#This is how you sound like to non-httyd fans

[ellulemmu]

Httyd fandom discourse in a nutshell

[violet-moonstone]

1, 6, 11, 16 for the HTTYD asks! Thank you for making them! 🫶

Thanks for asking!

Which part of the series was your introduction to HTTYD? How old were you when you first became a fan?

HTTYD 1! My social studies teacher showed it to my class instead of teaching us the Vikings unit, lol. I learned nothing about actual Vikings but gained a lifelong obsession. I was 10 when the movie came out, so I've been into this franchise for over half of my life. I find it kind of funny because I remember thinking the movie would be absolutely terrible when I saw the trailers (I thought it was a "boy movie"....yeah I was like that as a kid) and then I never shut up about it for 14 years, lol.

6. What are your favourite ships in the fandom and why?

Ok IMMEDIATELY Dagcup comes to mind. I LOVE ship dynamics that basically resemble the dynamic between a chaotic dog and an exasperated cat. (Although Hiccup is pretty chaotic too to be fair. He just seems so rational in comparison to Dagur) I've also got a huge crush on both Dagur and Hiccup so that helps, lol. Vigcup is probably a close second.

Honestly though, I'm a fan of most of the popular non-canon ships in the fandom and most of the canon ones -- and even rare or crack ships I can eventually get behind.

My current favourite rarepair (that I'm pretty sure only I ship...for the time being) is Drago Bludvist and Skuld the Sorceress. I also ship Chaghatai Khan and Griselda the Grievous (and I came up with some OCs to be their kids).

11. What are your favourite locations in the Barbaric Archipelago?

This is gonna sound like a cop out but...pretty much all Berk in movie 1 - the first film has my absolute favourite set designs, textures, and colour schemes. The forests, the houses, the great hall, the sea stacks...all of it is breathtaking. This photo in particular makes me wish I could visit movie 1 Berk in real life:

The vibrant colours in the following movies are wonderful, but to me, they don't quite say Berk the way the first movie does. I understand that the art direction was probably trying to reflect how allying with the dragons brightened the lives of the characters...but I still think cold, dark Berk can still be a happy place.

I also very much enjoy Caldera Cay/Defenders of the Wing Island in RTTE. I like seeing how the architectural style of the Defenders of the Wing differs from that of other groups in the Archipelago. Their style is so utilitarian, it makes Berk look luxurious! And it makes the dragon-related decorative elements of their ceremonial architecture stand out even more.

16. What is your favourite plot arc?

Ooooh that's a tough one. I don't have *one* specific one in mind, but I think I have to go with any epsiodes in RTTE that feature the rivalry between the riders and the Hunters. Watching Viggo and Hiccup constantly try to outsmart each other is so fun.

Thanks again for asking! You'll probably see some questions in your inbox from me soon!

[howtowhumpyourhiccup]

Httyd!

001 | Send me a fandom and I will tell you my:

Favorite character:

Hiccup Haddock!

Least Favorite character:

Idk, I guess, Grimmel?

5 Favorite ships (canon or non-canon):

Hiccstrid

Vigcup

Eretcup

Toothcup

Stalka

Character I find most attractive:

Hiccup! (And Astrid+Heather come in as very close seconds)

Character I would marry:

Hiccup (Like, how can you not?)

Character I would be best friends with:

I'm just going to say Toothless before I answer with "Hiccup" again! :'D

A random thought:

"I really want to work on this one Httyd fic."

An unpopular opinion:

The Httyd comics aren't bad, actually.

My canon OTP:

Hiccstrid

Non-canon OTP:

Toothcup

Most badass character:

I'm sorry, I'm supposed to make a choice in a cast that is purely made up of badasses already? :'D

But I would have to say Hiccup takes the top spot for me, purely because of how little faith people have put in him growing up and how strong of a character he truly is.

Pairing I am not a fan of:

I don't really know? As a multishipper, I generally like all pairings, even if I don't go out and search for fics or fanart of them.

Character I feel the writers screwed up (in one way or another):

Drago Bludvist. I like him a lot as a villain, but I feel like he could've definitely benefitted from more screentime. And I do miss the role he could've had in Httyd 3.

Especially after his moment with Hiccup, when he watches Hiccup pull Toothless out of the Bewilderbeast's control. The way Drago says "How are you doing that?" sounds so filled with genuine surprise, I wish Drago was explored more.

