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The friendship of a lifetime. |
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How to Train Your Dragon: The Hidden World (also called How to Train Your Dragon 3: The Hidden World or simply known as How to Train Your Dragon 3) is a 2019 American computer-animated action fantasy film loosely based on the book series of the same name by Cressida Cowell, produced by DreamWorks
Animation and distributed by Universal Pictures. It is the sequel to How to Train Your Dragon 2 (2014) and the third and final installment in the How to Train Your Dragon film trilogy. Written and directed
by Dean DeBlois, the film stars the voices of Jay Baruchel, America Ferrera, Cate Blanchett, Craig Ferguson, and F. Murray Abraham. How to Train Your Dragon: The Hidden World was released on January 3, 2019, in Australia, and on February 22 in the United States. The film marks the first DreamWorks Animation film to be distributed by Universal Pictures, two years after parent company NBCUniversal acquired DreamWorks Animation in 2016.
Plot
All seems well on the island of Berk as Vikings and dragons live together in peace and harmony. Now a Viking leader, Hiccup finds himself increasingly attracted to Astrid, while his beloved dragon Toothless meets an enchanting creature who captures his eye. When the evil Grimmel launches a devious plan to wipe out all the dragons, Hiccup must unite both clans to find Caldera, a hidden land that holds the key to saving Toothless and his flying friends.
Why the Hidden World Is There
- The animation has improved on the other two films, once again, it is gorgeous again to look at with how colorful it is. The sequence at the titular Hidden World, in particular, looks essentially like a design student's orgasm come to life.
- Hiccup going through his trials as chief, not having everything figured out was engaging to watch.
- The scene where Toothless tries to impress the Light Fury was hilarious that it inspired the internet meme. Another hilarious scene when Ruffnutt annoys the hell out of Grimmel to the point of Grimmel letting her go out of complete annoyance.
- Hiccup and Toothless are still lovable protagonist with even more characters development than ever.
- A lot of emotion to the story. The standout being the ending, with some small details you won't notice that make it better, as explained below.
- The score is beautiful by John Powell.
- The flashbacks with toddler Hiccup and Stoick were emotional. And it is refreshing that the film only showed us Stoick has died and not mention that he died during the events of the second film except for some line from Grimmel, which is also more of an indirect mention, to make the audience pick up that Stoick has indeed died.
- It fleshes out Gobber's sexuality a bit more.
- The New Dragons are creative.
- Toothless has an arc on his own this time.
- Toothless's new ability to cloak and summon lightning is epic.
- The ending was extremely emotionally satisfying where Hiccup and Astrid have their marriage and have 2 kids.
- Drago's Bewilderbeast appears again, where he redeems himself.
- While he isn't that fleshed out, Grimmel is actually scary sometimes, arguably the scariest villain in the franchise. Plus, it is fitting the trilogy's final villain is what Hiccup could've been if he killed Toothless back in the first film. Grimmel is also the reason why there is no information on Night Furies in the Book of Dragons.
Bad Qualities
- Just like the first 2 films, some of the side characters are either sidelined or just there to crack jokes.
- Grimmel isn't a fleshed out villain. His motivations might work on paper, but they're not executed well. Plus, it seems lazy to say all other Night Furies are killed, and other than we never saw one, there is no onscreen evidence to prove it and make us view
him as a legitimate threat that fits ending the trilogy than the other villains in the franchise.
- He also caused a continuity error stating that Night Furies cannot survive in cold areas or fly for long distance without resting, even though Toothless survived in cold places like Berk and other places in the DreamWorks Dragons tv series. He also was able to fly for a long time despite being tired.
- A few things in the plot and pacing felt a little bit glossed over and can distract some people.
- Despite the Hidden World being the main focus, it doesn't get shown a lot in the movie.
Reception
Like its two previous films, How to Train Your Dragon: The Hidden World received critical acclaim for its animation, voice acting, musical score, and emotional weight of the conclusion. On review aggregation website Rotten Tomatoes, the film holds an approval rating of 90% based on 263 reviews, and an average rating of 7.27/10. The website's critical consensus reads, "The rare trilogy capper that really works, How to Train Your Dragon: The Hidden World brings its saga to a visually dazzling and emotionally affecting conclusion.". On Metacritic, the film has a weighted average score of 71 out of 100, based on 42 critics, indicating "generally favorable reviews". Audiences polled by CinemaScore gave the film an average grade of "A" on an A+ to F scale (the same score earned by the first two films), while those at PostTrak gave it a 90% positive score and a 77% "definite recommend."
Videos
Trivia
- Dean DeBlois revealed that T.J. Miller did initially return to voice Tuffnut, but DreamWorks recast him after the actor's sexual assault allegations and arrest for calling in a fake bomb threat.
- Several release date were planned before it delayed to the current date:
- In September 2012, 20th Century Fox, DreamWorks Animation's then-distributor partner, and the studio itself announced the film was originally going to be released on June 17, 2016.
- In September 2014, the film's release date was pushed back a year from its original release date of June 17, 2016 to June 9, 2017. DeBlois explained the release date shifts as such: "It's just that these movies take three years. I think it was a little ambitious to say 2016... As is normally the case, they kind of throw darts out into the future and wherever they land they call that a release date until we start talking about it in practical terms, and then it's like, 'Uh yeah that's not enough time'. So knowing that they take three years from this moment, from outlining and writing the screenplay through to the final lighting of it, it's just a process of building models and doing tests and animating, storyboarding, the whole thing just adds up to about three years."
- In January 2015, the release date was pushed back a year from June 9, 2017 to June 29, 2018 following DreamWorks Animation's corporate restructuring and lay-offs meant to maximize the company's "creative talent and resources, reduce costs, and drive profitability."
- On June 18, 2016, the release date was moved up from June 29, 2018 to May 18, 2018, taking the release date of the Warner Animation Group's The Lego Movie 2: The Second Part (who delayed to February 8, 2019).
- On December 5, 2016, the US release date was pushed back from May 18, 2018 to March 1, 2019.
- The release date was moved up for a final time from March 1, 2019 to February 22, 2019, taking the slot of The Turning, a live-action DreamWorks film which in turn was pushed back to January 24, 2020.
- Unlike the first two films of the trilogy, The Hidden World does not have a tie-in game based on its plot. Instead, there are two games set before the events of the film, which are the top-down action adventure game DreamWorks Dragons: Dawn of New Riders available on consoles and personal computers (Nintendo Switch, PlayStation 4, Xbox One and Microsoft Windows) and the match-3 game Dragons: Titan Uprising for mobile devices (iOS and Android).
- This was the first film to use the current DreamWorks Animation logo. In fact, this is the first DreamWorks Animation film to feature DreamWorks logo with "A Comcast Company".
- Speaking of which, this is the first DreamWorks Animation movie to be owned by Universal Pictures.
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