I love this series to bits. TO BITS.

I love how the hero is not your typical strong, macho, good-looking, athletic guy. I love that the girl he likes is a well written character with her own strengths and weaknesses and opinions. She’s a character little girls can look up to, because she’s smart and she makes things happen and she doesn’t wait for anybody to rescue her, but she’s also not reckless and I love Astridd.

I love how the story teaches us to look beyond biases and history and to see what’s in front of us, and what could be. I love how Toothless is basically a cat.

I really really love How to Train Your Dragon.

And I really love how the story and the characters have progressed through each movie, and by that even the dragons and how they have their own personalities and habits and quirks.

And I really love how they’ve been able to keep the voice cast throughout the movies!

So yes, when we watched the movies with Lucas, I cried and cheered all over again.

It’s fun to watch all these things we love with our son, but really we also hope he’s picking up some good things too, not just fun things. Like Hiccup standing up to his whole village, and proving them wrong about dragons. Like Stoick learning to see things from Hiccup’s point of view. Like Valka being picked up by the dragon, and staying away because she found a calling greater than herself. Like how even if Snotlout, Ruffnut and Tuffnut are incredibly annoying, they’re steadfast friends who are loyal and (mostly dependable).

One of the things I love most about these movies is how disability is not a barrier to, well, anything! Look at the amazing inventor and engineer Hiccup turned out to be, and I’m sure that’s partly because of the great example set by his father’s great friend, Gobber. Hiccup invents all sorts of things to make life in the village easier, and of course there’s all the things he designed and built so that Toothless could fly. And there’s Hiccup’s designs for his and his friends’ own use, like the gliders to help them fly, and the armor made of dragon scales. Hiccup is pretty amazing!

Did I mention I love these movies? Huhuhu.