Favourite friendship:

I would say Hiccup and Toothless (it's what the entire franchise is based on, after all) but I also want to give some attention to Hiccup and Snotlout. Because if you see where they started versus where they ended? Amazing! Such growth!

[evilwriter37]

Author Honesty Hour

Tagged by @marril96! Thank you!

THE STORIES

1. Which is the fic you’re most proud of?

You guys are probably gonna know the answer to this, but Infernal Fascination. That thing is a monster in both content and size. Currently at 297k words. Not done yet. It’s the longest thing I’ve ever written and definitely the most emotional and I love how I’ve been able to explore psychology in it.

2. Which is your least favorite?

Not quite sure. 

3. If you were to recommend one to read to your mom?

Definitely my lighter Destiel fics. (She ships Destiel too.) There’s Sitting on the Floor, Weak and Broken, Brother Talk, At the End, and Angels Do That? Also, two of my lighter HTTYD fanfics would do: Cold Feet, and Phantom Pain. Definitely wouldn’t read a lot of my other stuff to her, though she does know what kind of content I write, (including non-con and torture) and she really doesn’t care that I write that stuff. She doesn’t believe in purity and censorship and all that bullshit when it comes to writing and I think that’s amazing. Though, I suppose a few of my whumpy one-shots would be okay.

4. Which one would you consider re-writing?

None of them. I put them out there because I was proud of them, so I don’t think any rewriting is necessary. Some editing? Yes. But rewriting? No. (Plus I don’t have time for it even if I wanted to.)

5. Biggest regret in a fic?

None.

6. Biggest success with a fic?

Also Infernal Fascination. I have tons of readers, comments, and kudos, and people have done fan art and aesthetics for it! It’s like I have my own fanbase! It’s crazy!

7. Your fic with the most notes?

This whump request in which Hiccup was shot with an arrow. I had a good time writing it, so I’m happy with how it was received. 

8. Your fic with the least notes

Savoring Victory. I mean, given the content of it that makes sense.

9. What do you think makes a good fic? Tips?

Don’t try to control the characters too much. If you’re writing them in character, they should be telling you what they want to do next. Sometimes you just have to let them do what they want. (I know I sound crazy, but seriously, it’s true.)

10. When’s the next update on your works?

When I have time, energy, and motivation.

11. Number of followers before you started writing and after?

No clue.

THE WRITER

1. Which character do you love writing for?

Hiccup. He’s fun to hurt. Plus HTTYD is my special interest.

2. Which character do you dislike writing for?

I don’t really dislike writing any character. 

3. What’s your favorite AU to write for?

I don’t do AUs. Ever.

4. What’s your least favorite AU to write for?

No.

5. What do you hope never gets requested?

Fluff without whump. Like, just fluff. I can’t really do straight up fluff. Whump is more fun. Plus, fluff after whump is way more fulfilling.

6. What do you wish was requested more?

Haven’t done requests in a while. I’m good honestly. Liked what people requested when I was taking them.

7. Thoughts on writing Smut/POC/Curvy/MxM/FxF?

Write anything and everything. Nothing wrong with any of it. Have written most of it myself.

8. Which account is your biggest inspiration in writing?

I wanna say @ashleybenlove because she leaves really awesome comments and also likes to give me whump ideas.

9. How long have you been a fic writer for?

Started officially writing fic in 2014, but little kid me used to do it a lot actually, just in random notebooks. Never finished or posted anything till 2014.

10. Any upcoming secret works?

Secret. ;) But okay, I’ll spill. My brain won’t stop coming up with ideas even though I’m super busy with a bunch of stories already and decided that writing another alternate ending to the Race to the Edge episode Enemy of My Enemy was a good idea. And naturally, since it’s me, it’s gonna be really dark and explicit and everyone’s gonna have a good time. By everyone I mean me. I’m gonna have a good time. Everyone else gets to suffer.

I feel bad that I don’t really interact with other writers, but I’ll tag the few that I do interact with and that I think would be interested in doing this: @ashleybenlove, @primedoverlord, and @skrillqueen. If I didn’t tag you but want to do it anyway, go right ahead!

