Netflix Retrospective - Dragons: Race to the Edge season 3 episodes 1-3

It’s been a while since we last checked in with hiccup and the gang, and with May also bringing my How To Train Your Dragon: The Hidden World review, it’s as good a time as any to take another look at race to the edge.

The Enemy of My Enemy

It’s a new day at the edge and Hiccup, despite being the defacto leader of the team, is feeling the need to sneak out to ride, against Toothless’ objection. It fails spectacularly as Astrid is right outside as he’s about to leave. It’s apparently been months since Viggo’s attack and Hiccup had planned to do recon, alone, without any support. Toothless is not fond of the dragon armour Hiccup was trying to make him wear. He’s also sporting a new tail that’s sure to be a great product for kids to buy.

Hiccup leaves as Astrid offers her support and goes to get Stormfly because he’s a dick like that. He sees a boat and tries to get a closer look, finding what seems to be unconscious dragon hunters, they were playing possum to draw them in. I’m pretty sure you didn’t need to be that close to see. They fire dragon root arrows and one hits toothless as they pull up. They crash on a nearby island, and now have to wait for the dragon root to run its course. Of course, the hunters are right on their tail, well, all 4 of them that they could afford to animate at once.

Hiccup hides Toothless in a cave and covers its entrance with leaves, with the amount of noise Toothless is making, the hunters should’ve found him first, but Hiccup stepping on a branch gives him away first and a low-budget chase scene ensues. During the chase, someone seems to be taking down the attacker, even saving Hiccup’s life at one point. Seeing the hunters regroup, Hiccup retreats back to Toothless and this time his noise does attract attention. Hiccup prepares to defend him but the Hunters are taken down (all off-screen)

Turns out the guy taking them down is Dagur, who’s back very quickly after turning against Viggo at the end of the last season. He helps Hiccup move Toothless away from the guards. Dagur and Hiccup’s dynamic makes for some good humorous moments, with the obvious mistrust between them and Dagur’s erratic, somewhat crazy nature being a driving fore for most of this episode.

Dagur hides Hiccup and Toothless in a cave under the waterfall. Dagur’s change of heart came from being stranded here for months with nothing to do but self-reflect. Toothless isn’t holding up well, Dagur mentions that he saw Ryker and Viggo discussing a dragon root antidote, with ingredients that, much to the convenience of the plot, can be found on the island. He gives Hiccup a sword to defend himself as they go out and fetch the ingredients.

The first ingredient is Bitterweed, a darker variant of the plant Dagur is staring at. Dagur further elaborates that growing to care about Heather, a living relative, makes being selfish no longer a desirable endeavour. They find Bitterweed, guarded by a Changewing but just in case you’re worried an action scene may ensue, Dagur uses a whistle to get the dragon to resume sleeping. Phew

Next ingredient is Firefern branches, they find some easily, but Hiccup injures his hand trying to collect it and Dagur takes him to the lake to help soothe the pain, and also collect fresh water as the next ingredient. Discussion quickly turns on Hiccup and his obsessive behaviour, and how Dagur, knows, from experience that it’s not a healthy way to live. Purple Oleander is the next ingredient, apparently the blue variant can kill a dragon so Hiccup is sceptic.

It’s atop a large rock pile that Hiccup starts to climb. Dragon Hunters begin to attack, Dagur resists killing them and then takes an arrow in the leg to protect Hiccup. Hiccup manages to take down the last Hunter and drags Dagur back to the cave. He prepares the antidote as Dagur recovers, now wearing a fancy sling around his arm, which is weird since I’m sure they shot him in the leg.

Hiccup gives Toothless the antidote but the moment Toothless starts acting up, he attacks Dagur, believing himself deceived, anyone want to tell him it may hurt as the antidote enters your system. They jostle over the waterfall and Dagur pins Hiccup down but just before we get any explanation, the hunters catch up with them. They threaten Hiccup with a branding iron which is pretty dark when you think about it, and Dagur decides to talk and lead them to the night fury. Of course, it’s a ploy to get close enough to the flame to burn through the ropes binding him.

Dagur runs off on his own, claiming Hiccup would slow him down. I hope Hiccup’s reaction was fake because it certainly sounds like it. Dagur head in for the rescue on Toothless, who to the surprise of no-one is fine once the antidote worked. Hiccup and Toothless attack the hunters, dispatching them from their ships, allowing Dagur to steal one and escape.

It’s a solid start for Hiccup, but I can’t help but feel leaving the other riders out of an opening episode might’ve been a mistake. Still, it’s a step forward for Dagur’s redemption which will last most of the rest of the show.

Rating 7.5/10

Crash Course

The gang are out collecting boulders for their catapults (except the twins, who are carving a statue of themselves) when they’re disturbed by a rumbling. Hiccup orders a retreat but since Astrid and Snotlout are carrying boulders, they’re unable to move quickly and Snotlout has issues cutting his netting. The rumbling is… somehow, the work of the fireworm queen, a long way from home as it turns out.

