There’s a new movie premiering centred around the game: Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves. While it was announced months ago, I waited to seek out the trailer. But having seen it, I’m hooked. It looks fun, and it made me laugh at one point. That’s all I needed.
There are some hopes and aspirations I have, so I’ll share them.
Firstly, I hope the movie has jokes. And not only jokes, bad ones. Bad jokes that distract from the story, but are funny nonetheless. Jokes that feel pop-culture-heavy and dated, some of which break the 4th wall. When you get down to it, that’s half of the fun. To demonstrate, here are the highlights from my campaign:
When designing characters, which took an entire session, one of the participants created a Frankenstein’s monster from different body parts and armour. When asked to name the character, she chose the equivalent of “Generic Name”.
In our first story session, one of us, an orc, barged in a tavern and demanded food. When given a bowl of slop, he wolfed it down and belched loudly, creating a mess. My response? “Great, something else to clean up.”
Shortly afterward, said orc wandered off to go find The Sunless Citadel, which was our map. Along the way, he encountered three enemies made of wood. After defeating them, he proceeded to eat them.
Upon entering the cave to The Sunless Citadel, the whole party, myself included, bragged about lessons our in-game fathers had taught us.
When we got to a nearby cavern, I made a comment about dwarves and their height. This offended a fellow campaigner who was a dwarf mage, and he went on a rant the entire way down.
When it was my turn, I tossed a giant rock down to see what the distance was. It attracted three, large rats. But not to worry, once we defeated them the orc ate them too.
There was a narrow staircase leading to The Sunless Citadel. Since my character was acrophobic, or afraid of heights, I was strapped to the chest of another character, a giant, all the way to the bottom. “Generic Name” mentioned that if everything went poorly, they could throw me into the abyss. I then protested and explained that my character’s acrophobia stemmed from childhood trauma.
Once at the bottom, I accidentally activated a trap door. After arguing over who’d save me, the giant volunteered. Relieved, I said, “I guess I should consider you my ‘get out of trap free’ card!”
When we got to a nearby cavern, I made a comment about dwarves and their height. This offended a fellow campaigner who was a dwarf mage, and he went on a rant the entire way down.
When it was my turn, I tossed a giant rock down to see what the distance was. It attracted three, large rats. But not to worry, once we defeated them the orc ate them too.
There was a narrow staircase leading to The Sunless Citadel. Since my character was acrophobic, or afraid of heights, I was strapped to the chest of another character, a giant, all the way to the bottom. “Generic Name” mentioned that if everything went poorly, they could throw me into the abyss. I then protested and explained that my character’s acrophobia stemmed from childhood trauma.
Once at the bottom, I accidentally activated a trap door. After arguing over who’d save me, the giant volunteered. Relieved, I said, “I guess I should consider you my ‘get out of trap free’ card!”
When we saw a button hanging on a wall, I pushed it. A spike came out that dealt me damage, followed by three skeleton warriors. We beat them, but not before almost killing our necromancer. Also, our orc wanted to eat the corpses.
A little while in, we spotted a glowing orb making sounds. Every time someone approached it, we darted in the opposite direction out of fear. When the orc was confronted about it, he said, “It was like watching a Tim Burton movie.”
Not long after, we discovered and befriended a dragon keeper who’d lost his dragon to goblins. Initially, “Generic Fighter” braced him for the worst, causing him to run away. We caught up to the dragon keeper and convinced him we weren’t a threat. Said dragon keeper started shouting “tickle-fresh”, which the orc mistook as a sign to tickle him. He also put a frozen dragon scale in his mouth, and we had to roll a D20 to remove it.
Upon meeting the dragon keeper’s community, the orc tickled a baby and was bitten by it.
When confronting the king of the goblins, the orc suggested doing The Chicken Dance. When that didn’t work, he yelled at him, initiating a fight we nearly lost. It was here that I asked, “Why is our strongest member also our lamest?”, to which the orc replied, “That tends to happen with my characters.”
We were saved at the last-second by “Generic Name” rolling a D20, getting a 20 and cleaving the king in half.
I also almost died and was sent to a dungeon, and I woke up with a death hangover. The remedy? A Devil’s Eggnog. (Basically a Prairie Oyster from Cowboy Bebop.)
