Things I hate (and things I love) about RoB/DoB/RTTE
(because "Watch me mostly destroy the whole HTTYD tv series because I have nothing better to do" was too long for a title)
Hoi there, everyone!
So, You probably don't even remember about me but that's fine, that's my bad. I legit only interact with the forum when I have a problem in-game, and for some reason today I decided I'd like to be a bit more active on here without needing a glitch or a bug as input.
So I thought that the HTTYD franchise would be a good subject for a chill conversation. It's like an evergreen on here, so I thought I couldn't go wrong with that.
As the title suggests, I thought it would be a good change for me to talk about the tv series of Dreamworks: Dragons. I should specify I will not include Rescue Riders because A) I haven't watched it (and I don't intend to, due to the fact that I'm a little out of the target audience for that specific series) and B) overall don't really consider it relevant to the HTTYD trilogy storyline itself, judging by those very basic infos I got about it.
To put it down with Astrid's words, I'd like to give the honey first and then the hatchet, so I'll start with the things I love about certain aspects of Riders/Defenders and Race to the Edge and proceed with the things I'm not particularly fond of.
Please note most of my statements often just point out the obvious, so I'm sorry for saying things that might sound unoriginal to you.
I Would also like to point out that I'm well aware a good chunk of the things I'm not too fond of about the series are due to low budget reasons. That doesn't change the fact that Rise/Defenders and RTTE is my favourite tv series and comfort show, and I think there's nothing wrong in addressing its flaws as well as its credits!
Characters Insight
the honey:
I loved the work they put into exploring each Rider's personality throughout eight seasons, and the fact that in all them each of them had at least a couple episodes dedicated to them. I particularly enjoyed the depth they gave to Snotlout without completely robbing him of his essential characteristic of being an arrogant kid. I also really liked his BROTP dynamic with Tuffnut, and speaking of the latter I also loved how they handled his love/hate siblings relationship with Ruffnut. Props to how they handled characters that only appeared in the series, too. One of the reasons why I'm such a fervent Dagur Fangirl is because his redemption arc was, in my opinion, quite well written. (I still loved him before he had a redemption arc, but the fact that he got one made him even more likeable to me). Viggo and Ryker also were made into interesting characters and Johann's arc was also an umcommon trope that I greatly appreciated.
the hatchet:
In my opinion, especially in Race to the Edge, there was too much focus on Hiccstrid. Before anyone comes to me with pitchforks and torches I will say in my defense I'm not a fan of ships in general, nor the "damsel in distress" kinda trope. While I do like Astrid's strong personality in the first two movies (leaving the third one out of the count because she wasn't that much relevant plot-wise there), I felt it was too much out of character of her to be the one needing rescuing nine times out of ten. I do get the intent was to develop Hiccup and Astrid's relationship in the tree years of gap between Riders of Berk and HTTYD2 but for the reason I explained, I think it could have been handled better. I was rooting much more for Heather and Fishlegs and I would say alternative romantic relationships were sacrified in favour of hiccstrid. By this I mean no offence to what I know being the most popular ship in this fandom nor its supporters, so please respect my tastes as much as I respect yours :)
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Universe exploration
the honey:
I am a sucker for worldbuilding. I loved how each tribe has its own village built in a way that reflects the tribe's own essence. If you take, for example, the Defenders of the Wing island and compare it to the Wingmaidens' island you'll see what I mean. Unique settings and customs for a specific group of people are literally what gives me life and I appreciated how that was handled for the various peoples of the archipelago.
the hatchet:
Historical inaccuracy. Take clothes as the most imediate example. I do love most of the clothes designs, I really do. There's no day that goes by without me wishing I had the Defenders of the Wing outfit in my closet. I also know very well that outfits are a key point for character design so I understand why certain choices were made.
The problem I personally have with this part of the HTTYD worldbuilding is that, hystorically speaking, clothes are extremely inaccurate compared to what history tells us about real vikings clothes. Now I feel the need to point out I don't have a major in Viking history or whatever, but I did read quite a few books on viking history.
