Live-action remakes have been dominant in Hollywood for almost a decade now. The live-action remake of The Lion King made more than $1 billion even though everyone who saw it thought it was bad. Given that level of box office return, though, it was only a matter of time before the How to Train Your Dragon franchise got its own live-action treatment.
The franchise, which kicked off with 2010’s first film has become a new animated classic, and now, we’ve got our first look at the live-action remake. This remake is being written and directed by Dean DeBlois, who also directed the original animated film, and it features the most familiar characters in the franchise, many of which are being played by new actors. Mason Thames will play Hiccup, Nico Parker will play Astrid, and Julian Dennison will play Fishlegs Ingerman. Gerard Butler, who voiced Hiccup’s father, Stoick, in the original trilogy, is reprising his role for this live-action adaptation.
The biggest surprise in this short teaser, though, is that the movie itself looks pretty solid. We only get brief glimpses at Hiccup, Stoick, and Toothless in the teaser, but those brief glimpses suggest that the movie will be pretty faithful to the original animated film but include some stunning Scotland vistas and state-of-the-art CGI.
The first film tells the story of Hiccup, a young viking living in a village constantly at war with dragons. When he befriends an injured dragon, the two of them must convince his village that dragons aren’t the evil force that they’ve long believed them to be.
