How to Train Your Dragon (2010) - 365 Movie Challenge Day 334

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Day 334 of the challenge! Took me long enough to get to the How to Train Your Dragon series!

Try to understand your “enemies”, and you might find you have more in common than you thought. That’s basically the moral at the core of the first How to Train Your Dragon, and it’s a message that seems more important today than ever. It’s a beautifully animated and acted film that’s dripping with heart, despite sticking to the usual animated feature formula more than I would have liked. But despite being as fun as it is, I can’t help but feel it starts falling apart a bit near the end.

Like mentioned above, How to Train Your Dragon has a great message at it’s core, but it’s a theme that seems at odds with itself a few times as the movie progresses.

SPOILERS FOLLOW

Hiccup (I see what you did there with that name btw) chooses not to kill dragons, wins their trust, and ultimately helps unite both the vikings and dragons to…kill an even bigger and nastier dragon? Dramatic and satisfying for an epic final showdown for sure, but a bit confusing to me thematically. Kind of seems to go against the whole point of Hiccup’s character arc…but anyway…

Regardless of it’s small shortcomings, How to Train Your Dragon was a wonderful blast from beginning to end, and I can’t wait to see the next one.