And...Yep...I'm a Nerd

16 Jun 2014, 23:17

Were they ever planning to flesh out her reasons for not returning? As I recall, the only thing we ever got was that she felt she would have been endangering Hiccup. I have to admit that left me a bit unsatisfied. I just felt there's so much more I wanted to know about this character. What you just said about losing priorities is particularly interesting.

valkasboy

16 Jun 2014, 23:54

And...Yep...I'm a Nerd

16 Jun 2014, 23:17

Were they ever planning to flesh out her reasons for not returning? As I recall, the only thing we ever got was that she felt she would have been endangering Hiccup. I have to admit that left me a bit unsatisfied. I just felt there's so much more I wanted to know about this character. What you just said about losing priorities is particularly interesting.

Oh my gods! so many versions! Most of them only in storyboard form. They went round and round on whether Valka should think that Hiccup and Stoick had died in the attack. There was one version where Hiccup asks her why she didn't come back and she says "I did" then we launch into yet another flashback where you see Valka and Cloudjumper returning to Berk and seeing Stoick and a five year old Hiccup in the forest. She remains hidden as she witnesses her husband trying to teach her son how to slaughter a dragon using a fallen log as a substitute. She hangs her head and slips away. So, yeah, lots of stuff was tried.

underwater-smiles

16 Jun 2014, 23:46

good point. The alpha kinda screwed everyone who needs/uses a dragon to fight over, really. And it did seem a bit out of place when they made her confront Drago, too. It just seemed out of character for her to do so.
I also think everyone but Toothless and Hiccup were sort of "sidelined" in, at least, the final battle. It was totally up to Hiccup and Toothless to finish off Drago and the Alpha, which really went against the themes building up throughout the movie of "teamwork! family! help one another!".

underwater-smiles

16 Jun 2014, 23:28

[...] And another thing, how was she "on the sidelines"? She was in the middle of the battle the entire time! She did just as much as either Stoick or Hiccup did. She gets taken down by Drago and puts up a fight as long as she can. She's obviously never been a fighter, seen in the flash-backs, so how could she hold her own against someone like Drago?

valkasboy

16 Jun 2014, 22:47

[...] One thing I would like to caution people against, however, is laying all of this at Dean's doorstep. It's true, Dean's original vision for the film had Valka as a darker character, and Drago was not going to appear until film 3. But, I would not place the blame for the changes on Dean. He received many notes from multiple sources that he was obliged to deal with, and in my opinion he's a magician for being able to make a largely coherent movie considering the barrage of requests that he was deluged with. Some others may have thrown up their arms and quit, but he's a strong, patient, and insightful filmmaker and easily one of the best directors in the business.

I like Valka's flaws, it makes her interesting. She was always meant to represent the end of a path that Hiccup could go down, a mistaken path. Drago was a little like that too, in a different way. I think, as her animator, I would have preferred portraying her more like that, it would have been juicy! But early test audiences weren't liking it. Personally, I don't like the notion of relying on test screenings to shape your work, I think we should just make what we want to make.

[...] The last moment to go was right after Valka and Hiccup hug in the snow, she then said "Right, we'll start by rescuing Berk's dragons!" and a little argument ensued. It was a good moment for Hiccup as he realized that Valka's way, as much as Stoick's way, was not him.

I understand why the changes were made, I mean having your dad die, AND your mum revealed to be a psycho is a little much for one movie, well, for a general audience anyway. The hardcore fans probably would have liked it. [...]

valkasboy

16 Jun 2014, 23:54

And...Yep...I'm a Nerd

16 Jun 2014, 23:17

Were they ever planning to flesh out her reasons for not returning? As I recall, the only thing we ever got was that she felt she would have been endangering Hiccup. I have to admit that left me a bit unsatisfied. I just felt there's so much more I wanted to know about this character. What you just said about losing priorities is particularly interesting.

Oh my gods! so many versions! Most of them only in storyboard form. They went round and round on whether Valka should think that Hiccup and Stoick had died in the attack. There was one version where Hiccup asks her why she didn't come back and she says "I did" then we launch into yet another flashback where you see Valka and Cloudjumper returning to Berk and seeing Stoick and a five year old Hiccup in the forest. She remains hidden as she witnesses her husband trying to teach her son how to slaughter a dragon using a fallen log as a substitute. She hangs her head and slips away. So, yeah, lots of stuff was tried.

puxlit

17 Jun 2014, 00:07

underwater-smiles

16 Jun 2014, 23:28

[...] And another thing, how was she "on the sidelines"? She was in the middle of the battle the entire time! She did just as much as either Stoick or Hiccup did. She gets taken down by Drago and puts up a fight as long as she can. She's obviously never been a fighter, seen in the flash-backs, so how could she hold her own against someone like Drago?

It's not that she was physically sidelined; it's that her importance in the story as a character dissipated. After an hour of setup, her biggest contribution from the reunion onwards was to give Hiccup a morale boost.

underwater-smiles

16 Jun 2014, 23:46

I also think everyone but Toothless and Hiccup were sort of "sidelined" in, at least, the final battle. It was totally up to Hiccup and Toothless to finish off Drago and the Alpha, which really went against the themes building up throughout the movie of "teamwork! family! help one another!".

Eret

17 Jun 2014, 00:05

What was the reasoning against making her think stoick and hiccup had died?

valkasboy

17 Jun 2014, 00:27

Eret

17 Jun 2014, 00:05

What was the reasoning against making her think stoick and hiccup had died?

At the time Dean was keen to make it her choice to stay with the dragons, which worked well when she was a little more antagonistic. When she lightened up, her decision became more problematic, but thinking Hiccup was dead would have changed so many of her initial reactions, which had already been animated, that it would have been impossible to redo it all. Such is the nature of the beast.