least something to do in this one, even if some of it is… questionable, like Snotlout trying to court Hiccup’s mother for whatever reason. Hiccup and Toothless probably go through the biggest arcs here, and they’re both executed rather well. I also like how Astrid and Hiccup’s relationship is in this one. Usually I’m not one for romance, but their relationship actually felt genuine here. We also get more of Eret, Valka and even Stoic through flashback, which is always good.
The animation is still awesome, even better than in the second. It’s just done so bloody well and I love it. The sand in the scene where Toothless and the Light Fury have their first “date” looks amazing enough on it’s own.
Speaking of being good-looking: the colors. One major issue I had with the second movie is the very bland and just all-round ugly color palettes they used throughout it. It was mostly just your general pale blue and light gray mix that didn’t even change all that much throughout the film. Poor choice of colors is definitely not present here. It looks stunning. The design of the Hidden World, especially.
The music is also very good, as is to be expected. I like the Hidden World theme the most, again.
If there is one flaw I could bring up here it is the thing everyone has talked about already: the Light Fury design:
It has grown on me a bit, but I still don’t like it. It just looks too soft, round and baby-like, for something that’s supposed to be related to supposedly the most dangerous dragon species out there. And apparently the reason they designed her this way was because they wanted her to look more feminine? You do know that so far none of the major female dragons had such a needlessly soft design, right? Meatlug is female. Stormfly is female. Windshear is female. Do they all look different? No, they don’t. So why this one has to look like “Feminine Love Interest Dragon” is beyond me.
The Light Fury also seems to have very little personality. Yes, she’s elusive and wild, but it doesn’t go much further than that. Toothless has a personality. He’s loyal and fiercely protective, but also with a dorkier side. He is intelligent and sometimes has an attitude. The Light Fury just feels very lacking in depth when she’s supposed to be the thing to finally separate Hiccup and Toothless, who have a bond of years and years. Just…not a fan of Love Interest Dragon.
What dragon designs I do love? The Deathgrippers, Grimmel’s dragons:
These are the most awesome dragons to come out of the How To Train Your Dragon franchise yet, aside from Night Furies, of course. They spit acid-fire, have retractable poisonous fangs, huge claws, scorpion like tails… They’re just bloody awesome. I would ride one into battle.
The Hidden World was an altogether awesome film with only minor issues at most. It’s a huge step forward after the second movie with amazing animation, a heartfelt arc for our main characters, beautiful colors and a great villain.
A really solid movie I definitely recommend for Dragon and animation fans alike. At the very least second in the series, maybe even on par with the original.
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