For a generation of film lovers, How To Train Your Dragon was a franchise that grew alongside them in their youth. The animated trilogy, directed by Dean DeBlois (joined by Chris Sanders on the first film), began in 2010 and closed out with The Hidden World in 2019 – a period during which those who associated with young hero Hiccup also went from childhood to young adulthood. Now, DeBlois is adapting the films into live-action, set to bring a whole new generation of fans into the world of dragons, vikings, and the Isle Of Berk. And its new Hiccup, The Black Phone’s Mason Thames, was one of those whose adolescence unfolded alongside Dragon’s protagonist.
“It really shaped who I was as a kid, just like a lot of people who watched it growing up,” Thames tells Empire of the series. He wasn’t just a casual fan either. “I was Hiccup for Halloween,” he says. The fact that he’s now playing the character in live-action is “still surreal to me”. It’s little wonder so many people found themselves in Hiccup’s story – it’s all embedded in real relationships. “When I was young, I was the apple of [my father’s] eye, but when I was a cheeky teenager we butted heads a lot,” says DeBlois of the emotion he poured into the films. “Then he passed away when I was still a teenager, so we never had the chance to make amends at a time when we had a bit of an acrimonious relationship.” The relationship Hiccup has with his father Stoick (Gerard Butler) is “the making-amends moment that I never had,” DeBlois explains.
It seems Thames will be busy for a while: How To Train Your Dragon 2 has already been announced for the live-action treatment, taking him deeper into Hiccup’s story and the evolving legacy of Berk. “The second movie was always my favourite,” Thames says. “All the action sequences, [and] how the relationships have evolved five years after the first film…” The training has only just begun.