"How to Train Your Dragon 2" (2014)

DreamWorks Animation’s track record has always been spotty at best. For every Shrek, there’s an Over the Hedge or Shark Tale that makes the studio feel indifferent and mercenary in their efforts. One of the studio’s most surprising efforts, one that was both a critical and commercial success, was How to Train Your Dragon a clever and colorful hero’s journey based on Cressida Cowell’s book series of the same name. How to Train Your Dragon left off in a place that didn’t seem to necessitate a sequel, but the dictates of the current film climate have led to this second film.

While its pleasures are less abundant than its predecessor, How to Train Your Dragon 2, like other questionable but still fun animated sequels like last year’s Despicable Me 2 and Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs 2, is still a dependable piece of family entertainment that even occasionally manages more mature stories and themes. It's unmistakably a cash-grab but it admirably attempts to be a dark companion piece to the first film -- even if it isn't wholly successful in its efforts.

The film picks up five years after the first film. (The film’s five year jump almost feels unnecessary. It allows for the establishment of a new status quo, but it also causes all the formerly fifteen year olds who drove the first film’s narrative to be in their early twenties. The film’s treatment of these characters and their emotional inner states too often makes them feel like they’re that of adolescents, not individuals on the cusp of adulthood -- Side rant over!).

Dragons have firmly been established as harmoniously part of the formerly anti-dragon town of Berk. The characters inhabiting this world are a strange but joyous blend of Nordic Vikings and Scottish highlanders (think Brave). They live in medieval thatched-roof cottages perched upon rocky mountainsides that look like islands floating in a sea of mist and accentuate the need for flying creatures to maneuver anywhere. 

With outside threats non-existent since Berk learned to tame (or, more appropriately, train) the dragons, the pressing concern turns to the village’s chief Stoick the Vast (Gerard Butler) insistent on his son Hiccup (Jay Baruchel) preparing to take over as the town’s leader. Hiccup is sensitive and pensive, and he stands in stark contrast to the more rowdy and boisterous members of his community. Hiccup doesn’t believe he’s well-suited for the position. 

It’s easy to guess where this is going; Hiccup is ready, even if he doesn’t realize it yet, and will learn through a new adventure to accept the responsibility and recognize his qualifications for the job. 

Writer-director Dean DeBlois, who directed the last installment, has two significant developments play out to expand the film’s universe and to deepen the emotional stakes. The first comes in the form of a Big Bad who goes by the name of Drago Bludvist (Djimon Hounsou). Drago is a shadowy figure who is sending out soldiers, including hunky leader Eret (Kit Harrington), to trap dragons to become part of his dragon army. Stoick tells of tales of Drago’s destructive wrath, but Hiccup, despite his father’s wishes pursues Drago in hopes of negotiating peace. Drago’s not an especially memorable villain and his motivations are pretty blasé, so much so that at one point in the film Hiccup self-awarely notes how uninteresting and empty Drago’s plans are. 

In his journey, Hiccup accidentally stumbles upon his long-lost mother Valka (Cate Blanchett). In the twenty intervening years, Valka has taken it upon herself like an environmental enthusiast and preservationist (resembling something of a Jane Goodall, except with dragons not apes) to save and protect dragons, creating a sanctuary safe from both the formerly violent Berk and Drago. It’s a nice little way to tie together the two different films without overreaching, and, with the help of Blanchett’s performance, the film creates some really emotionally resonant scenes between Hiccup and Valka, and Valka and Stoick.  

For a time, the film appears to be moving towards an Empire Strikes Back-like second film narrative positioning. The film has the potential to leave the film in a very murky, complicated and devastating place, but it backs away in favor of a more pleasant, sun-shiny one. This isn’t completely detrimental to the film’s story, but it does leave one wondering just where and how DeBlois and Dreamworks intend to take this story forward in the pending third film. 

The film retains the vibrant animation of the original. A more sizable budget and ambitions only allows for more wonderful displays of spectacle and world-building. In one scene Hiccup enters a stone and grass atrium flowing with countless varieties and colors of dragons, some we’ve never seen before, flying in a spiral like a kaleidoscopic tornado. Moments like these are so exuberant and carefree and they demonstrate the series playful penchant. The film also still retains the humor of the first in Hiccup’s friends (America Ferrera, Jonah Hill, Christopher Mintz-Plasse T.J. Miller and Kristen Wiig) and his uncle Gobber the Belch (Craig Ferguson). 

Despite whatever may have been lost in the process of cashing in on the first’s success, How to Train Your Dragon 2 is charming and entertaining. It lacks the snap of the first film, that sense of unrestrained discovery, but once you’ve trained a dragon, isn’t it safe to say that it’s likely the high point of your existence. 

Grade: B