[despiteherself]

☕️ The extremely boring HTTYD fanfiction cliches of Hiccup Runs Away, Modern Berk, Snotlout Does Something To Hiccstrid And Suffers, We All Hate Snotlout Because He Was So Mean To Hiccup, Hiccup Suddenly Has A Sister, etc.

firstly thanks so much for sending in !!!!!! i’ve been hanging out for opinions to respond to. secondly lmao i don’t know what fan fic u think i read but it’s only tiny rare pair ships lmao so ??? half of these i’m like ????????? ??

re: hiccup runs away - eh, makes sense for the canon; an interesting concept ppl want to explore. haven’t read any but i can see why ppl are interested in the general idea.

re: modern berk - lmao i will defend ppl’s right to write as much modern au as they fucking want. this fandom has a hard-on for complaining abt modern au and it’s like ??? mostly ppl who don’t even write like shut up. lshfkfkf there’s some REALLY aggressive rude commentary about modern au out there, with a really self absorbed, petulant tone and basically my response to this kind of entitlement (“how dare you write modern au, i a non-writer don’t want that.”) is lmao write as much modern au as you want. lmao ppl wanna see their favs in situations that directly affect/happened to them, let them goddamn write the twins with a vine or snotlout on instagram.

re: snotlout does something… - lmao as if I’d ever read a hiccstrid fic. but the concept is super bad bye 👋 yuck 🤢 sounds like wank

re: we all hate snotlout… - sounds super boring. i don’t associate with snotlout haters, didn’t know there were any, sounds like stuff written by like 12 yr olds tbh.

re: hiccup suddenly has a sister - never heard of this? unless it’s half siblings hiccup and astrid then hoo boy ✔️✔️👍🏾👌🏾👌🏾👍🏾💯✔️✔️👌🏾👌🏾👌🏾that’s some good Shit. if it’s not ??? whatever tbh. sounds kinda like a self insert Mary Sue kinda concept. 12 yr olds? hmm? eh let them have their fun. I’m not interested personally. oh shit tho,,, u know that part of rtte when hiccup thought heather was his sister for like half a day? shit i would have been up for that ??????? ??? that was ACTUALLY a twist. im good with berserker siblings tho so it’s fine she’s not.

[kingofthewilderwest]

On Toothless' speed in the defenders of berk series he can break the speed of sound (1200km/h) but that is non canon. In the film after the first shot on the red death to toothless covers roughly 300m in under a second which yo me is faster than 60mp/h. Otherwise in the books dragons can go in a flight mode just under he speed of sound (book 5 I believe). So imagine something as aerodynamic as toothless flapping and diving. There is no sonic boom so he doesn't reach the speed of sound.

The speeds at which the dragons can fly are certainly impressive! I love thinking about it! They are creatures who have been built for the skies, and that is manifested in ways like how quickly they can fly. It makes the dragons more aweing, knowing these abilities. I feel as though the speed of sound breakage that we could be seeing in Defenders of Berk is meant to be a dramatic artistic effect moreso than something precisely literal. But they still are freakishly fast.

What is cool is that in The Art of How to Train Your Dragon, the animators discuss how quickly they intended the dragons to be flying. I’ve chatted in depth about how fast Toothless can fly in the DreamWorks HTTYD franchise based upon the material given in The Art of How to Train Your Dragon. I’m guessing you could be responding to that old post since you say Toothless seems to fly over 300m in a second - faster than the estimated 60mph speed I mentioned in that analysis. (300 m/s is about 670 mph).

While I know there are simple ways to calculate how fast a character moves on screen, I personally would put the word of the animation studio first. They would have done their own calculations to get Toothless moving at appropriate speeds. They state straight out what they intended with their own animation. If they say that they’re intending to animate Toothless flying over 100mph when he dives, then I believe them. That’s the effect they intended and that’s fact. 

At times they may have exaggerated the effect to make it more clear visually how fast Toothless is going. Visual effect is important in animation to get across certain “feels” - and we know that one wanted feel to show was Toothless’ fastness. And the fact Toothless is often coming out of a dive (which is over 100mph, they said) means that he’ll be going screeching fast in the Red Death fight, even when he’s shooting forward horizontally. Toothless is flying faster than 60mph. His fastest horizontal speed is probably going to be somewhere around 60mph, but upon coming out of a dive - yes, he’ll be faster.

