How To Train Your Dragon 2

To be fair, the books have done that as well. Toothless isn't a Basic Brown, he's a baby Giganticus Seadragonus Maximus (basically a baby Red Death).

edited 27th Jun '14 9:41:29 AM by Mort08

Every dragon has its secrets

Some facts should not be said

I'm still a bit disappointed that no one brought up the breast hat.

Though I disagree that Hiccup looks totally different from how he did in the first movie, there was a noticeable Art Shift in this movie in the way many of the characters were designed, even beyond the effects of getting older. I noticed it right away with Astrid, because things like her facial structure and the way her hair sits on her head looked very different, but it's noticeable with a lot of the characters - even the adults who were there in the previous film, and of course it's all there in the new characters as well. Things like eyes, faces, body proportions, etc.

I think it improves most of them, to be honest.

edited 27th Jun '14 1:23:15 PM by KnownUnknown

I think it has something to do with how they're animating the characters entirely differently than from the first movie. Their bodies are now referenced from motion-capture actors.

WHAT!? MOTION CAPTURE?

Dreamworks, Im Dissapoint.

No news sources I read made it clear if Dreamworks simply filmed mo-cap actors "for reference", or if they used mo-cap the normal way, ie, imposing the CGI models onto them. Judging by how many people on the Comments section of a Youtube preview clip complained about how Hiccup's head never stops moving, I'm inclined to believe the latter. But to my happy surprise, that clip showed the WORST-acted scene in the whole movie, while the rest of the acting was the usual great Dreamworks acting.

I saw this at the weekend, and I really enjoyed it. Apart from Cate Blanchett's accent, that is. I wouldn't have minded so much if it was just bad - it wandered across the country, so just ad I'd got used to the bad Glaswegian accent, it changed to a bad highland accent - and got lost at one point and crossed the Irish Sea. Presumably Stoic married from ouside the village.

Was there some sort of bet on in Hollywood? Maleficent was full of woeful accents for no good reason too, but there they were just another symptom of the overall horribleness of the film.

Why do vikings speak with Scottish accents anyway?

Hollywood is multi-ethnic. It has been since the early 20th Century- an influx of British and European workers took over the place and it actually helped the industry grow! Charlie Chaplin was British. So it continues into today, where Eastern-European accents and British accents are extremely popular in Hollywood.

If you don't mind changing the subject for a bit, I think Kit Harington ought to do more roles like Eret. I've heard mixed things about his previous work, but he was really good in this.

I liked the first half. I didn't like that the second half was the first half with the characters switched around.

Stoick before his beard exploded.

It's amazing how facial hair makes so much of a difference! He was a HUNK MUFFIN without his bread!

You meant "beard", right?

................... yeeeaaahhhhh...

... I DO LIKE how MANY guys look better without slices of bread.

Just saw the movie, I actually quite enjoyed it. I saw a few flaws like a lack of backstory for Drago beyond that quick scene and Valka's presence being downplayed after Stoick reunited with her.

Still I felt the film was on the same level or slightly better than the first. At least in my opinion

Though damn Stoick's death was punch to the gut. Yeah sure there was foreshadowing with Hiccup being pressured to become Chief but it was still cruel. Freaking Drago.

I've never tried my luck with women while holding a slice of bread, myself. So you're saying I shouldn't try it?

edited 3rd Jul '14 9:04:42 AM by DrDougsh

The vikings have Scottish accents presumably from Berk being based on some small island off the Scottish coast that the author spent her summers on during childhood.

I assumed Valka's bizarre, shifting accent was due to how long she'd spent isolated from other humans. It would fit with how feral her movements were in her introductory scenes. I loved the animation of her movement (and the animation overall was superb). She seemed to become more human in movement as she grew accustomed to other humans.

Was it just me, or is Drago basically evil Thorin Oakenshield? He looks a lot like the film version of Thorin from behind, and both want revenge on dragons for destroying their homes and families. Imagine if Thorin had the One Ring...

edited 12th Jul '14 9:50:00 PM by Yuanchosaan

I have to say, i'm still not liking Debois' idea to end the series with this "no more dragons" thing. I guess it's because, when all's said and done, the dragons are what made Hiccup who he is. [[His ability to train them and ride the rarest of them is what made Hiccup a leader, they brought him the chance to be "the pride of Berk", and it was them that finally brought Hiccup Stoick's respect and Astrid's love]]. Plus, Toothless and Hiccup's relationship, along with those of all the Vikings and dragons, seem too strong to end like that.

The third movie's not coming out for two more years. Let's just wait and see what they do.

Pretty much this. I read a post on Youtube that seemed to imply the movies are working on the law of Equivalent Exchange.

A leg for a life. A father for a mother A friend for a family (the theory for the third movie)

I don't know about that but we'll see. Regardless I LOVED this movie and it's one of the only ones in recent years I've seen in a theatre twice and would probably see one more time given the opportunity. I loved pretty much everything about this flick. Side note, I would LOVE for that song that Stoick sings to Valka, "For the Dancing and the Dreaming" to come back as a reprise or something with Hiccup and Astrid.

There's a whole big discussion as to why the vikings in How To Train Your Dragon have Scottish accents in the film's trope page.

So there is. Are the series officially set on the Scottish Hebrides, though, or is that just a fanon explanation? I always just figured they used Scottish accents because it's the most geographically approximate English dialect, and thus felt more right than American accents (kind of like Tintin speaking with an English accent in his movie).

Also, is there actually a single, unified accent that an English-speaking audience can readily identify as a "viking accent"? I ask because accents from different Scandinavian languages are pretty different anyway (Icelandic and Faroese accents in particular sound nothing like Danish, Norwegian or Swedish ones).