Admirable film.

Entertaining from beginning to end, it maintains the spirit of the franchise while establishing it's own seal with a fun cast

One of the worst ways to make a cult movie is to set out to make a cult movie.

Actress is magnificent and exudes a hypnotic screen presence in this affecting drama.

This animated short is a sequel to How to Train Your Dragon and released as a DVD extra.The film follows Hiccup and his friends accompanying their mentor, Gobber, on a quest to kill the mythical Boneknapper Dragon. The dragon is recounted by Gobber in some dubious stories which we see presented in traditional 2D animation. I presume using such as animation technique was also quicker and cheaper to produce.The normal story is done in CGI. Its amusing enough for kids and I liked the voice acting of Craig Ferguson who plays Gobber the Belch. The story is not deep and moves briskly enough.

As with so many animated films, How to Train Your Dragon created this short film I presume to go on the DVD as an extra. The plot is that the gang of children set out in search of a completely mythical dragon called the Boneknapper – a dragon only known via the highly dubious stories told by Gobber. While the main parts of the short are CGI, the stories snap into a nicely effective cartoon style which I liked as it differentiated it from the "reality" of the rest of the film. I can understand why some would see these sections as "cheap" because they clearly are less expensive to produce, but this didn't mean that this was the motivation – it worked as a device for me, not as a cost-saving.The plot is simple and most of the laughs do come from the exaggeration in the story-telling in the cartoon sections. It isn't great but I did like the "and what came rising out of the water/volcano/ice" bits as they were out of nowhere and consistent. The rest of it comes and goes pretty quickly though and I certainly don't think the short is worth making an effort to seek out and it certainly doesn't stand up to the standard of the main film. But as a throwaway extra on a DVD? Sure, why not?

Let me start out by saying that I'm a huge fan of the original HTTYD film. The plot and characters, the voice acting, the visuals, and the score were all superb and I rank the movie highly amongst all of the animated films I've seen. I'm aware that this is supposed to be a "short film" and not a full- length sequel to the movie. However, that is no excuse for throwing together a half-arsed job in an attempt to milk what looks to be a very promising franchise. If I could erase my memory of viewing this short, I would. Let me break down everything that was wrong about this "film" for you:The plot: Technically, HTTYD is a "family" movie aimed towards kids; I get that. However, being in my 20s I still found the original story to be highly enjoyable (if a bit predictable) but still with a respectable level of emotional maturity. Still, the dialogue was witty and the story flowed well. I'm well aware that you can't do much in the span of 15 minutes, but the story in LOTBD was embarrassingly juvenile such that anyone over the age of seven would find "uncool" to watch. Did they hire the same writers? Jokes were lame, and everyone's personalities were reduced to stereotypes. Toothless had more of a cameo than an active role, despite the fact that he is one of the principal characters. Heck, the hammerhead sharks and yak had more screen time (take from that statement the content of the plot)! The film was more about Gobber, who I found to be quite funny in the original but I hated how he was portrayed here as a paranoid, stubborn, bumbling oaf.The visuals: This was what shocked me the most, aside from the horrendous script writing. What happened?! The original movie had absolutely mind-blowing visuals; the details they put into both the characters and environment were stunning. The environments were incredibly stale and unpolished, like something I would have expected from the 90's in terms of quality. And to cut even more corners, they stuck in some lame 2D schlock-fest to fill up about half the time. The score: I loved John Powell's soundtrack to the movie. It's on my iPod and I've listened to it about a dozen times. To make it even more obvious that this film was a last-minute idea, they didn't both to re- hire Mr. Powell to create a new score, and they instead re-used everything from the original. I was looking forward to hearing some more original stuff, but it became a predictable disappointment.Frankly, I'm also disappointed with the voice actors that they would lend their talents to such a shoddy production. If the quality of this film is a preview of what I can expect from the second and third full- length sequels, then Dreamworks will have lost my support for this once- promising franchise.

I imagine the one poor review below was due to the reviewer believing (as I did) that LOTBD would be another feature film like HTTYD. True, it turns out to only be a short, but for what it is it's very good! No, the "stars" are not the main characters Hiccup and Toothless from the first film, but is that so strange? Lots of shorts spotlight secondary characters from the original movie. In this sequel, Gobber goes on a hunt for his old nemesis, the Boneknapper Dragon. He enlists Hiccup and the other junior Vikings, none of whom are quite sure the so-called "Boneknapper" even exists. Since the focus is on Gobber this is Craig Ferguson's party and that's just fine with me; his performance was awesome in the first movie, and here his expressive rantings narrate the growingly ridiculous exploits of Gobber perfectly. The plot is pretty much the same as HTTYD's but that's not such a bad thing. All around, it's a charming little extra chapter of the wonderful original film.