We do know that there are several instances in which factors like speed and size have been exaggerated for effect in HTTYD. For instance, we also know that there are several shots in the final battle with the Red Death where the dragon was made larger than she actually was. If I remember the scene right, when Toothless is flying over the back of the Red Death, they actually scaled the Red Death much larger to make the moment more dramatic.

So I stand where the animation studio themselves stand about Toothless’ speeds! As they say in The Art of How to Train Your Dragon, when he dives, he’s going over 100 mph! That might not be speed of sound breakage, but it’s definitely something incredible - and places Toothless as one of the fastest creatures in the world.

Now, regarding canon XD …

I personally believe the television series should be called canon because it is an official production by DreamWorks released publicly to audiences. “Canon” to me is a term that denotes any official materials released, distinguishing it from fan-made materials. I understand that for several reasons people are critical about what is and is not “considered canon,” but for me that line is easily met simply by determining whether an official studio created the material or a fan unofficially did. Defenders of Berk was created and released by DreamWorks. I will always analyze every bit of material within Defenders of Berk as full canon and my analyses reflect that perspective. I look at all material within officially released DreamWorks material and use all of it together to glean meaning from one of my favorite franchises.

Personally, I believe whether or not canon materials are perfectly consistent with one another or if they’re written by different authors is unimportant and overthought by fans. Canon doesn’t need to be perfectly synchronous - fiction is about having fun, not having a perfectly developed world that is 105% consistent with itself (all fiction has some holes anyway). Canon doesn’t even need to be consistent at simple levels to still be canon, in truth. If it wildly contradicts, whatever, it’s still canon. It still exists. There are at least a dozen different origin stories for Wonder Woman within DC Comics - all of which are equally canonical. There are many notable “contradictions” that occur between different comic books, easy to see for instance by looking at materials before and after The New 52 reboot (just to give one example). There are many, many, many different authors who have written for Superman, and as is such, there are different personas that can seen - his personality will change a little (or a lot) based on who writes him. But he’s still always Superman, the fact someone else wrote Superman doesn’t make this any less a canon story about Superman, and the fact that there are contradictions between how other people wrote Superman still doesn’t make this any less a canon story about Superman. And if we want to look at human mythology, last I checked, all the different conflicting myths were are still equal “canon” real myths!

So the fact that Riders of Berk, Defenders of Berk, and Race to the Edge weren’t written straight from Dean DeBlois and Chris Sanders doesn’t matter. If we went by an author = canon argument, then technically we can’t call the HTTYD movies themselves canon. They weren’t written by the creator of HTTYD, Cressida Cowell!

Even with a single maker in a single movie, we get contradictions (Cressida Cowell is full of contradictions in the HTTYD series, actually). We as fans can choose how we handle the contradictions, but that’s just us making sense of the world we’ve been given from canonical materials. It doesn’t mean those materials aren’t canon.

Sure, consistency can be nice. Fans like consistency because it can help us make sense of the fiction world in which we are enveloped. Consistency isn’t necessary for canon. Consistency is something that I think fans want so badly, that they’ll “take and leave” materials based on how “accurate” it is to their standard. If something doesn’t meet their standard of consistent accuracy, then they often decide it’s not canon.

I’m not someone who’s going to pick and choose. You can if you want, no worries, but I won’t myself. Movies aren’t more canon than television shows or books. I’ll acknowledge inconsistencies where they are, but for the purpose of analyzing in-universe, what I like to do is just take all information and try to make a good consistent account best I can! XD

[jillmckenzie1]

Cinema Latino

Insomnia and I have been bitter sisters for a long time now. She knows my secrets and reminds me of them, over and over and over during the tiny hours when all sensible and peaceable people should be sound asleep. I admit that some of this is my own fault. My two favorite cocktails war it out; Sudafed and caffeine team up against melatonin and merlot. Eventually I decide that the drugs aren’t making me feel better, they’re just making me feel a different kind of bad. Then it’s back to just me and Insomnia in a monogamous, monotonous relationship. I lie awake and fester in my thoughts, or walk around my tiny house, or read boring books for hours. I’m currently reading an endless saga of Ice Age people who saunter across Asia in real time, stopping occasionally to have some bad sex. Eventually, morning comes (if not as quickly and enthusiastically as the book’s characters) and, bleary-eyed and jangly, I saunter over to Aurora, because Asia is too far away.

