How to Train Your Dragon (2025) is the latest in a long line of live-action remakes that feel more like box office insurance policies than artistic endeavors. Directed by Dean DeBlois, who also helmed the original animated trilogy, this version revisits the well-loved 2010 DreamWorks film, but with real actors, heavier visual effects, and—unfortunately—the same core issue plaguing nearly all these remakes: a lack of purpose beyond profit.
This year has already given us Snow White and Lilo & Stitch, and while How to Train Your Dragon isn’t the worst of the bunch (that crown still goes to Snow White), it remains stuck in the same soulless cycle. For a story about forging new paths and breaking tradition, the film itself ironically does neither. Nearly every narrative beat is lifted from the original, only now it’s filtered through a more lifeless aesthetic and a heavier reliance on CGI dragons, some of which look fine, others which still feel oddly weightless and unconvincing in motion.
Mason Thames stars as Hiccup, the misfit Viking who upends generations of tradition by befriending a dragon, the elusive and feared Night Fury known as Toothless. Gerard Butler plays Stoick the Vast, Hiccup’s stern father, and Nico Parker adds some welcome presence as Astrid. Nick Frost shows up as Gobber, bringing levity to a movie that, despite its fantasy elements, never fully takes flight.
The problem isn’t that this live-action How to Train Your Dragon is aggressively bad—it isn’t. It’s competently made, with decent performances and visual effects that are, at times, surprisingly restrained compared to the overly processed CGI eyesores we’ve come to expect. But that competence only highlights its hollowness. It exists to appease, not to inspire. If you’re a fan of the original, there may be moments of mild nostalgia or recognition, but rarely excitement or discovery.
What’s most frustrating is how this movie follows the animated version so closely while stripping it of its charm. The animated How to Train Your Dragon (which I’m not even especially fond of) had a distinct tone and energy—something that doesn’t translate when replicated shot-for-shot in live action. This remake plays it safe in every possible way, afraid to diverge from a proven formula, and in doing so, becomes little more than a competent echo of what came before, while somehow adding 27 minutes to the originals’ runtime.
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There are a few bright spots—Butler and Parker in particular offer more than the material deserves—but they’re small comforts in a film that never finds a compelling reason to exist. With all the talent and money poured into these projects, it’s baffling that they so rarely try anything new. These movies increasingly feel like they were designed to be streamed, not experienced, and How to Train Your Dragon is no exception.
Score: 5/10
How to Train Your Dragon (2025)
- Cast: Mason Thames, Nico Parker, Gerard Butler, Nick Frost, Gabriel Howell, Julian Dennison, Bronwyn James
- Director: Dean DeBlois
- Genre: Action, Family
- Runtime: 125 minutes
- Rated: PG
- Release Date: June 13, 2025
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