How to Train your Dragon Spin-Off: Riders of Berk coming this Fall

[Shrek]

How to Train your Dragon: Riders of Berk is a new series coming to Cartoon Network this Fall, marking the first time a Dreamworks TV series is airing on a channel other than Nickelodeon. According to the Comic-Con Panel, the series will be filling in the gaps between the original How to Train your Dragon movie (2010) and the upcoming sequel, How to Train your Dragon 2, coming in 2014. It has been confirmed that Jay Baruchel will be returning to reprise his role as Hiccup, and America Ferrera will once again voice Astrid, Hiccup's love interest in the original film.

The series will feature many new characters and new Dragons, including a recurring villain named Alvin the Treachorous who will be played by Mark Hamill. The team behind the series is working to recreate the quality of the original film, with high-quality animation and a complex storyline as one of it's biggest goals. Season 1 will feature 26 episodes, and Season 2 has already been ordered as well. The series will begin in September as part of Cartoon Network's Fall 2012 rotation, with a 1-hour sneak-preview airing August 7th.

If any more details surface, I'll try to add them to this post. Anyhow, discuss away!

Edited August 8, 2012 by Shrek

[Soniman]

This actually sounds promising, cant wait to see it when it airs.

[KHCast]

Dreamworks has a show on both nick AND Cartoon network?!!!

[Cola]

Interesting! I enjoyed How To Train Your Dragon, so I'm looking forward to this.

Also any TV series that has Mark Hamill playing the villian gets a gold star

[Nepenthe]

Cartoon Network just played a teaser after the Ben 10 movie, and I was very impressed with the quality of the animation. It looked fairly close to direct-to-video material in the subtlety of the character's actions and the faithfulness of the models to their theatrical counterparts. On a visual note alone, it blows the other Dreamworks-based shows out of the water. Very much looking forward to it now.

[Tornado]

I just watched the trailer on YouTube. It looks pretty good, but what I'm not sure is how much of the footage from it was recycled from the movie so I can't really get a feel for how good it will look.

[Kimb]

Here's the vid (lower quality tho,but you can still see).

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EtlGL9i9c-o

And wow,the quality is definitely a step-up from both Penguins and KFP-Legends of awesomeness!

Although this looks pretty damn good so far,deep down I still would rather prefer if the show was done in 2D Like those 2D portions in Legend of the BoneKnapper,loved those.

But oh well,I'm still looking forward to this!

[WarioBone]

How to Train Your Dragon was God-tier, so I expect a lot out of both the show and the sequel. I've always thought that a show would be a great way to fill out the dragon handbook thing they showed in the first movie. Definitely want to see that dragon that turns people inside-out.

[Phos]

So funny thing about the first movie, I spent a few minutes looking up the book it was based on, the movie has basically nothing to do with the book (which is basically a picture book for four year olds) so basically all the licensing did was attach a title that has little to do with the plot, probably pay Cressida Cowell a lot of money, and probably complicate any future licensing deals.

Also what was up with Not Jack Black? I'd say it might be because the genuine article wouldn't work for scale, but he was in brutal legend, so I guess he wouldn't work for scale for dreamworks.

[WarioBone]

Also what was up with Not Jack Black? I'd say it might be because the genuine article wouldn't work for scale, but he was in brutal legend, so I guess he wouldn't work for scale for dreamworks.

Glad I'm not the only person who was wondering this.

[Milo]

So it's supposed to fill the gap between the first and second film? I guess it'll probably be a short series then, unless a third film is also planned-then they can use later seasons of the show to fill in the gap between the second and third film.

[Shrek]

Also what was up with Not Jack Black? I'd say it might be because the genuine article wouldn't work for scale, but he was in brutal legend, so I guess he wouldn't work for scale for dreamworks.

To be fair, two different teams are developing the Kung Fu Panda and the Dragons series. From what we've seen so far from the animation, Dragons has a much higher budget to work with, so I guess they may not have been able to afford it? I can't say for sure because there haven't been very many details released for the series yet, it may just be that Jack was working on something else at the time.

[Snatcher2047]

I love the original movie to death and if that video is any indication of what we're to get in the TV series, consider me psyched. They're really going all out with this franchise with the TV series, the sequel and that cool looking live show they have going on now.

