It seems that every week Dean DeBlois is making headlines with his hugely anticipated sequel to 2010’s roaring animated success: How to Train Your Dragon.
For all the good reasons, this steady flow of information is doing little to desensitize us to the prospect of another trip to Berk. On the contrary, I for one am more excited than ever!
Having only recently revealed that How to Train Your Dragon 2 is to be the second act of a much larger – potentially trilogy-spanning – story, the film’s director has turned his attention to casting, informing Empire that the original ensemble are set to return in full.
“What I presented to them was the second act of a much larger story, so the film takes on much more breadth, it’s really quite epic. We leave the first film with these Vikings on the backs of dragons, so the world just opens up and expands exponentially.”
“Everyone’s back on, in fact Gerard Butler was the only one who was sort of unknown until up until just last week and then I got confirmation”
With Jay Baruchel returning as the voice of Hiccup and the thunder-stealing Craig Ferguson back as Belch, this really is shaping up to be the cinema event of 2013. With the allegedly epic story still under wraps, we can at least take solace in the news that Roger Deakins will similarly be returning as cinematographer – Dragon 2 at least promising to be one of the most beautifully presented films of the year.
Now that Stoick the Vast is finally signed to return, rounding out the winning ensemble, all that remains to be announced is the return of exemplary British composer John Powell so I can hibernate in peace. Until then, however, I will leave you with these comforting words of wisdom from DeBlois himself.
“We don’t make films for children, we make films without excluding children.” Amen to that, my friend!
