Don’t believe that Disney is the only studio producing live-action versions of great, iconic animated movies. How to Train Your Dragon, a recreation of the 2010 movie of the same name, is DreamWorks’ entry into the market. Perhaps it should come as no surprise that DreamWorks Animation is making another attempt to retell the fantasy coming-of-age story in a new medium. How to Train Your Dragon and the two sequels it inspired are among the most adored films the studio has ever produced, both by critics and fans. Here is all the information we currently know about How to Train Your Dragon before the film opens in theatres next summer.
The live-action adaptation is being directed by Dean DeBlois, who co-directed the first animated movie with Chris Sanders and directed the two follow-ups, How to Train Your Dragon 2 and How to Train Your Dragon: The Hidden World, alone. DeBlois is a seasoned animator who has worked on films like The Lion King and Atlantis: The Lost Empire, co-directed Lilo & Stitch (which, incidentally, will also get a live-action remake next year), and executive produced the most recent DreamWorks Animation blockbuster, The Wild Robot. He has little live-action experience, though, with the exception of a few concert documentaries he produced with the Icelandic band Sigur Rós. That isn’t always an issue; in fact, it might be preferable to have someone who is so conversant with the original material rather than a live-action veteran who isn’t familiar with How to Train Your Dragon.
In an interview with Collider, Nick Frost, one of the performers in the upcoming movie, praised DeBlois and acknowledged that the movie “couldn’t be done without him.”
“He’s just f–king beautiful.” He’s smart, hilarious, and clever, and you simply think, “Okay, he got it.” “Calm down,” Frost said. “Don’t stress over it. Simply practise your lines and enjoy yourself. Knowing that someone has you is such a comfort.
The animation movie’s composer, John Powell, is back to compose the music for the live-action version.
The original How to Train Your Dragon featured a rather remarkable voice cast, including Gerard Butler, Jay Baruchel, Craig Ferguson, America Ferrera, Jonah Hill, Christopher Mintz-Plasse, T.J. Miller, and Kristen Wiig, as is frequently the case with a DreamWorks Animation film. Only Gerard Butler, who plays Stoick the Vast, the chieftain of the island of Berk, is returning to the role. The 300 and Plane star said in an interview with Collider that playing Stoick in live action required him to wear a 90-pound outfit and brave frigid temperatures, which is very different than entering a recording booth.
Mason Thames, who most recently starred as Hiccup in Scott Derrickson’s horror film The Black Phone, puts himself in the dragon’s saddle. In the animated films, Baruchel provided the voice of Hiccup, Stoick’s pacifist son who befriends a dragon after refusing to kill it. Astrid, another young warrior in Berk and Hiccup’s ultimate love interest, is portrayed by Nico Parker, Thandiwe Newton’s daughter who starred in Dumbo and HBO’s The Last of Us; Ferrera provided the voice of the character in the original. Gobber the Belch, the village blacksmith who assists Hiccup and the other young people in becoming dragon slayers, is portrayed by the previously mentioned Nick Frost. In the original, Ferguson provided Gobber’s voice.
The other villagers are played by a bunch of young performers. Bronwyn James and Harry Trevaldwyn portray the twins Ruffnut and Tuffnut, respectively (Wiig and Miller voiced them in the animated film); Gabriel Howell portrays Hiccup’s adversary Snotlout (originally voiced by Hill); and Julian Dennison, star of Hunt for the Wilderpeople and Deadpool 2, plays Hiccup’s best friend Fishlegs (originally voiced by Mintz-Plasse). Another villager, Phlegma, is portrayed by Ruth Codd, a TikTokker turned actress who has appeared in the Netflix thriller series The Midnight Club and The Fall of the House of Usher.
A number of sequences, such as Hiccup’s initial encounter with the dragon, Toothless, seem to have been meticulously reenacted for the live-action version of the movie, which is expected to follow the original’s plot.
The British novelist Cressida Cowell’s children’s books serve as the basis for the films, and How to Train Your Dragon notably adapts the plot of the 2003 debut novel in the series of the same name. How to Train Your Dragon centres around Hiccup Horrendous Haddock III, the clumsy son of the Berk chief, and is set in a mythical world inspired by the Viking age. With the exception of little Hiccup, the inhabitants of Berk take great pleasure in becoming dragon-slaying warriors and believe that dragons are dangerous. Hiccup traps a Night Fury, a very uncommon kind of dragon, in an attempt to prove himself by catching one. He couldn’t bring himself to kill it, so he makes friends with the dragon, naming it Toothless. Their relationship has the potential to change Berk’s perception of dragons, if he can discover out how to train Toothless first.
The plot was carried on by the animated follow-ups, How to Train Your Dragon 2 and How to Train Your Dragon: The Hidden World, which collectively constitute one of the greatest trilogies of the last two decades. It is logical to suppose that the sequels may also receive the live-action remake treatment if the live-action version of How to Train Your Dragon proves to be successful.
It is evident that the March 14, 2024, release date for the live-action How to Train Your Dragon was not met. The production was supposed to start in June 2023, but the Writers Guild of America and SAG-AFTRA strikes caused a one-year delay. The majority of the filming was done in Belfast, Northern Ireland. After filming concluded in May 2024, the film is scheduled to be released on June 13, 2025.
On Tuesday, November 19, the first trailer for the live-action How to Train Your Dragon was unveiled. Instead of giving away too much, the teaser trailer introduces viewers to Thames’ Hiccup and Butler’s live-action Stoick the Vast. Stoick is a big, tough dragon-slayer; his son doesn’t think he has it in him. But the trailer ends with Hiccup capturing and beginning to befriend Toothless — who looks rather faithful to the animated version of the cat-like black dragon.
This “live-action” Toothless is, of course, created entirely by computers, just as he was in the computer-animated How to Train your Dragon, but this version attempts a somewhat higher level of realism compared to the stylized cartoon nature of the original. It’s an intriguing first look at how the movie will try to get beyond the fundamental challenge that all live-action remakes encounter, which is how to bring a cartoon’s energy to life without having it seem lifeless. When How to Train Your Dragon is released the following summer, we will be able to tell if it succeeds.