Stream It Or Skip It: ‘Hilda and the Mountain King’ on Netflix, a Delightful Feature-Length Special That Wraps Dangling Plot Lines From ‘Hilda’ Season Two

The second season of Annie Award-winning Netflix cartoon series Hilda left fans extraordinarily cliffhung when its intrepid titular protagonist woke up one morning to find herself transformed into a troll, and, yes, bellow it with me into the hills, I HATE IT when that happens. The suspense concludes with feature-length special Hilda and the Mountain King, which picks up precisely at that pivotal development and resolves big chunks of the overarching plot from the series’ two seasons, before the third and final one comes along.

HILDA AND THE MOUNTAIN KING: STREAM IT OR SKIP IT?

The Gist: Hilda (voice of Bella Ramsey) now has a long funny nose, lives in the woods, will turn to stone when exposed to sunlight, is terrified by the sound of ringing bells, no longer wears clothes and appears to not be anatomically correct – which is a long way of saying she’s a troll. This is quite the inconvenience, especially for someone who’s used to being an 11-year-old human girl who wears a signature beret-and-scarf ensemble. Things aren’t much better at her apartment in Trolberg. Her mother Johanna (Daisy Haggard) is beside herself with worry for Hilda. And on top of that, Johanna’s taking care of a troll baby, Baba, in human form because some sort of body-swap spell is behind all this distressing folly, which positively reeks of Vice Versa if it was populated with Moomins.

Meanwhile, Trolberg’s chief of the safety patrol, Erik Ahlberg (John Hopkins), shows off some crazy new weaponry that’ll zap trolls into stone, in addition to the giant bells and towering wall that keeps the creatures away. So, yeah, the cops have been militarized. Oh boy. Hooray for everyone. Hilda’s best pals David (Oliver Nelson) and Frida (Ameerah Falzon-Ojo) choose to reject the message of a propaganda video they’re forced to watch in school, which demonizes the trolls as a bunch of beasts that live to devour humans whole – they know better, see, while many others choose to live with blinders on. The town is divided between those who fear the trolls and those who wish to broker peace with them. This situation positively reeks of a centuries-of-animosity type thing, or at least a two-seasons-of-Hilda type thing.

Back in the forest, Hilda meets two key trolls: One is a giant, the mountain king, Trundle (Dino Kelly), who asks Hilda to do him some favors for him in exchange for turning her back into a human, which positively reeks of a deal with the devil. (Totoro, he sure ain’t.) The other is an unnamed troll, Baba’s mother (Rachel August), who misses her cute little troublemaking offspring, but believes there’s no way to reverse the spell. Baba’s mother takes Hilda on a guided tour of underground troll life, and shows her some of the joys of being a troll, all the better to take a nice long walk in someone else’s shoes, even if they don’t wear shoes, because it’s a metaphor, see. Everything is about to collide – Hilda’s quest for her humanity, Trundle’s apparent ulterior motives, the safety patrol’s aggressive maneuvering, Johanna’s attempt to find her daughter, David and Frida’s attempts to reverse the spell – hopefully without too much violence and destruction, right? We hope.

What Movies Will It Remind You Of?: As you may know, Hilda adapts a series of graphic novels by Luke Pearson, and the simple and vibrant look and timeless storytelling style of the TV series has me hoping that Netflix’s upcoming adaptation of Jeff Smith’s wonderful Bone books is just as strong. ANYway, movie-wise, HATMK has the ebullient balance of visual clarity and thematic depth that we saw in slightly-off-the-beaten-track animated films such as Coraline and Kubo and the Two Strings – and frankly inspires one to yearn for more 2-D animated features.

Performance Worth Watching: Hilda wouldn’t have the air of self-assurance without the strong vocal performance of Bella Ramsey (who, you’ll maybe recall, aired a significant amount of self-assurance as the small-but-fierce Lady Mormont in Game of Thrones).

Memorable Dialogue: Erik the pro-violence cop doesn’t want to listen to his deputy when she suggests they act rationally with regards to the troll conflict: “Should we not be looking at ways to calm the situation rather than stir it up?”

Sex and Skin: None.

Our Take: I’ve already mentioned HATMK’s ebullient balance of visual clarity and thematic depth, and now I just want to reiterate that such ebullient balance of visual clarity and thematic depth is remarkably difficult to achieve. Too many youth-oriented movies and series tend to be plot-driven adventures that are as entertaining as they are shallow, or they tend to talk down to their audiences, underscoring ideas about the importance of family and such with all the subtlety of a volcanic eruption.

The movie’s depiction of ideological division in Trolberg is presented with a matter-of-factness that keenly avoids being preachy or condescending, and it’s against this rich background that Pearson – who wrote the screenplay – sets a somewhat traditional identity-quest story with fantastical creatures plucked from myth and folklore. He strikes a tone that counters a sturdy sense of dramatic consequence – and real-world socio-political parallels, gotta acknowledge the real-world socio-political parallels – with whimsy and light comedy.

The film is a delightful watch that’s also a plea for understanding and unity over distrust and segregation. It’s also brave enough to not reach a tidy happily-ever-after conclusion, but one that suggests compromise, moderation and incremental progress are the key to achieving something around or about communal harmony. I also laughed a handful of times. All this stuff is the perfect medicine for anyone wearied by the state of things – or just looking for a bit of an escape.

Our Call: STREAM IT. If Hilda and the Mountain King is your introduction to Hilda’s cartoon adventures, I imagine it’ll make you a fan. The initiated will likely find it rather satisfying as well. It’s lovely, lovely stuff.

John Serba is a freelance writer and film critic based in Grand Rapids, Michigan. Read more of his work at johnserbaatlarge.com.

Stream Hilda and the Mountain King on Netflix