And yes, I know it's pointless to talk about historical accuracy in a franchise about giant fire-breathing reptiles that fly but heh, leave me be :3
Aside from the classic horned helmets stereotype, which is already "meh" enough of a concept for me personally, there are a few more things Race to the Edge and httyd in general got completely wrong about the viking culture and customs. My biggest peeve is the Hollywood representation of viking funerals that perpetuates in both the second movie and the series (is it even allowed to mention funerals on the forum from a quasi-anthropological point of view?). I know I'm not making much of a great arguement there, but that's because some of the books I have read on the subject that I used as source contain pretty sensitive topics which I reckon are best to keep off a kids-friendly community. I also do not intend to act like an annoying know-it-all and am definetly not qualified enough to talk about history as if I actually have a major in the subject so I'm sorry if I gave away that impression of myself!
I still don't get why they have yaks in Berk to begin with. From what I gathered, "The domestic yak (Bos grunniens) is a long-haired domesticated cattle found throughout the Himalayan region of the Indian subcontinent, the Tibetan Plateau, Northern Myanmar, Yunnan, Sichuan and as far north as Mongolia and Siberia. It is descended from the wild yak (Bos mutus)" (source: wikipedia). However vikings did have cows and cattle along with pigs and chickens and sheep, and technically speaking yaks are indeed a type of cow, so maybe the writers just chose to use the word "yak" as a generic term for "big hairy animal tha gives milk"?
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In-Universe continuity
(There's no honey here, just the hatchet)
I know this has been discussed a lot (I've been lurking a lot on the forum in the past lol), so I want to apologize beforehand for bringing up the small inconsistencies that surfaced throughout and at the end of rtte. I like to call myself a failed perfectionist in the way that no matter how hard I try I always end up being careless about minor details and I think this series is a perfect embodiment of such concept. The most immediate examples that come to mind are the Eruptodon going trough a gender transition offscreen and the whole Toothless' shot limit inconsistency (though, checking on the httyd wiki page about Toothless, the site does mention this specific inaccuracy might be caused by the fact that the series was animated by a different crew than the one that worked on the movies. Unfortunately the article doesn't mention a source so I'm not sure how attendible that piece of information actually is and I'm too lazy to look further into that). There obviously are more of those, but you guys know already about it so I will move forward.
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Graphic and Visual Quality
the honey:
While obviously neither riders/defenders or RTTE can even compete with the quality of the movies, I will say that, for being a low-budget project, the series has a pretty decent quality and uses a few clever tricks to save up on animating complex objects by essentially getting rid of most of the furry coats and textures, for example. Some scenes were clearly put more effort into in the animating and rendering process and the camera shots are mostly well-thought.
the hatchet:
Astrid's hair in Riders/Defenders looks like overcooked noodles and nothing will ever make me unsee that. Some fabric also look a bit rubber-looking and tend to act more like rubber than actual fabric (an example is Dagur's vest whenever he's seen riding Shattermaster). Overall the textures in general look much poorer, whether it is clothes or dragon scales.
The extreme use of the same model for background characters, like the dragon hunters and the Defenders of the Wing, also makes me turn my nose up big time. But again, I understand this was due to a limited budget so I'm not going to drag this out any longer.
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This post feels long enough already, so I think what I wrote so far is more than enough. I hope you will appreciate my committment to this post as I've been working on it all evening now :') (yes, I am definetly a snail when it comes to writing and editing a post)
What are the things you enjoyed the most about the HTTYD series? What are your biggest peeves about them? Do let me know, if you like!
Thorspeed, until next time!
-BlueSunflower
I never noticed everything until you pointed it out.
Now I'll never unsee it! Haha!
The things that bother me the most, was at the end of the Race to the Edge series, that the KING of dragons layed an egg, which made me wonder if it was actually a Queen of dragons.
Plus it shows Valka getting the egg, and my curiosity is, what did she do with it?
I know she didn't hatch it and it grew up within a year or so before Hiccup finds her! SO WHAT HAPPENED TO THAT EGG?!?!?!
And once Astrid I think said something like "We need bigger g u n s to beat (Forgot who it was)!" I don't remember exactly what she said, but I know that she said g u n s, which is also historically inaccurate.
They should've at least changed it to be maces or swords of something like that.
I also have my dislikes with the end of the third movie, but I won't share that in case anyone here hasn't seen the movie is reading.
Overall though, I do really like the Race to the Edge, and first and second movie, and maybe some of the third.
They should've at least done another spinoff of the second movie, where they raise the Bewilderbeast baby, and show how it grows!
Like what they did with Garf a little.
Oh yeah another thing that is bothersome, on the episode where they find the female Monstous Nightmare, and Hooky goes after her, Hiccup asks Toothless this: "You'd never leave me for another dragon, right bud?"
