In the books, Toothless is tiny
How to Train Your Dragon began as a series of twelve children's books by the British author Cressida Cowell, published between 2003 and 2015. The books are quite different from the films. In them, TOOTHLESS is a small, grumpy, common garden dragon that could sit on a person's arm, HICCUP can speak Dragonese, the language of dragons, and the Vikings keep dragons as hunting pets rather than fighting them.
Cowell has said she was inspired by summers spent as a child on a tiny uninhabited island off the west coast of Scotland, where she imagined the Vikings who had once lived there and made up stories about dragons. The film, released in 2010, turned the small dragon into a sleek, powerful NIGHT FURY.
A dragon built from a cat
The animators wanted Toothless to be powerful but lovable, and they studied cats and dogs so his movements would feel familiar. He purrs, tilts his head, chases a spot of light like a cat, and acts like a dog when he is excited. His large eyes are there so audiences can read his feelings without him saying a word.
The filmmakers also asked the famous cinematographer Roger Deakins, who usually works on live-action films, to advise them on how to light scenes, and the flying sequences look remarkably like real film shot in the sky. John Powell's music was nominated for an Oscar.
A hero who loses a leg
At the end of the first film, Hiccup loses part of his leg in the final battle and wakes up with an artificial one. It mirrors Toothless, who lost half of his tail fin and can only fly with a saddle and a false fin that Hiccup built. Boy and dragon each depend on the other to fly. Many families have said it matters to children with disabilities to see a hero like that.
Hiccup starts as the weakest Viking in the village, no good at fighting, and wins by being curious and clever instead. That makes the story's message that understanding beats force easy for young viewers to follow.
Vikings did not wear horned helmets
The Vikings of BERK wear helmets with horns, which looks great in a cartoon and is not true to history. No real VIKING helmet with horns has ever been found; the idea came from nineteenth-century opera costumes. Our Vikings page covers what they really wore and did.
Hiccup's father, STOICK the Vast, is the village chief, and the blacksmith GOBBER, who has a hook for one hand and a peg for one leg, trains the young Vikings to fight dragons. VALKA, Hiccup's long-lost mother, lives among dragons, and DRAGO Bludvist is the villain of the second film.
Hiccup's friends — the fearless ASTRID, the dragon-fact-loving FISHLEGS, the boastful SNOTLOUT, and the squabbling twins RUFFNUT and TUFFNUT — each ride a different kind of DRAGON: the spiky NADDER, the round GRONCKLE and the two-headed ZIPPLEBACK. A live-action version of the first film came out in 2025.
The rest of the grid is the stuff of dragon riding: the SADDLE, the SHIELD, the tough SCALES, and FLIGHT itself.