As the writer and director of the original animated How To Train Your Dragon, and both sequels, Dean DeBlois is all too aware how closely audiences hold those films to their chest and that a live action adaptation is, perhaps, not that necessary; heck, he even admits himself that he’s never been one to think much of the live-action trend.
But as the creative visionary behind the acclaimed trilogy, his stamp on this new live-action reimagining should be one sealed by audiences alike, and he’s hoping that by enrichening these stories, this story will take on a whole new immersive persona for a new generation of families.
As the full-length trailer for How To Train Your Dragon arrives online, Peter Gray spoke with DeBlois about the live-action mentality he adopted for the original animation, the casting process, and why he’s completely prepared for some audiences to refuse this film’s existence.
There’s always that conversation surrounding live action adaptations of animated fare, and why is it necessary. Was there a genesis for you that sparked the reasoning as to why to tell this story in this new format?
It’s an interesting one for me, because I’ve firmly been on the side of not just adapting those films as a trend. I love animation, and I love those films that come out of the studios, but I’ve never been for remaking movies in a new medium without any real purpose to it. But when Universal talked about this project and seeing it through as a live-action film, it, to me, kind of pinged something in me regarding the making of the first movie that was always an ambition for Chris Sanders and I. Which is to lean into a live-action sensibility. And we didn’t have much time. We came onto (the animated How To Train Your Dragon) quite late, because we were the replacement directors and writers of a previous incarnation. There wasn’t much time left, and we had to make a lot of brash decisions and sort of rush to the finish line with limited time and limited money.
There were many ambitions that we had for the movie that we had to set aside. And suddenly it felt like we could actually really indulge it. We could almost treat that first animated movie as though it’s the latest test screening. And with some time and money left over, where would you put the character depth? Where would you increase the mythology? Where could you heighten the immersive quality? So it aims to keep the best of what worked in the animated movie, and I’m very proud of that animated movie. I’m not trying to replace it, but to bring a different experience and kind of freshen it up with a grounded world and really believable performances. But also intensify the action for an audience that may not have seen it before, or for an audience that has grown up with the (original) movies, but they now perhaps have families of their own. So it’s a way of addressing nostalgia, but also sort of broadening the experience to people who might not have seen the animated films. I got on board with the idea because I felt there was something we could really bring to it and do with it.
Did you find there’s any key differences in storytelling and visual language between animation and live-action that you didn’t know you needed to consider during this adaptation?
It’s funny, because we leaned into a live-action aesthetic in the animated movie, so that’s the reason we brought in Roger Deakins to be our consulting cinematographer on all three movies. We wanted it to feel gritty and that the peril was increased. We tried to do away with cartoon conventions, like getting burned by fire and you just wipe off the soot, or falling from a great height and you just bounce back. We tried to lean into consequence, because it served the story. In this case, it just comes with the medium, and just by virtue of that fact that you’re building sets and you have human actors in those sets, everything takes on a grounded approach. There’s a reality to it, and I found that nature just came packaged with this idea of live-action.
On the mention of casting, it’s so great to see Gerard Butler back. Were there any particular qualities you were looking for when it came to Hiccup and Astrid? How did you know that Mason Thames and Nico Parker were your two?
Yeah, I think we end up with a mix of characters who look like their animated counterparts, and characters who don’t because I didn’t want to just be driven by purely looking for likeness. I want to be driven by the spirit of that character. In the case of Mason, we had seen a lot of really fantastic actors, and then Mason walked in. He was younger than all of them. He was 15 when he came into the audition, but he immediately just had the vulnerability and awkwardness, and you could feel that gangly quality and the lack of comfort in his own skin. And the self-deprecating humour was just coming out of him immediately. It’s a bonus that he looks like Hiccup too, but just the fact that he got his personality and he grew up with the character, so he immediately understood Hiccup. The movie meant a lot to him.
With Nico Parker, she was among many young actors that came in who looked like Astrid. They’d walk in to the audition and it was like they’d stepped out of the animated movie. But Nico was the only one who could deliver some really key bits of dialogue that were quite demoralising toward Hiccup without making them sound mean spirited. She just had the personality and the energy of a high-school sports team captain, you know? She just drove herself to a high degree and a high standard, and she expected others to follow in her wake. It was a very subtle thing, because she’s beautiful, but she never played an awareness of her beauty. She never leaned into it. And she’s commanding and strong without being mean spirited, which was a difficult thing to find.
With the idea that these two films can live side by side, did you go to Gerard Butler first for that role? And if not, you had an idea to pivot?
Sort of, yeah. Gerard was my instance from the start, because he’s the right age and he’s got that rugged wear to him. And that voice! But he wasn’t initially available. His schedule was so booked up when we were first casting for that character, and I thought “This is going to be tough.” We now had to think of another actor who could step into this role, a role that Gerard helped create himself. He and I and Chris Sanders, we created that role based on the character from Cressida Cowell’s books. We had so many discussions, and I knew that Gerry had brought a lot of himself to it. But then the actors strike happened, and because of the actors strike, things had shifted, and suddenly Gerard was available for a short window. He was able to join us in the very cold winter of last year in Belfast to make the movie, and it worked out. It’s hard to imagine anyone else in the role when you see him stomping around in the movie.
When I first saw him in the trailer, it’s such a treat to see him going “full Viking.” It’s really great to hear that you’ve approached these films with that sensibility that complements the original animated films, because there’s such a cinematic quality to them beyond just being animated films. And it sounds like this won’t take away from the animated film.
My attitude was, you know, if we mess it up, there’s always the animated movies (laughs), but the intention was to do it with love and respect and to only be additive. We’ve kept the best of the story, but we’ve enriched the characters and deepened the relationships and just added mythology. Making it more immersive and kinetic and visceral. It was made without a cynical bone in the mix. I think, regardless of how it does at the box office, it’s something that we’re all proud of and I’m glad in the end that we did it. If there are hardcore fans of the animated movies that refuse to see it, that’s okay too, because I’m very proud of those movies as well.
How To Train Your Dragon is scheduled for release in Australian cinemas on June 12th, 2025.