The series will feature many new characters and new Dragons, including a recurring villain named Alvin the Treachorous who will be played by Mark Hamill.

SOLD.

Edited July 15, 2012 by Snatcher2047

[Gabz Girl]

If Mark Hamill's in it, it's bound to be good! But then I really like How to Train Your Dragon too, so I can't wait for this. =]

[Aero]

I enjoyed the original movie quite a bit! Looking forward to this!

To be honest, there is one peeve I have: I read all of the books before watching the movie, and they're hardly anything alike. Note how different Toothless looks:

(Yes this is an actual picture from one of the books)

Books: Small dragon with no teeth at all

Movie: Large dragon with hidden teeth

(Also, Alvin the Treacherous first appeared in the series from the book "How to Twist a Dragon's Tale")

[Kimb]

Well,judging by the original concept art,it does show the movie was actually planned to be alot closer to the book.

But why it ended up being so different is mainly due to them wanting to give the story a more ''epic-fill-the-big-screen'' type feel.Since the dragons and vikings are already shown as friends in the book,they wanted to add more conflict for the very beginning,and build it up from there with Hiccup taming the injured Toothless etc.

So as a film that is loosely based on the book series,it works.And the author approved since she felt it still managed to capture the message portrayed in the book c:

[Shrek]

Sorry for the massive bump, but it seems Cartoon Network has been advertising a 1-hour long preview (Apparently composed of two different episodes.) of the series airing tomorrow night, starting at 7:30. While the series doesn't officially start until this September, the preview should be enough for everyone to judge the quality of the series for themselves. If you're interested, don't miss it! Or I will hunt you down and kill you.

Edited August 7, 2012 by Shrek

[Tornado]

So it's like a pilot episode, except the show has already been picked up for two seasons regardless? Cool. I'll set my TV to tape it.

Edited August 7, 2012 by Gilda

[Shrek]

I caught the first few minutes of the Pilot, and I have to say that I'm impressed. The animation is gorgeous and outshines the other Dreamworks cartoons by a long shot, and the plot was pretty good as well and picked up directly where the first movie left off. From what I could tell, the entire voice cast returned, so that's a plus too. I'll search around and see if anyone has uploaded it yet, and it seems that Cartoon Network is airing it again through out this week.

[Tornado]

Dragons: Riders of Berk Official Tornado Review™

Let me preface this by saying that as soon as the show was announced and actually shown off, I was practically ecstatic. HTTYD is a movie that has real sentimental value to me for almost pathetically emotional reasons, so I hoped to absolute god that they wouldn't screw this up. Have they? Not at all. There are some things that I hope they sort out, but lets cover this by pieces.

Voice Cast/Acting:

First of all, bravo for bringing back a sizeable portion of the voice cast from the film. Jay Baruchel and America Ferrera came back, and the people who didn't (Craig Ferguson being the most obvious one) were given replacements who act as reasonable facsimiles to the originals in characterization.

The acting is generally as good as the movie too. Jay Baruchel hits all of his notes perfectly, and Chris Edgerly stands out well as the new Gobber (he doesn't sound that close to Ferguson, but he puts just as much effort into the role that it causes no problems). America Ferrera has some lines that seem like they should have tried another take, but it's not too distracting; and all of the supporting characters carry just as well as they do in the movie. Really, the only disappointment that I can see is Nolan North replacing Gerard Butler as Stoick, who seems rather detached from the role at times. When he is addressing other characters he seems fine, but there just doesn't seem to be the chemistry between him and Jay Baruchel, so the interactions between Stoick and Hiccup don't seem to flow well. You don't feel the father/son relationship, you don't feel the character development between the two that happened by the end of the film, and by the end of each episode the status quo of their relationship seems to return to some weird hybrid of how it was at the beginning and end of the film. There is arbitrary skepticism everywhere (Stoick doubts Hiccup constantly over things tiny in scope compared to the events of the movie), and it is a real shame because their interactions in the movie were some really powerful shit.