A little while in, we spotted a glowing orb making sounds. Every time someone approached it, we darted in the opposite direction out of fear. When the orc was confronted about it, he said, “It was like watching a Tim Burton movie.”
Not long after, we discovered and befriended a dragon keeper who’d lost his dragon to goblins. Initially, “Generic Fighter” braced him for the worst, causing him to run away. We caught up to the dragon keeper and convinced him we weren’t a threat. Said dragon keeper started shouting “tickle-fresh”, which the orc mistook as a sign to tickle him. He also put a frozen dragon scale in his mouth, and we had to roll a D20 to remove it.
Upon meeting the dragon keeper’s community, the orc tickled a baby and was bitten by it.
When confronting the king of the goblins, the orc suggested doing The Chicken Dance. When that didn’t work, he yelled at him, initiating a fight we nearly lost. It was here that I asked, “Why is our strongest member also our lamest?”, to which the orc replied, “That tends to happen with my characters.”
We were saved at the last-second by “Generic Name” rolling a D20, getting a 20 and cleaving the king in half.
I also almost died and was sent to a dungeon, and I woke up with a death hangover. The remedy? A Devil’s Eggnog. (Basically a Prairie Oyster from Cowboy Bebop.)
When we finally found the dragon, the orc tried speaking garbled Draconian. The dragon got offended and stormed off. “Generic Name” then asked what’d happen if someone failed at speaking Orcish, to which he responded, “I’d laugh”.
(We’re not even done our campaign, FYI.)
Anyway, this goofy improvisation’s integral to the experience. And I’ll be mad if the movie doesn’t have it.
Secondly, I want good chemistry between the leads. This might be based on a game with contrivances, but it’s a movie. And it needs characters who work well together. You can have as many fantastical and nonsensical elements as you want, but if the leads don’t mesh, you’re setting yourself up for failure. Fortunately, that appears to be a non-issue.
Thirdly, I want meta-references. I want call-backs to this being a campaign with nonsense. I want hints at the different dice, including the D20. I want moments that distract from the story, as well as characters bobbing in and out depending on availability. And I want the episodic nature of the campaigns here, including cliff-hangers and expository recaps. I don’t know if all of this will work here, but it’d be nice to have some of it.
Finally, I want this movie to go all-out. This is D&D, where the story’s only limited by the people playing it. If there isn’t even a fraction of the chaos this game’s notorious for, I’ll be disappointed. In fact, I’ll be angry. Because D&D deserves better.
Ultimately, I want to have fun. It’s an action-fantasy epic in the vein of a self-aware comedy, complete with quips and meta-humour. That’s all I’m asking for, and I hope it delivers. Fortunately, it appears to be doing that, judging by reviews. But we’ll see soon enough.
(We’re not even done our campaign, FYI.)
Anyway, this goofy improvisation’s integral to the experience. And I’ll be mad if the movie doesn’t have it.
Secondly, I want good chemistry between the leads. This might be based on a game with contrivances, but it’s a movie. And it needs characters who work well together. You can have as many fantastical and nonsensical elements as you want, but if the leads don’t mesh, you’re setting yourself up for failure. Fortunately, that appears to be a non-issue.
Thirdly, I want meta-references. I want call-backs to this being a campaign with nonsense. I want hints at the different dice, including the D20. I want moments that distract from the story, as well as characters bobbing in and out depending on availability. And I want the episodic nature of the campaigns here, including cliff-hangers and expository recaps. I don’t know if all of this will work here, but it’d be nice to have some of it.
Finally, I want this movie to go all-out. This is D&D, where the story’s only limited by the people playing it. If there isn’t even a fraction of the chaos this game’s notorious for, I’ll be disappointed. In fact, I’ll be angry. Because D&D deserves better.
Ultimately, I want to have fun. It’s an action-fantasy epic in the vein of a self-aware comedy, complete with quips and meta-humour. That’s all I’m asking for, and I hope it delivers. Fortunately, it appears to be doing that, judging by reviews. But we’ll see soon enough.
That’s about it. If you’ll excuse me, I have some more goblins to slay…
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