I'm a huge fan of dragons. If you don't know that about me, know that about me now.
I loved the first How to Train Your Dragon movie dearly. I've seen it several times. I do that when I like something a lot. But let's be real, who doesn't love Toothless? That dragon is the cutest. He has so much personality, and he's very cat-like. That might be part of why I love him. I do love my cats.
At its core, How to Train Your Dragon is a story about love and friendship. That was true for the first movie, the second movie, and the third movie solidified it. Those are universal themes every one of us can relate to, and I think they're why the movies have done so well.
Love and friendship have been dressed up in an adventure with dragons, with a boy growing into his own. It's a classic fantasy and coming of age story. It has so many things that are familiar, and it makes them fresh and new again. In the end, that might be the real art of storytelling. Core truths, the core principles of humanity, don't change. So how do we storytellers make them new again?
Characters, fantasy worlds, they all have similarities, but different minds bring new insight. They tell stories from a point of view unique to them. That's where stories differ. It's in the details that make them up. The journey we experience with them. No two lives are exactly the same. No two stories are exactly the same.
Humans are social creatures. Hiccup and Toothless have a friendship that some of us can relate to. It's a relationship we admire. By the third movie, they've been through more than their fair share of trouble and pain, and they've stayed strong together as a family.
Change is a constant. It's the one constant in all of our lives. It's hard. It can be painful. It's even more painful when it comes to a relationship as strong as Toothless and Hiccup's. Sometimes, we have to let go.
I won't say any more than that because spoilers are the devil, but I'll conclude by saying this movie was a very fitting end to the series. And the soundtrack is amazing. I've listened to it every day since I saw the movie. Listen to it. Buy it. Seriously.