Plot:

This was actually the most impressive aspect I think. It spends no time in the start introducing the characters in a manner which makes it blatant (there is no "Hi, I'm Hiccup. This is Astrid, this is my father, etc."). No biggie. The movie made more money than god and everyone saw it, so why bother? That being said, it does bring the characters into the show naturally. I obviously can't comment on this from experience, but the show builds the premise in a way that someone who hadn't seen the movie would find it interesting. It nicely summarizes the plot of the movie, the characters are introduced through their actions and dialog without being blunt about it, and it builds off of the movie ending to cover the storylines of the episode. Both of the episodes thus far have been about the "now that you mention it" problems with the ending of the movie.

The first one dealt with the problem of logistics. The movie was about the Viking village trying to repel/kill dragons so the limited resources they have to survive on wouldn't be stolen and fed to the King Dragon (or whatever it was called). The first episode points out that having those exact same dragons living in the village voluntarily means that those resources are still constantly being taken by the dragons.

Think of it like instead of killing a cougar because it ate your sheep to survive, you adopted the cougar. And it ate your sheep to survive. The problem is still there, but now you are purposely accommodating it. So some new guy introduced for the show who hates dragons uses this as a pretext to try to manipulate Stoick into having them removed from the village (I don't like this character, by the way. He was unnecessary to the plot when that would have been a proposed solution regardless, and is a kind of stereotypical mean old bastard), and Hiccup protests. While Hiccup is coming up with a Hiccup-style plan, things go to shit and Stoick puts his foot down. So Hiccup has to go behind his back and prove to his father that the dragons can coexist with the Vikings (which sounds the same as the movie, but this is a bit more in depth in regards to more wide-reaching implications).

Overall, the episode was nicely written except for some of Stoick's actions and the mean old bastard character. It had some good humor throughout, the plot was nice expansion of the movie's ending (even if the themes were kind of retreads) and it was a good start to the series.

Edited August 8, 2012 by Gilda

[Sean]

It was pretty cool that for these episodes they focused on some of the obvious problems that would arise from the vikings adopting dragons into their culture, like how the dragons just don't instantly become domesticated and Gobber having to find something else to do. I also liked that they didn't skirt around the issue that they all used to kill dragons in the past; it's something I almost expected them to conveniently ignore for the most part. Overall the show's gotten off to a great start and I'll definitely be following it, and it's way, way better than any of the DVD specials that have come out after the first film - Astrid seems like she's back in character again after Gift of the Night Fury.

[Shrek]

One thing I really do hope they do for future episodes is more of a focus on Toothless, because his design and personality was a huge part of what made the movie so great (obviously) and was just as much of a main character as Hiccup, but in both episodes so far he's basically just been in the background behind every speaking character. It's almost criminal how little he is represented.

You're in luck, because at Comic-Con an episode was mentioned that solely revolves around Toothless and why he's the only Night-Fury that appears, most likely elaborating on his origins. Most of the fans had already assumed that he was the only one of his kind, and it looks like they'll be going into more detail over it in the series.

[Shrek]

Did anyone catch the new episode from last week? The Dragons were framed for destroying the armory when it was actually Mildew's doing, and they were kicked off of the island. This weeks episode seems to be the second half of the two-parter, the new villain played by Mark Hamill is being introduced, and he looks great so far. From what I gathered, Hiccup is trying to bring the Dragons back so that they can defeat Alvin the Treachorous and save Berk. Sounds pretty good so far, the series is getting better with each episode.

[Dark Flame Master]

Did anyone catch the new episode from last week? The Dragons were framed for destroying the armory when it was actually Mildew's doing, and they were kicked off of the island. This weeks episode seems to be the second half of the two-parter, the new villain played by Mark Hamill is being introduced, and he looks great so far. From what I gathered, Hiccup is trying to bring the Dragons back so that they can defeat Alvin the Treachorous and save Berk. Sounds pretty good so far, the series is getting better with each episode.

I saw it, I put the series on record ever since it aired, and I've fallen in love with the show, (it reminded me of how much I like the movie) and have been watching it avidly. I can't wait to see the second part of it and see what happens.

I'm glad this show is so good, at first I just passed it off as another spin-off that wouldn't live up, but after seeing many promos and hype for the show, I decided to give it a shot and whaddya know, it's one of the few shows I even watch on CN or on tv for that matter.