How to Train your Dragon Just Embarassed Disney

How to Train Your Dragon (2025) Review

Would DreamWorks and Universal please take a bow for How to Train Your Dragon? Not only did they manage to do the original film justice, they managed to utterly embarrass Disney in the process. The House of Mouse is going to be smarting from this for a while!

As a teenager, I never saw the original How to Train Your Dragon in theaters. I would see bits and pieces of it and its sequels, spin-offs, and specials over the years, though, so it’s safe to say I’m a casual fan. However, when I heard that DreamWorks and Universal were doing a live-action remake, I couldn’t help but roll my eyes. I was never on board with these remakes to begin with, and years of hits and misses by Disney haven’t helped matters. It doesn’t matter if they have nostalgia bait or try to add something new to the story. At the end of the day, if people dont think that a remake measures up to the original, then what was the point of making it? If the recent failure of Disney’s Snow White is anything to go by, more and more people are starting to realize this. That movie is so bad, it usurped Dragonball Evolution as the worst-rated movie on IMDb.

So, with people turning on live-action remakes, how does the one for How to Train Your Dragon prove itself? How does it justify its reason for existing? The short answer: it doesn’t…because it knows it doesn’t need to.

How to Train Your Dragon had nothing to prove…

Loosely based on a book series of the same name, How to Train Your Dragon could be considered a timeless animated film. It centered around Hiccup, a scrawny outcast in a village of brawny Vikings who spend their time fighting dragons. In a society of jocks, he’s the lone nerd who wants to win everyone’s respect. Yet when he gets the chance to kill a dragon no one’s gotten close to, he realizes he can’t do it! That act of kindness leads Hiccup to discover that everything his people thought they knew about dragons was wrong, leading to a great change in how they view the world.

The reason why How to Train Your Dragon could be considered a timeless film is because, at its core, its a coming of age story. Hiccup is an awkward teen outcast who can’t fit into his people’s norms even when he tries. When you’re a teen trying to find your place in the world, that can be the scariest thing. It’s only when he chooses to accept himself for who he is and quits trying to be something he isn’t that he becomes the badass he was meant to be. It’s a well-written, well-executed story!

So if it ain’t broke, dont fix it.

…And DreamWorks and Universal knew that.

Someone at DreamWorks or Universal must have been taking notes on everything that Disney was doing wrong, because they avoided the Mouse’s pitfalls. It didn’t try to add any overly preachy, woke messages like Snow White. It used CGI only when necessary for the dragons. And best of all, the characters and their motivations more or less remained the same. While they did tone down Hiccup’s sarcasm to play up his angst and insecurity, it never reached insufferable levels. If anything, Mason Thames’ earnest performance endears him to me all the more. Everyone seemed to bring their A-game.

It also helped that the director of the original film came back for the remake. That meant that they knew what they were doing.

Remaking a film can often be like walking on a tightrope. You have to balance between being faithful to the original and trying to improve on it. How to Train Your Dragon, though, didn’t need to change much. It already knew that it had a winning story that people would love. It knew it had nothing to prove, and that allowed it to soar to new heights. It’s likely the first big hit of the summer, and I might end up seeing it a second time.

As for Disney, maybe getting embarrassed by their rivals will be the wake-up call they need. We dont want another Snow White incident!

I Give “How to Train Your Dragon” a 4.5/5