In "How To Train Your Dragon," why do the adults all have Irish accents, while the children sound like Americans?

My guess is that it’s targeted at American kids. The kids aren’t going to identify with the adults, so they can be given a secondary function as scenery.

Actually that’s a Scottish accent you’re hearing, not Irish. Even so, there was a lot of criticism, since they’re Vikings, not Scots. And there was also criticism for the kids having American accents.

Irish. Scottish.
I’m from Alaska. I don’t know the difference. XD Sorry.

@AshLeigh it doesn’t matter in the US. Most Irish people are a third Scotch. Most Scotch are a third Irish. Irish are the bad boy/girl with a heart of gold. Scotch are the nice boy/girl you don’t want to piss off, as they bring a surprising amount of kick ass.

The adults have Scottish accents because Scottish accents are scary, apparently. The kids are on the good side, so they get ‘normal’ accents.

Here is one reasonable answer:

”
“A lot of people have speculated as to just why the movie has the Vikings speak with Scottish accents. The reason is because the audiobook, released in 2004, is read by acclaimed actor David Tennant, who is Scottish. The way he voices several characters is quite similar to the film, notably with Gobber and Stoick.”

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dh28W9Lqw2w

@Imadethisupwithnoforethought.

“The use of Scotch to mean ‘of or relating to Scotland or its people’ is disliked by many Scottish people and is now uncommon in modern English. It survives in a number of fixed expressions, such as Scotch broth and Scotch whisky.” Dictionary.com

When I ask questions like this, my husband always says, “It’s a movie, honey. Don’t look for logic. Just watch it.”

@Nullo good answer! Kinda like the “Wah Wah Wahhhh” voices of the adults in the Charlie Brown cartoons. Secondary and of less importance.

Have you ever seen a movie starring Hayley Mills? Take The Parent Trap, for example. Twins separated at birth that are raised in the US by US parents. One lives in Boston and the other in California. No child cared, and probably never noticed that the ‘twins’ had a British accent. Children typically don’t pick up on this type of flaw.

I suspect the producers didn’t have the time or patience to provide adequte accent coaching to the kids so they just didn’t bother.

…except the kids weren’t voiced by kids. And the adults were voiced by native Scots. IMDB puts their budget at $165,000,000: at that level you can have pretty much any actor in the world, and they cast the way they did for a reason. I think @Jeruba‘s husband is actually a little bit too dismissive of the amount of thought that goes into these things!