Movie Review - How to Train Your Dragon: The Hidden World
MegaSoulhero I’ve been feeling very depressed lately. I won’t say why, but it involves a cop yelling at me on the freeway at the top of his lungs. I don’t think I’ll ever get over that. I feel very guilty. But at least I got to see How to Train Your Dragon 3. Did it cheer me up? No. No it didn’t. But to be fair, I don’t think anything will. I kind of envy Stoick at this point. With that being said, this is still an amazing movie.So there’s this villain guy who wants to capture Toothless since he’s the only Night Fury he hasn’t killed. So Hiccup comes up with a plan to move to a different location to protect the dragons. On this adventure, Toothless meets a female dragon, known as a Light Fury, and tries to get her to like him. Just like the previous two movies, this has a lot of heart and emotion to it. The relationship between Hiccup and Toothless is still very believable. Their relationship plays a bigger role in this film which would make certain moments feel more impactful. And then there are also the scenes with Toothless and the Light Fury. One of my favorite scenes in the movie is Toothless trying to impress her. That scene doesn’t have dialogue, but it’s great seeing Toothless interact with a dragon that’s similar to him. Each character is given something to do in some sort of way. Although, some characters have less of an importance than others. Hiccup’s mother is back and is still as awesome as ever. Stoick also appears in the film, but obviously in flashbacks. Those scenes are very heartfelt. The movie also develops the relationship between Hiccup and Astrid. I won’t state any spoilers, but what they do with them is very cute. Also, the animation is just brilliant. Especially during the flying scenes. There’s also this one scene with Toothless and the Light Fury flying together and it just looks beautiful.
Unfortunately, I do have some issues with the film. Mainly with the villain. While he looks menacing and looks like a threat, he has absolutely no motivation. No reason for why he’s doing what he’s doing. This just kinda makes him boring and generic. This is sad because I thought the villain in the second movie had more of impact. The one in this movie is just very underwhelming. However, he’s not the worst character in the movie. That would be Ruffnut. I absolutely despised her in the previous movies and I still feel the same way about her here. They actually managed to make her even more annoying here. There’s an entire scene involving her that got on my nerves. It wasn’t funny at all. It also reminded me of a SpongeBob episode. Why am I bringing up SpongeBob? It just makes me even more depressed considering the Super Bowl disaster. Anyway, her twin brother is also kinda annoying in this one as well. Plus, the new voice actor sounds absolutely nothing like T.J. Miller. There’s also a running gag where one of the characters has a crush on Hiccup’s mother and it’s so dumb. Also, despite the movie having “Hidden World” in the title, we only see the Hidden World for 2 minutes. It’s just in one little scene and they don’t show us much of what’s in it. It looked like a beautiful place, though. I also found the ending to be very predictable. However, I’m one of those people who doesn’t mind predictability as long as the execution is good. In this case, it is. It’s the kind of ending that is enough to make someone cry. Depending on how you felt about the other two movies. But yeah, it’s a pretty emotional scene.
Clearly, this is a step backward from the second one, but it is still a great movie. Really captures the heart and intensity of the previous films. There are some flaws, but they’re not very big flaws. I’m surprised that I watched Lego Movie 2 in a sold out theater and then the theater I watched Hidden World in had tons of seats still available. Anyway, I’m still feeling a bit depressed, but I’ll probably get over it eventually. Maybe reviewing Happy Death Day 2U next week will make me feel better. I doubt it. That movie looks bad.
Score: 9/10