Movie Review: How to Train Your Dragon 2

How to Train Your Dragon 2
20th Century Fox, DreamWorks Animation, Mad Hatter Entertainment, USA, 2014. 

Some years after the events in the first movie the vikings of the Berk Village live together with the dragons. The collaboration has made new extreme sports possible such as Harry Potter's Quidditch-style sheep-ball game. Hiccup and his dragon Toothless are more fans of individual sports so they go skydiving. They are searching for new lands and new dragon species. Hiccup's father Stoick the Vast wants to make him the new chief but Hiccup doubts if he will be up to the task. 

Hiccup and Toothless

Astrid and Hiccup drawing a map

Stoick wants to make Hiccup the new chief

Hiccup and his girlfriend Astrid bump into Eret's dragon hunters. They are catching dragons for a man named Drago Bludvist. Drago is building an army of dragon riders and planning to conqueri the world. Stoick fears Drago for he is a ruthless madman. Hiccup wants to negotiate with Drago to stop the war. 

Drago

Mysterious dragon rider is rescuing captured dragons and causes nuisance to Drago. Hiccup gets a great surprise when the identity of the dragon rescuer is revealed. Hiccup must get the vikings and the dragon rescuer to co-operate so that they can save Berk and the dragons. 

Dragon sanctuary

Valka and Hiccup

Alpha dragon

The animation looks great. The sceneries and flight scenes are beautifully rendered. The dragons are cute and act like big kittens or puppies. The story has both funny and emotional scenes when secrets from Hiccup's childhood are revealed. Friends of Hiccup offer the comic relief, there are goofy twins Ruffnut (girl) and Tuffnut (boy), chubby dragon card collector Fishlegs, and chivalric Snotlout. There is a slight Star Wars feeling, Hiccup's flame sword is like a light sabre, the battle in the middle part looks like "Empire Strikes Back" and there is a kind of "Luke, I'm your father" moment.

The story is darker than the first movie, and the characters are grown up from the first movie. There is also viking funeral. The first movie was nice but this part takes the franchise to more interesting path. It is a story about Hiccup becoming a viking leader protecting peace but defending his village if necessary. Hiccup is pressurized by his parents' expectations but in the end he must find his own path. There is also a message of protecting animals.The minuses are that after the exciting, emotional and funny first half the finale is quite predictable routine work. The ending also leaves some plot holes (that maybe are answered in the "How to Train Your Dragon 3"). As some of Hiccup's friends are trying to grow a beard, I wonder if Hiccup will look like Commander Riker in the next movie.

Rating: Very good 

Voice actors: Jay Baruchel, Cate Blanchett, Gerard Butler, Craig Ferguson, America Ferrera, Jonah Hill, Christopher Mintz-Plasse, T.J. Miller, Kristen Wiig, Djimon Hounsou, Kit Harington, Kieron Elliott, Philip McGrade, Andrew Ableson, Gideon Emery, Simon Kassianides, Randy Thom 

Director: Dean DeBlois