Dear Jonah Goldberg: Did We Really Go to the Same Dragon Movie?

by Jeff Johnson

Dear Jonah Goldberg,

Did we really go to the same dragon movie? And you watched it twice with your proto-meta-pseudo-post-Hollyweird-what-spineless-moral-would-liberal-wusses-bury-in-it glasses? Because I just watched it with some giant gray IMAX goggles. And I didn’t see some “in life, there are no villains,” subtext. I just saw a bunch of fatheaded Vikings who were stubbornly torching a lot of their own resources, energy and lives stuck fighting an enemy primarily because they were morons who lived on a tiny island where all of their Viking stuff-like sheep, for example, were easy pickins’ for predators. (Incidentally, I thought Vikings, you know, explored more, got the hell out of geographic locations that didn’t work and also didn’t have Scottish accents. I hate cartoon characters with Scottish accents.)

Anyway, in the film were the Vikings ever really scolded or chastised for not investigating any alternatives or attempting any acts of diplomacy or trying to understand the dragons? Not really. Were they “wrong” to want to kill them? No. Because how would they know anything different?

Things only changed for the Vikings because they were enlightened by one of their own-that little annoying Hiccup sucker-a kid who was on their side, and desperately wanted to prove it, but whom the Vikings judged just as harshly as they judged the dragons. And Hiccup was enlightened only because he took down a dragon and went looking for its corpse. Had he been some non-violent objector, none of this would have happened.

When he found the injured dragon, the whole Viking way of life began to change. Sure, he and the dragon became quasi-buddies, but more importantly Hiccup was an innovator, in a way that should make a patriotic, “we are never wrong” American audience very happy. Because Hiccup’s innovations weren’t based on better ways at being a mealy mouthed pussy who thinks the Western mindset is poisonous, wrong and that everyone should have free health insurance.

No, instead of fighting with the dragons, Hiccup smartly learned to fly atop one of them. In that sense, one might argue that he was doing a lot more for the Vikings than his dad was, unless you see the Viking vs. Dragon, Itchy vs. Scratchy existence as somehow beneficial to Vikings staying alive and advancing. Anyway, by the end of the film, sure, the dragons were allies with the Vikings, but they were clearly the beast in the relationship. Man still dominated. Hence the title “How to Train YOUR Dragon.” It’s not “How to acquiesce in the face of any challenge.”

Answer this question Jonah Goldberg: Did the Vikings have flight before Hiccup saved that dragon and teamed up with him?

A: No.

Answer this question, too: Did the Vikings ultimately need flight to defeat the real enemy, the huge, nearly planet-sized dragon whom they awakened from the bowels of some furnace-like cave?

A: Yes.

Does this giant dragon, in your eyes, NOT count as a REAL villain in this movie? Or do you think all the little kids left the theater wanting to cuddle with that fucker? Did the Vikings not benefit by adapting to a changing world, instead of merely shooting first and asking questions later? Was there or was there not still some high-octane bloodlust and violence when they fought and ultimately defeated it? Was the scene where the one Viking with the missing arm and missing leg fishing around in his empty beer mug for his silver tooth, finding it, then hammering it back into place in his mouth with his empty mug NOT the coolest thing in a movie in, like, the last decade?

Now take all of these questions, these answers, your answers, and your original column and stuff ‘em.

Is the world NOT more complex than monsters vs. no monsters? Do you not give your daughter any credit for appreciating a film with a bit more nuance than just “Kill bad guys”? Was your column kind of a little wink, designed to show off that you’re an easy-going dad, while still ultimately pushing your political agenda through your fraudulent interpretation of the film?

And this one, too: Don’t you think if every heterosexual American male just reached out and found one Middle Eastern Muslim man to give a non-sexual hot oil massage for no longer than 60 minutes that all of our problems except our debt to China, would magically evaporate?

I’m just kidding on that one, Goldberg! Still reading?

The problem with your critique of the film is the same as that of the age-old argument your ilk uses anytime a situation like this happens. When anyone dares to say, “Well, this is a stupid war,” you somehow equate that with a desire to understand the enemy, do some group therapy with them and therefore not support the troops. In the case of this film, however, Hiccup was supporting the troops-and his own civilization- by TRAINING THE MOTHERFUCKING DRAGON, and sure he said some stuff about how the dragons were misunderstood by Vikings, but the film culminated in a giant rumble, amigo, in which the Vikings and dragons fought side by side to defeat a bigger enemy. Sometimes life is not just about not fighting, it’s about fighting smarter and choosing your battles wisely-not because you want to understand your enemy and wave a white flag, but because you want to live to fight another day. And win.