Aimee Garcia Teases ‘How to Train Your Dragon’ Easter Eggs in ‘Dragons: The Nine Realms’ Season 4: ‘A Little Wink for the OG Fans’ (Exclusive)

Dragons: The Nine Realms Season 4 just launched on Peacock and Hulu, continuing the adventures of the modern Dragon Riders. The series takes place 1,300 years after the events of How to Train Your Dragon and stars a phenomenal voice cast that includes Aimee Garcia (Dexter, Lucifer). Recently, PopCulture.com had a chance to chat with Garcia about the show, and she teased that the new episodes have some Easter Eggs that throwback to the original How to Train Your Dragon movie from 2010.

“What I love about this season is there are a lot of Easter eggs to the original franchise,” Garcia told us. “So I feel like people will… There may or may not be some really fun little Easter eggs thrown at the movie that started it all. So a little wink for the OG fans.” She also confessed that she always knew the show would run for multiple seasons, explaining, “I re-watched the [new] episodes last night, and I have such a good time. I love that the dragons have almost bigger personalities than the kids. I always have a smile on my face, and it’s just fun. I feel like we need just good fun that you can watch with the whole family. You can watch with your friends. And so, I’m not that surprised, I got to say.”

In the show, Garcia voices Alexandra “Alex” Gonzalez, the team’s tech expert/hacker, who, as Garcia tells it, is “too much of a realist, which is why we love her.” Garcia added, “She is a glass-half-empty kind of girl. I love it when they’re like, ‘This is a new realm,’ and she’s like, ‘There’s probably danger lurking everywhere.’” The actress went on to say, “She’s definitely your pessimistic, socially awkward person. But I think we see her continuing to open up her shell. She definitely prefers, at least first season, technology to humans, because tech is more predictable than people and animals. But I think that Feathers, her dragon, and the other dragon riders, and her friends, they’ve really kind of made her come out of her shell.”

Offering some insight into how Alex’s mind works, Garcia explained, “She’s the kind of person that will be facing imminent danger and be like, ‘I really should have just stayed in bed.’ But she showed up, she’s there, and she helps, and she’s a team player, and she’s collaborative, and she uses her tech smarts to always get them out of harm’s way. But she does it still a little bit begrudgingly, which is why we love her.”

Teasing what’s to come for Alex this season, Garci shared, “One of my favorite episodes, I don’t want to give spoilers, but there’s just cuteness overload on one of the dragons where it’s like you have that kind of Mandalorian, where you just bust your heart open and you’re just like, ‘Oh my gosh, that’s too cute…’ and everyone’s like fawning over this little nugget of adorability.” She added, “[Alex] will continue to come out of shell, and she may or may not have a best friend, which is a big deal for her because she’s not the most extroverted person. So she may or may not have a best friend who is the most unlikely of best friends.”

Part of what Garcia loves so much about being part of Dragons: The Nine Realms, is how diverse the characters are, which she agrees has a positive influence on younger viewers, and how much it also has to offer older fans. “Obviously there’s action and there’s dragons and there’s like they’re flying, and that’s so fun for kids because it’s totally adventure-packed,” she said. “But, as an adult, when I watch it, I learn from it.”

She continued, “There’s something in there that’s like, ‘Look, just because you don’t like it or you don’t understand doesn’t mean you still can’t be a part of it.’ And I’m like, ‘Wow, that’s a good lesson.’ So I think there’s something for everybody.” 

Noting how having an eclectic group of people in your life can be formidable, Garcia added, “I think that’s what’s so cool about this, starting from the original that the dragons bring out their best qualities, and these kids learn just as much from the dragons as the dragons learn about them. So it has that kind of universality that I think will make it maybe even go longer than four seasons.” All six episodes of Dragons: The Nine Realms Season 4, as well as seasons 1-3, are now streaming on both Hulu and Peacock.