How to Train Your Dragon (2025) Review
"Toothless is still Toothless in all his temperamental cat-bat-salamander glory." - Sam Sewell-Peterson
How to Train Your Dragon (2025) Review
Director: Dean DeBlois
Screenwriter: Dean DeBlois, Cressida Cowell (based on the novel by)
Starring: Mason Thames, Nico Parker, Gerard Butler, Nick Frost, Julian Dennison, Bronwyn James, Harry Trevaldwyn, Gabriel Howell, Peter Serafinowicz
by Sam Sewell-Peterson
When’s a remake not a remake? When it’s more of a remix. Okay, look, the 2025 live-action How to Train Your Dragon is more-or-less exactly the same movie as its predecessor from DreamWorks Animation. The set-pieces, soundtrack, large swaths of the dialogue and the biggest character moments are all pretty much identical. So why does it still win you over much more than, say, the 2019 Lion King?
The coastal settlement of Berk is locked in a war with dragons, the flying reptiles raiding their village for food and the humans trapping or killing every creature they can until the day teenage inventor and disappointing Viking Hiccup (Mason Thames) brings down an illusive Night Fury. Naming him Toothless and forming an unlikely bond, Hiccup must convince his fellow dragon trainees and wider Berkian society, especially his imposing dad Chief Stoick the Vast (Gerard Butler) that everything they know about dragons is wrong and that their future depends on understanding and working with these legendary animals.
We open with lavish, shot-for-shot re-do of the original animation’s opening scene, dragons assaulting Berk at night and its residents frantically putting out fires and attempting to hit the big scaly buggers really hard, complete with the exact same Hiccup voiceover that wryly introduces audiences to how this world works: “This is Berk… my village. In a word? Sturdy. The only problems are the pests.”
The key here is whatever worked in animation, all the moments of wonder and emotion, particularly all the stuff around Hiccup and Toothless getting to know and trust each other, still play like gangbusters in a more realistically-rendered world. The dragons, given more of a zoological basis, all look fantastic, like eldritch dinosaurs with severe attitude problems and the level of craft on show in creating a Viking village precariously perched on the stunning coastline of Northern Ireland is admirable.
Whereas The Lion King was fighting a losing battle in trying to make photorealistic animals emote like their anthropomorphised cartoon counterparts, the dragons were always animals that we related to on the level of a pet, so despite being a bit larger and more lithe, Toothless is still Toothless in all his temperamental cat-bat-salamander glory. Thankfully they knew his design required little alteration for fear of losing the essential nature of one of the most ingeniously designed kids movie characters of all time.
Another reason for this film’s relative success is the human element. Gerard Butler (reprising his role from the animation) and Nick Frost replacing Craig Ferguson as blacksmith/trainer Gobber are both good, if not exactly stretched as the adult contingent, but the young cast are all ridiculously talented, and their characters have been changed in small but interesting ways in the remake. Mason Thames was born to embody Hiccup’s combination of self-doubt and grit in live action. Astrid (Nico Parker) has had to drag herself from the gutter and has ambitions to rule, Snotlout (a scene-stealing, hilarious Gabriel Howell) has daddy issues with the gruff Spitelout (Peter Serafinowicz provoking laughs with a handful of lines), twins Ruffnut and Tuffnut (no longer identical: Bronwyn James and Harry Trevaldwyn) have been aged up, explained by them being “held back” after repeatedly failing dragon training and Fishlegs (Julian Dennison) still memorises D&D-style dragon stats but seems more desperate to fit in and make friends for the first time.
Regarding the soundtrack, why would you mess with perfection? John Powell re-arranges his soaring Celtic folk-inspired score for the extended scenes, but otherwise alters it little, matching the glorious spectacle of blockbuster director of photography extraordinaire Bill Pope’s (The Matrix) cinematography perfectly, particularly in the alternately magical and kinetic flying scenes.
Perhaps with an eye on the sequel (provisionally confirmed for 2027) several plot threads that came in later in the animated series have been set up earlier here; name-dropping Hiccup’s departed mother and talking about dragon “alphas” who have a supernatural control over the rest of their species will both be key in the next chapter of this particular story.
We really didn’t need Stoick’s line of dialogue which explains why the vikings are more ethnically diverse this time (giving under-represented actors in fantasy movies jobs should be enough), and some of the character exchanges that re-iterate the big emotions they’re feeling in the moment play much more like a soap opera when delivered by real people on camera.
The new How to Train Your Dragon clearly demonstrates returning writer-director Dean DeBlois is still passionately wed to this fantasy world and its beloved characters. He hasn’t had to change much to bring the animated HTTYD universe to live-action and have it remain compelling, but fans of the wider series can certainly hope for more daring and invention in the future of this series. The pure, unbreakable, timeless relationship between a boy and his dragon is still the beating heart of all this, and seeing it retold will continue to bring new fans in with tears in their eyes for years to come. Maybe just get your kids to watch both versions so they can decide which they prefer.
6.5/10
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