My review of the D&D Movie.

Enjoy;

https://youtu.be/MaelKOjzA3o

Really enjoyed your video. Well-presented and thorough discussion.

Just a quick kick at the can.

Cheers.

Because WOTC had something to do with it? 

Everything they touch turns to shit.

The one part of the video that I disagree with is the notion that the D&D movie does a bad job representing historical European fantasy. That's selling the movie short as it does a bad job representing ANY sort of recognizable fantasy at all.

If you look at Harry Potter, it combines the classic Merlin wizard of a pointy hat and wand with the broom riding and cauldrons of traditional witches, adds the uniforms of English schools and sets the whole thing in a castle. Every element shown in the movies is recognizable yet they arranged in a fresh, original way.

With the D&D movie, it's just a random mix of modern and ren fair clothing set in a generic sci-fi looking world. People who are familiar with the modern D&D aesthetic are used to this so they don't realize how ridiculous and corny it looks to anyone not immersed in that version of the game.

I'm not watching the movie because I do what I can not to give money to people who'd happily put me in a gulag.

Haven't and won't watch the movie itself because the trailers look so ridiculously awful.  But my answer is simple: The target audience is D&D fanboys like J. Scott Garibay who will lap up anything with the D&D moniker on it.  So the writing, plot, etc., are at a kindergarten level.  Can't see how they expected to attract others with those trailers.

And therein rests my exact point.

Quote from: hedgehobbit on April 10, 2023, 09:15:05 AM
The one part of the video that I disagree with is the notion that the D&D movie does a bad job representing historical European fantasy. That's selling the movie short as it does a bad job representing ANY sort of recognizable fantasy at all.

If you look at Harry Potter, it combines the classic Merlin wizard of a pointy hat and wand with the broom riding and cauldrons of traditional witches, adds the uniforms of English schools and sets the whole thing in a castle. Every element shown in the movies is recognizable yet they arranged in a fresh, original way.

With the D&D movie, it's just a random mix of modern and ren fair clothing set in a generic sci-fi looking world. People who are familiar with the modern D&D aesthetic are used to this so they don't realize how ridiculous and corny it looks to anyone not immersed in that version of the game.

Quote from: hedgehobbit on April 10, 2023, 09:15:05 AM
With the D&D movie, it's just a random mix of modern and ren fair clothing set in a generic sci-fi looking world.

The look reminded me of Star Trek: The Next Generation.

After the first D&D movie, I just decided D&D isn't material to make a good film. How a silly elf game can become anything but a silly elf movie? The comparisons are not very favorable and, to me, I would always have in mind: "This isn't Peter Jackson's Lord of the Rings."

Only when I learned it took place in the Forgotten Realms that I thought about watching it. I am not a FR fanboy. I never played or ran a game in the Realms before last year, but I played all Baldur's Gate and Neverwinter Nights video games; and because of that I was curious. But I heard there isn't much of the Realms in the movie, not one recognizable NPC, it is back to "if it is on TV, I will watch it" (since I don't watch TV anymore...).

So, the one thing that could have sold the movie to me was to actually use D&D mythos and not make another generic B-movie fantasy thing, and they decided to go the generic B-movie fantasy route.

I am not going to watch it because I don't want to give money to people who hate me.

It is #4 this weekend, at the rate it's dropping it should disappear off the charts pretty quickly.

Good.  Hope it doesn't make it's money back.

I refused to pay to see it on principle which I explained in the video.

But WokeC contradicts themselves too much to let it stand without comment.

I enjoyed their and it's definitely better than the early 2000s D&D movie.

You just damned it with faint praise, my friend lol

Haven't seen the new one, because I've eaten at this restaurant before and gotten food poisoning, metaphorically speaking.

The best D&D movies / shows are the ones that have no actual relationship to the game. The LOTR movies. GOT. Witcher. You get the idea.