Dean DeBlois To Helm Live-Action ‘How To Train Your Dragon’ Adaptation

Dean DeBlois is set to make his live-action feature directorial debut, and it will be on a property with which he’s intimately familiar.

A live-action adaptation of Dreamworks’ animated feature How To Train Your Dragon is in the works at Universal and should land in theaters in 2025.

Film details:

• Dean DeBlois, the three-time Oscar-nominated writer and director of the original trilogy, will be back to write, direct, and produce the live-action adaptation, slated to hit theaters on March 14, 2025. DeBlois’ impressive resume includes co-writing and co-directing Lilo & Stitch with Chris Sanders (who also co-directed the first HTTYD film) and a story co-head credit on Mulan.
• The original How to Train Your Dragon animated feature, released in 2010, was adapted by Dreamworks Animation from Cressida Cowell’s popular children’s book series. The feature film trilogy eventually grossed more than $1.6 billion globally and spawned animated series adaptations, live shows, theme park rides, and a merchandising empire.
• DeBlois’ thinking regarding live-action remakes looks to have evolved. At Annecy 2020, when asked for his opinion on the Hollywood trend of remaking animation projects as live action, DeBlois said, “I’m not interested in them. I haven’t seen many of them. They’re made by capable filmmakers, and I don’t want to disparage any of the talent or the hard work that went into them, I just think that it’s lazy on the part of the studio… I think it’s easy to go back to something successful that a really talented team put a lot of years of hard work into and then redo it… but to me, that is a missed opportunity to put something original into the world.”
• That may bode well for a How to Train Your Dragon live-action remake, as DeBlois will likely be looking to do something original with his adaptation. Another key difference here seems to be that the talented team, or at least the talented writer-director of the original, will be at the helm of this live-action remake.
• Universal’s vp of production development Lexi Barta will oversee the new version of How to Train Your Dragon. Oscar-nominated producer Marc Platt (La La Land, Bridge of Spies) will produce for his Universal-based company Marc Platt Productions alongside Adam Siegel, president of Marc Platt Productions.