AND WHAT DOES TOOTHLESS DO?
Grimmal would be a good villain to me if his voice didn't annoy me. I have no idea why, but his voice is just so annoying! Him and Draggo have annoying voices in my opinion. Especially Draggo's screaming.
Hermione thanks you for loving her!
I'll have to get a photo on here of her Halloween costume! I'm dressing her up as a Stormcutter, which means possibly losing a limb trying to put my Build-A-Bear Toothless's wings on her.
Oh my Thor! I remember the first time I heard Drago's scream it weirded me out a lot xD And there I was thinking I had issues.
I think what they were trying to do with the scene in the hookfang episode was a foreshadowing, but indeed it ended up looking like another poor attempt of that.
And you know what? We *need* a spinoff like that. At least, I would be totally in for it. It would be a splendid opportunity to see what went down outside of Berk before and during the events of httyd1 and the series from Valka's perspective. Come to think of it, that's actually a good prompt for a fanfiction!
And yes I love cats, no exceptions xD
I remember a few years ago my sister and I crafted some cardboard wings for our tuxedo cat. He didn't particularly appreciate them but he didn't really get to refuse. I should still have some pics of him wearing them, if I find them I might post them later!
I'm glad I'm not the only one who hated Draggo's scream too!
The first time I saw the movie, and I saw Cloudjumper, I thought he looked like Hermione so much!
I even got two Stormcutters and named one Hermione, and the other Schmich (her weird nickname I gave her)!
It is true about the Hookfang episode with trying to hint that Toothless was like "I love you Hiccup!" Then, "Bye Hiccup! I see a Light Fury, who is waay better than you!"
I am curious if Hiccup was thinking that exact time when he hugged Toothless.
If you do the fan fiction, can I help?
It would be cool to do one, along with what Valka did when she was first taken to her sanctuary, and all the way up to the Bewilderbeast egg, and finally meeting Hiccup again.
And in between the 2nd and 3rd movie with the Bewilderbeast baby would be awesome too.
Because Valka just left it at her sanctuary without telling her own son that she had the Bewilderbeast egg, and leaving it on its own.
Maybe we should start a thread of a pet Dreadfall contest, and have our cats compete!
Hermione will have her extra "What-in-the-world-did-you-do-to-me-and-WHY?" face.
One last thing, I find this thread a little funny, because we both are ranting a little about the flaws, and also talking about cats at the same time!
Homie, cats and dragons are literally what gives me life xD
I'm not sure if my cat would allow me to get away with dressing him up again but hey, I'll never know unless I try!
I would love to work on a four-handed fanfiction project! Unfortunately I am quite busy with work and other artistic projects so I'm not sure when I might be able to focus on this one too.
My starter dragon is actually inspired by one of my other cats! I might post pictures of both of them in the future, I don't know xD
I have a bunch of hatchets to give over HTTYD: The Hidden World.
I'll start with my baker's dozen over THE Light Fury. I honestly hate the fact that the Light Fury was just a "Girl Toothless"- and a poor one at that- as well. I find her entire personality offputting- and... not justified to say the least. It's too much "I like Toothless. I hate humans.", and she gets little character development at all. I also find her design to be... poorly thought out as well. The extreme femmeninity of her design is like slapping pink paint on a hen and giving it makeup. It's also unnatural looking- how does she not have scars? How could she be white aside from being an albino or leucesistic? How do her scales? feathers? end up looking like makeup in the first place? Why specifically make her a "Light Fury" in the first place? I overall feel like the movies designers really dropped the ball here.
I also feel like they dropped the ball with Toothless in this movie. Designwise, I don't have much to say, but personalitywise? I have a baker's doxen hatchets to give for Toothless's personality in The Hidden World as well. He's pretty much... not the same dragon we grew to love in the first movie. Where the first movie's Toothless is a strong, well thought out character, again, the third movie's Toothless is just... offputting and not justified. His entire personality is changed/reduced to "I'd never leave you Hic- Oooh! Pretty girl dragon! I'm gonna leave you- forever!", as... whichever one of you has Dart in your profile picture summed it up. I was honestly sad that he never even thought of trying to visit the Hidden World for any other reason, and that he never even thought of Hiccup once during most of the movie.
