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Turns out, audiences DO want live-action cartoon remakes, if they're Lilo & Stitch and How to Train Your Dragon

You can't argue with box office results, and the box office is telling studios that people really want to revisit old favorites in live-action do-overs if the success of Lilo & Stitch and How to Train Your Dragon is anything to go by

Graeme McMillan
News by Graeme McMillan, Editor
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Consider all talk of audiences not wanting live-action remakes of animated classics — something talked about a lot in the wake of Disney’s Snow White flopping at the box office earlier this year — a thing of the past, with the two live-action remakes currently in theaters hitting box office highs this weekend.

Variety reports that the worldwide opening weekend of DreamWorks Animation and Universal’s How to Train Your Dragon was on track to score close to $200 million in its opening weekend, while Disney’s Lilo & Stitch remake pulled over the $850 million mark after just four weeks, tracking to be the year’s first movie to hit a billion dollars in global box office take in its theatrical release. Clearly, audiences are still into live-action remakes of some movies.

How to Train Your Dragon outperformed expectations with an $83.7 million opening weekend in the US, which marks a new high for the franchise overall. It’s been such a hit, in fact, that a sequel is already in the works for a 2027 release — something that director Dean DeBlois admitted he was nervous about the studio announcing before the first remake opened.

“I'm like, maybe we should just release the movie first and see if people like it before you go and announce another one?” he joked to Entertainment Weekly after the project was announced at CinemaCon 2025.

Maybe Disney should have announced a second live-action Lilo & Stitch at the same time, as well, given how well that movie is doing with audiences around the world. Well, there’s always the next D23 Expo in 2026 to break that news…!

Both How to Train Your Dragon and Lilo & Stitch are in theaters now. How to Train Your Dragon 2 will fly into theaters June 11, 2027.

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Graeme McMillan

Graeme McMillan: Popverse Editor Graeme McMillan (he/him) has been writing about comics, culture, and comics culture on the internet for close to two decades at this point, which is terrifying to admit. He completely understands if you have problems understanding his accent.

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