I don’t have a lot of business in Aurora, although there’s some cool stuff happening in the arts district. I wandered over there because I have a long-running self-improvement campaign in place and “maintain my Spanish skills” is part of that. I landed in the parking lot of Sonora Cinemas, a Spanish-language movie theater on 6th and Peoria at 10am on a Sunday morning, which is when the cool people all show up to the movies.

I’m a fan of low-brow venues and dive bars and have spent a non-negligible amount of time at the Elvis Cinema, which has cheap prices, dark hallways, and sticky floors. The Sonora is not that. It’s big, bright, and sparkling clean. Your feet practically bounce off the carpet. The smartly-dressed manager asked in English to assist me. I requested a ticket for How to Train Your Dragon: Hidden World. He explained that that film was only in Spanish. I am a six-foot, blue-eyed, natural blonde–more Cameron Diaz than America Ferrera. I appreciated his courtesy, but replied that Spanish-only was fine. I used to get the same question at theaters when I lived in Latin America and conducted the entire ticket transaction in Spanish. I look unequivocally white-bread.

I find my seat in Theater Two. I am the only person in this theater. I even turned on my cell phone flashlight to check out the dark corners of the seating area. It’s completely empty. So basically, I went from the dark, empty solitude of my sleepless bedroom to the dark, empty solitude of a weekend-morning movie theater. #Winning. I spread out and put my feet up. Even though every sign on the doors warned in Spanish that outside food is not allowed, I snuck in my own snacks. My 2019 nutrition plan doesn’t include Raisinettes. I brought a refillable water bottle and a navel orange because I am extremely cool and also, pooping in your 30s is a different game than pooping in your 20s.

I picked HTTYD in Spanish, no subtitles, both because I didn’t want the crutch of reading the text in either language and because I thought a cartoon would be easier for my rusty language skills to handle, although it’s harder to read lip and facial cues on a cartoon character. I’m gonna say this: HTTYD3 is not Dreamwork’s masterpiece. I remember reading a Gabriel Garcia Marquez novel in college in the original Spanish, and being totally befuddled by it. I got a copy in English to clarify the narrative, only to discover that it was just as bizarre in English and I had understood it perfectly in Spanish to begin with. I felt the same way about this movie; it felt entirely unnecessary and full of contrived weirdness. Maybe I didn’t get on the HTTYD wagon soon enough in the franchise? Maybe something was lost in translation? I’m pretty sure I got the gist of the movie…the problem was that there wasn’t much gist to be gotten. Lots of dragons, a villain, a noble young hero, fire and explosions abound. Spoiler alert: the good guy won. I think the bad guy got swallowed by the ocean or something suitably tasteful and punishing.

This is the point where I rant about why Hollywood makes so many terrible movies: they make them for the world market and explosions don’t require dialogue, much less subtitles or translation. More profit, but lots of boring, flammable plotlines out there lately. Sadly, this has even infected “children’s” movies like HTTYD. I actually fell asleep during the movie, which tells you that Sonora’s seats are comfortable, the movie was tepid, and that insomnia really does end in Aurora.

On my way out I checked out the bathrooms because there is nothing more important than bathrooms in a venue. I am happy to report that they were glittering and spotless. Countertops and floors were bone-dry. The dispensers had soap, the towels were stocked. Lovely. The manager smiled at me as I walked out and invited me to return again soon.

A fellow was standing by the door of the theater as I walked outside.

“Oh, my god!” he exclaimed, in Spanish. “Where the f— did you come from? What’s going on here?!”

I have to take this as evidence that he didn’t expect me, the white lady, to be there, which is kind of the reason I was there. This is where I get philosophical. Why leave the house when you can see everything in the world on Netflix or Hulu at home? Putting on pants is such a drag. My reasons to be there were many of the same ones that make me support live theater and music. There’s something about a social, group experience that makes it entirely different than listening  or watching alone in your bedroom. And if you make an effort to be somewhere that most people “like you” are not, it expands your world. You see new things and meet new people who remind you that the world is a very big, highly variegated place. It’s good for your soul and your language-processing brain lobes to do something outside your norm. Take a risk. Head to Aurora. There are some new releases playing in the matinee.

from Blog https://ondenver.com/cinema-latino/