Roundabout way of getting a D&D story on-screen…

During the mysterious early 2020s, a YouTube channel known as Critical Role hit critical mass. With a cast of voice acting talent and professional production values, they brought the reality of tabletop RPG gameplay home to both existing fans and curious tourists alike. While shows like Stranger Things brought attention to the hobby, theirs was a glorified, Hollywood-ified snippet.

The team from Critical Role showed everything from start to finish at the tabletop. And their inaugural campaign, Vox Machina, eventually transformed into an animated series, voiced by the actual players (with heavy additions to the cast of NPCs to relieve the burden on DM Matt Mercer, who still gets plenty of airtime on the show).

The Legend of Vox Machina is fairly straightforward heroic fare. Unlikely heroes. World-threatening villains. What they bring to the table (or… from the table) are two elements that set LoVM apart from most shows.

1. The characters hardly need any introduction. I don’t mean because people already know them. You can go right in blind, and in fairly short order, the characters introduce themselves through dialogue and actions. It’s not a writer or even a team of writers coming up with the script. These were people playing characters, and they were playing as these characters. The art direction helped, as well. You didn’t need to be told ahead of time that Vex’halia and Vax’ildan are brother and sister. They have a strong enough family resemblance AND they act like siblings. You don’t need flashback cut scenes to show that Grog and Pike are especially close friends, they act like it. A writer can only hope their character work develops that kind of immediate chemistry.
2. Unpredictability. So much, especially fantasy fare, gets drawn into the inexorable gravity of genre expectations. Yes, some standard tropes show up and play their part on the stage for a while. But the characters veer from common expectations. Their motivations don’t mold around the plot; the plot shifts because of their actions. There are consequences to these unexpected actions, and you can see how they shape the narrative downstream in ways that a writer with a set ending in mind might not have allowed.

By modern animation standards, the visuals are solid, if unspectacular. Some of the bigger monsters (especially dragons) use a mix of CG, and it works fine. But there’s a level of voice work you rarely get in western animation, most obviously due to the VAs knowing their characters so well. Also, there are legitimate songs in this, sung by those same VAs (OK, mostly just the bard, but hey…).

I’d say that this is an excellent way to introduce new players to the core ideas of the game, but there’s a huge caveat: this is definitely TV-MA territory. Your first introduction to the party’s bard is during a sexual encounter, and there are (*SPOILERS FOR THE NUMBER*) hookups within the party. Violence in a D&D world is rampant, and LoVM’s depictions are unflinching. Animated or not, people and monsters die some gruesome deaths. So… in short (too late), it’s not something to show kids to hype them up to play.

Still, if you thought the recent Honor Among Thieves was the only good D&D on screen to enjoy, give The Legend of Vox Machina a chance to change your mind.

Check it out on Amazon or the original Critical Role (S1E1) on YouTube