The Way of the Dragons: Dean DeBlois on HTTYD2

Sprawled on a sofa in Cannes’ Carlton Hotel, Dean DeBlois is big and bushy-bearded – not exactly how you might imagine one of Hollywood’s most in-demand animators. Then again, appearances can be deceptive; just look at his 2010 film, How to Train Your Dragon. Adapted from Cressida Cowell’s long-running series of children’s books, this seemingly formulaic-looking tale of a Viking boy named Hiccup and the mythical fire-breather Toothless he befriends surprised everyone.

Co-directed with Chris Sanders, with whom DeBlois made the underrated 2002 cartoon Lilo & Stitch, HTTYD took almost $500 million at the box office. Immediately, a spin-off television series, DreamWorks Dragons, was put into production, while DreamWorks Animation head Jeffrey Katzenberg called for a sequel. With Sanders off making prehistoric cartoon The Croods, it was left to DeBlois to go solo on How to Train Your Dragon 2.

Thankfully, he came up with something rather more imaginative than the sequel’s perfunctory title. “I told him [Katzenberg] I was keen on it if he would consider it being a trilogy,” says the 44-year-old DeBlois. “So it doesn’t feel like an arbitrary random next adventure with the same five or six characters. It’s now a seemingly necessary evolution in Hiccup’s coming of age, and so by introducing five years later, we get to see him at a different period in his life.”

While DeBlois confesses that the classic Star Wars sequel The Empire Strikes Back was an inspiration, this latest adventure deepens the story, as Hiccup (again voiced by Jay Baruchel), his friend Astrid (America Ferrera) and Toothless venture from the Viking village of Berk, overseen by Hiccup’s father Stoick (Gerard Butler), to discover an island haven full of dragons. There they meet Valka (Cate Blanchett), a dragon-rider and protector, who boasts a deep, personal connection to Hiccup.

With Blanchett affecting a spot-on Scottish accent, it continues the franchise’s Celtic theme. “It comes from Cressida Cowell,” informs DeBlois. “She lived in London, but she spent her summers on a remote island in Scotland [a tiny uninhabited isle, owned by her father, off the west coast], so she was well aware of the Viking presence there. She always imagined Stoick to have a thick Scottish brogue. So when we cast Gerard Butler, it set a standard for the adults.”

Like fellow animator Brad Bird, who went from Pixar’s The Incredibles to directing Mission: Impossible – Ghost Protocol, the Quebec-born DeBlois still harbours dreams of moving into live-action. Post-Lilo & Stitch, he sold three projects to the studios, all of which stalled. “It’s still an ambition of mine,” he says, but adds that the crossover between the two mediums is such that he’s able to enjoy many of the experiences that his live-action counterparts take for granted.

Indeed, from working with a double Oscar-winner like Blanchett and acclaimed cinematographer Roger Deakins (a visual consultant on the film) to taking advice from Steven Spielberg, DeBlois is in a far more fortunate position than most. “These are all things that in your fantasy of live-action would be ideal,” he says. The only problem is he’s now got to deliver a conclusion to the trilogy. “The pressure to get the third one under way is palpable,” he sighs.

Thankfully, while the films have departed from Cowell’s books somewhat, the author has signposted DeBlois towards wrapping it all up. On one of her visits to the studio, she told him that by the end of her ongoing series of books “she was going to explain what happened to dragons and why they are no more.” It fired his imagination. “Where they’ve gone, and what happened to them, will be revealed,” he promises. Game of Thrones eat your heart out.