Given the history between the fireworm queen and Hookfang, she wants Hookfang to follow her, Hiccup notices some nasty scars implying she needs help defending herself. Hiccup and the others follow to back him up but when they arrive at her island, they see no Dragon Hunter ships around. In the cave, there’s some slime briefly foreshadowing what’s to come, as they arrive, they see a dragon burying through some rocks.

Fishlegs uses his new Dragon cards (available now $14.99) to identify it as a Cavern Crasher, a mystery class dragon that’s exceptionally fast, seemingly fire-proof and excretes a flammable gel, which the gang find out to their cost as the fire causes the cave to start collapsing. Snotlout, being the meathead that he is, charges after the fire-worm queen, who leads him down a tunnel into her hive, where she has her eggs, the main target of the Cavern Crasher.

The Cavern Crasher is with the others, it sprayed them with slime, meaning if the Crasher gets one good shot, they’re cooked alive. A couple of the eggs begin to hatch, and Snotlout gets to sing a lullaby to one, it’s quite sweet. The gang think they’ve trapped the Cavern crasher but its able to collapse its skeleton and squeeze through the cave-in.

With many of the eggs hatching at once, the noise is clearly attracting attention. Thankfully the stone carving skills of the nuts helps them through the cave-in. Hookfang and the others stand their ground but the Cavern crasher is uniquely skilled at countering their attacks. It also manages to use its slime trail to cut off the others off. Hookfang and the fireworm queen combine their firepower to use until the Crasher runs out of slime, giving them an opening to repel it, as the others arrive to back him up. There’s a sweet moment between Hiccup and Snotlout that follows as the episode comes to a close.

It’s one of the better Snotlout episodes

Rating 8/10

Follow the Leader

In some somewhat limited 2D-flash animation, we see Fishlegs dreaming of being put in charge of Dragons Edge and the adulation of women, including Gothi (yikes, that’s disturbing) Fishlegs is in his 3D design and it’s incredibly jarring, the styles just don’t mesh.

So, setup for this episode. Fishlegs is put in charge of the Edge whilst Hiccup and Astrid are away, but because Snotlout and the twins are douchebags, they don’t respect his authority. They drive Fishlegs away and he hears noise coming from a nearby cave, Fishlegs, thinking about proving his bravery, enters and finds a sword and a bunch of presumably ancient markings.

Unfortunately, when Hiccup and Astrid return, they discover the Twins have been up to no good, destroying their entire batch of monstrous nightmare gel. Hiccup tells to them to replace it and he doesn’t care how. And Hiccup gets to berate Fishlegs on his leadership. Hiccup, even on your best day, you’d struggle to force the twins to not do something they have their minds set on doing.

On continued exploration of the cave, Fishlegs falls into the inner tunnel and finds himself surrounded by what look to be night terrors. His antics and boar rinds seem to entertain them and they take him further into the cave, there’s a massive chamber where they could sleep but they’re also very not fond of the light and there’s a hole leading outside that needs to be covered.

Ruffnut and Tuffnut’s first attempt to get gel from a wild Monstrous Nightmare goes about as well as you’d expect. Snotlout, being a opportunist, offers to sell them more nightmare gel for a ‘reasonable, yet hefty price.’ Seriously though, if Hookfang could replace the gel in an instant, why is this B-plot even happening?

Fishlegs quickly creates a cover for the hole, using a pulley system to open and close it so they can come out at night. The dragons carry him to the ancient throne, they’re so pleased. Hiccup’s a little concerned about Fishlegs, and worries he might’ve been too hard on him earlier, gee, you think? The dragons become a little too friendly and don’t want to let Fishlegs leave, so attempts to leave, but as Meatlug heads through the hatch, the dragons close it, and tackle Fishlegs off her, she manages to escape but Fishlegs remains trapped.

Meatlug naturally goes to Hiccup and Toothless for help and soon the whole gang are there. Unfortunately the Night Terrors notice quickly and move to attack, Barf and Belch, Stormfly and Hookfang are soon separated from the group and Toothless is out of ammo. Fishlegs managed to escape and uses their distaste for loud noises he’d discovered earlier to keep them at bay.

This only works for so long, but allows them enough time to open the hatch and let in the now existent sunlight. Fishlegs uses the sword to reflect the light, to help protect the others as they make their escape. They thankfully close the hatch behind them, so as not to return things back to how they were.

Hiccup apologises to Fishlegs as the Twins once again blow up the nightmare gel. This was always a stupid non-conflict. But there’s something to be said as to how Fishlegs responds in a crisis. The episode ends with them geeking out over the sword.

It’s a middle of the road episode, the main driving factor of the plot seems contrived, and the rest rather formulaic.

Rating 6.5/10