In addition, I find the whole "Night Furies are extinct" nonesense to be a whole can of rotten worms. The fact that- in the movie cannon- one man was able to cause the extinction of an entire species of dragon just doesn't make sense. The only way this could happen is if the Night Fury population overall was extremely tiny (perhaps even from their evolutionary start) and if it was so isolated that it was living on just one island. Given that these are dragons we're not talking about, and not Dodos, there is no way that the Night Fury species could have been in that state for long. If they had ever been in that state, than they would have been in that state shortly after they first evolved. I think it's more likely that Grimmel only killed a few and the rest became extremely elusive- to the point that few to no human ever found them- and so the vikings assumed that they were extinct. Due to this reasoning, I think Dreamworks could have just said that "Toothless isn't the last of his kind", and let more Night Furies appear in the movie.
A plot messed up as this makes me honestly like games like School of Dragons better than the sequel movies. In a way, School of Dragons is actually better/more realistic than the movies are. I do have my pet peeves about the Light Fury in School of Dragons, and a toy hatchet about the Hobblegrunt having the wrong model, but otherwise I'm somewhat okay with School of Dragons... especially compared to the HTTYD sequels. I'd have to think about the TV series, though...
I completely agrer with you on everything. While I believe Toothless was given that character in httyd3 specifically to show the bad effect of to domestication of wild animals on the animals itself. I also found the storytelling of that movie incredibly low compared to the other two movies in the franchise.
The light fury herself is a perfect example of the so called "smurfette syndrome" (if you never heard of that before you can check some video-essay on youtube about the subject) and that's probably the biggest reason why I don't like her. Her whole character revolves around her being "toothless' love interest", and while I know it was a clever marketing move that eventually led to the nightlights I wish that was not the route they took for this movie. And also yeah, let's talk about how unoriginal the whole light fury ideas really is. I've seen fanfictions about albino night furies since the first movie came out. It really just looks like the writers saw one of those fanfictions and just went "You know what, Mike? Let's go with that one!"
Literally the whole movie could have worked out just fine with a regular female night fury, too. "Oh wow, looks like toothless isn't the only night fury left after all, praise Odin!"
I honestly think the introduction of another night fury and an explanation like the one you suggested would have given the movie a much more interesting prompt and happier outcome. Not that it wouldn't be possible with the light fury as well (like, if hiccup and the gang spent some actual time in studying the light fury like he did in the first movie, for example. It would have also made a nice parallel but no. We were given Toothless walking like a weird chicken to impress a girl. That's your Alpha dragon).
I used to love the school of dragon plots, but sadly the quality dropped big time after the battle for the Edge expansion. And then even more after the special events were introduced. Not that I don't like competing in them, but plot-wise they're kinda poorly written in my opinion. I wish we would get an expansion as good as the first few that were released (an expansion that's actually worth the amount of gems it costs). I don't mind if the dragon related to it is not as "cool" as a hybrid, I was never too much fond of those anyway. I just want to be able to get the dragon with my own pace.
Tracking!
I may come back to add something, but for now I'm just gonna linger in the shadows.
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Exactly! The Bewilderbeast egg is something that didn't sit right with me either. For the fact that a king of dragons laid an egg, I like to think Bewilderbeasts are like seahorses. In the animal world, the male seahorse is actually the one who gives birth to its babies (they still meed a female egg to fertilize though). If this is the case, I would expect the writers to have such a relevant detail to be explained or discovered by the protagonists, and the fact that wasn't addressed at all makes the ending of rtte feel indeed like "hold on, what is happening?". It's overall just a big fail from the writers for the reason you pointed out and honestly? That's a waste. They threw out of the window seven seasons and a half in favor of a rushed ending. It felt like they tried to close a circle that wasn't even meant to be. As for the Bewilderbeast egg problem, I personally obliged to it with a headcanon that for some reason the egg didn't survive.
I didn't like the third movie either! Or better, I didn't like the Light Fury and how her character(essentially just being a girl toothless) was handled. Aaaaand I might still be a tiny bit sore about the whole ending. It ruined my plans for a post movie setting fanfiction and with it a good slice of my teenage years' mental sanity :')
Grimmel was the only thing I really enhoyed about the movie. I have a thing for twisted, cold blooded villains and Grim-grim met all the requirements to enter my top three without a doubt.
(Unrelated, but I stumbled upon the information that your cat is named Hermione and I love her twice as much as before I knew her name already)