A great sequel to a great first film

Rating: 9/10 (21 July 2014)

The original How to Train Your Dragon was a great, no, wonderful film that was not only the best DreamWorks film since The Prince of Egypt but also one of the best animated films of the 2000s. While it does start off a tad slow and not as endearingly simple as the original, this sequel was excellent(to me it beats Kung Fu Panda 2 as the best DreamWorks sequel) and almost as good. As with the first film the animation is amazing, and actually even better than that of the first, the character designs are a touch more expressive and the colours are richer and have more atmosphere. And I don't think even the first film had a character introduction as mind-blowing as that of Valka's. The soundtrack really gives the sense of fantasy and adventure and does so rousingly and beautifully. How to Train Your Dragon 2 is strongly written, with smart quirky humour, suspenseful conflict and plenty of emotional parts without being overly-sentimental. The story scores highly too with more depth and darkness than the first- which really succeeded in how simple it was- yet the quirkiness and wonder as well as the touching sentiment that was in the original film are present here as well. Which was impressive for a film that had a lot going on. The characters and their back-stories are intriguing(remarkable for a film with the amount of characters it has), especially the emotional scenes between Hiccup and his mother and the endearing man and beast friendship between Hiccup and Toothless(which maybe could have been more prominent), with the exception of the comparatively one-dimensional villain Drago, who was still malevolently voiced and well-designed. Of the characters, personal favourite is Toothless, who never speaks but has as much impact as and even more so than other characters that do, who is even more expressive and adorable as in the original. The voice acting is excellent, especially from Jay Baruchel and Gerard Butler. In conclusion, a great sequel and almost as good. 9/10 Bethany Cox