Book of Dragons

Book of Dragons is a short animated film set in the world of How to Train Your Dragon. Hiccup, Astrid, Fishlegs and Gobber guide the viewer through the legendary Book of Dragons, the record of dragon lore kept by the Viking Bork the Bold, while Toothless makes his presence felt. Drawing on what they have learned as dragon trainers, they describe the creatures catalogued in the book, the classes they belong to, and the training methods the young Vikings have worked out for dragons that had never been seen before.

The film was directed by Steve Hickner, who wrote the screenplay with Bart Coughlin and Joshua Pruett, and produced by Ian Richter and Lisa J. Freberg for DreamWorks Animation. It followed Hickner's The Prince of Egypt and Bee Movie, and came before Kung Fu Panda: The Emperor's Quest. Jay Baruchel, Craig Ferguson and America Ferrera return to their roles from the feature film as Hiccup, Gobber and Astrid, with Christopher Mintz-Plasse as Fishlegs, Jim Cummings as Bork and Tress MacNeille as Bork's Wife.

Running 18 minutes, the short was released in 2011 and sits alongside the How to Train Your Dragon features as a piece of companion storytelling rather than a full-length adventure. On IMDb it holds a rating of 6.3 from around 3,600 votes, while on TMDB it scores 6.8 from roughly 200 votes, a modest but steady level of approval from viewers.