#httyd2spoiler

[kingofthewilderwest]

Maybe this is where Hiccup got the idea for Stoick's statue.

[kingofthewilderwest]

You Know You Are in the HTTYD Fandom When...

Let's get a list going!  I'll start with just a few... NOW ADD!

1. You swear with Norse gods.

2. Literally anything can be turned into a Stoick the Past joke.

[kingofthewilderwest]

Which one did you like more? HTTYD 1 or 2? And which one of the books is your favorite?

Oh my Odin… you’re forcing me to make decisions?  I can’t even decide what restaurant to eat out at when a friend provides me a choice of two!  The more menial the decision, the more I belabor over an answer…

BUT HTTYD IS ONE OF THE MOST IMPORTANT THINGS EVER SO LET’S ANSWER THIS!

In short, I would say my favorite movie is the second, and my favorite book is the eleventh.  And these two glorious babies share one important characteristic in common: emotional impact.  In fact, they particularly show emotional pain the main character has to endure almost down to the breaking point.

I. love. having. those. feels.  I love gasping in shock at the movie theatre or swearing up a storm at the pages in a book.  I love the drama, I love the pain, I love the plot twists, I love the tears.  And HTTYD 2 and “How to Betray a Dragon’s Hero” are the two in each of the respective HTTYD ‘verses that fulfilled these elements the most impactingly.

There indeed is something incredible about the drama in ”How to Betray a Dragon’s Hero.”  An apocalyptic war burned to the ground by raging dragons.  Fishlegs finally losing it and standing up and punching THE HOOLIGAN CHIEF Snotlout because he is fed up with all the bullying of so many years.  The betrayal.  Torture.  Dramatic escapes.  Sword duel between the cousins. 

And, most importantly, Snotlout’s death.

Cressida Cowell took a character I did not even like, someone who had been an obnoxious jerk for ten and a half books, and made me cry.  You shouldn’t be able to do that.  Especially since I even knew the spoiler beforehand.  But Cressida Cowell mastered a story in which we saw Snotlout’s backstory and WHY he hated Hiccup so much so that he became a sympathetic character, saw him repent and change, and saw him incredibly, very heroically, sacrifice himself for Hiccup.  If you can write something that powerful and make someone like me who rarely cries reading stories leak tears watching one of Hiccup’s enemies die… you have done something glorious.  For if you don’t have feels reading over Hiccup’s concluding remarks about Snotlout at the end of that book, you are an android without an emotion chip.

The second movie does a similar beautiful number on me.  The first movie, yes, definitely contains sad aspects, but even a few minutes after Hiccup loses his leg, he’s still able to smile at the good changes occurring on Berk.  The story moves roughly from a depressed Hiccup to a happy Hiccup.  HTTYD 2 does the absolute opposite, as I’ve described long-windedly elsewhere – Hiccup goes from smiling and happy to burdened, sad, and… hrm hrm hrm… more stoic.  He loses much more than a leg here.  Writing a story where we see a young man sob over his father’s corpse, then have him say lots of touching words in the subsequent funeral, hits me right where I want to be hit.  Give me all the sad feels.

For sad feels, more than anything else, shows that an author did something right.  That they made you care about the characters.  And that the characters are changing in interesting ways as a result of the pain.

The parallels between books 9-11 and HTTYD 2 only ferment my choice for HTTYD 2, though admittedly this is REALLY hard for me to make because I love everything so much.  It’s a really close call especially between the two DreamWorks movies.  My answer very well might change, since I’ve only seen HTTYD 2 four times and I do not have a long-standing test of time judgment of it. 

If people asked me to compare the quality of music, CGI, story writing, plot arcs, character portrayal and development, literary quality, and the like, I might give different answers.  Merely talking about my emotional appeal and making decisions of personal favorites is more than hard enough because everything is so good.  But, simply talking about my personal appeal to these stories, I know that I greatly enjoy these two installments best respectively between the book!verse and DreamWorks!verse.  For me my choices rest on the emotional power within the story.

Thanks for the fun question.  :)  I’d be interested hearing your favorites, as well as anyone else’s!

[howtotrainyour-toothless-dragon]

» How to train your -Toothless- Dragon

Stoick: "Val! Val! It's alright, it's alright... We're a team now. Now what do you want to do?" Valka: "We have to save the dragons!" Stoick: "Aye, you got it! Come on, son!" This part is so important. Stoick has always been the leader, no matter what. He always made ​​decisions for everyone, he has always been the leader and, more than anything else, has always been proud and firm on his role. He's the boss: he takes the decisions. But now, here, side by side with his beloved one he asks for her command. He's not the leader here, they're a team. What Valka wants to do? And this is so important and deep from him, because he knows she had taken her decisions alone for twenty years and no matter who he is and what is his role back home, he is in Valka's realm now, and Valka's alone... He just wants to remind her that now he's there with her. He offers her all of himself with so much respect, it is wonderful how much we can see his love for Val. He even answer to her words with "Aye" like you do with your captain, and this is so powerful and sweet from him. Valka is his queen.

[howtotrainyour-toothless-dragon]

Can we talk for a moment about the fact that now Berk has an "army" of all Berk's dragons, all Valka's nest dragons and all ex-Drago's dragons? And an Alpha.

Because... I mean... 

[howtotrainyour-toothless-dragon]

For the Dancing and the Dreaming - ITALIAN

[howtotrainyour-toothless-dragon]

The Night Fury

>> How to train your -Toothless- Dragon

[kingofthewilderwest]

Ugh every single time my phone rings and I hear "Stoick Saves Hiccup" I am reminded why putting this as my main ringtone is a very bad idea.  And yet I never change it...