I recently saw the new Dungeons & Dragons movie, Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves. As a fan of D&D, I was excited to see how this movie would use D&D mechanics to tell a story and adapt it into a film that anyone can enjoy watching. Overall, the movie is fun. It's not the next Lord of the Rings or the greatest thing ever, but the movie is fun, with likable characters, themes about found family, grief, taking responsibility for your mistakes, and good world-building. I went to this movie with a friend who knew very little about D&D, and she also enjoyed the movie for the same reasons.
So let's talk about the good and bad. Minor spoilers ahead.
Nat 20 (The good)
World-building - I am a believer that less is more. It would have been so easy for the movie to sit there and try to explain all the lore of Dungeon and Dragons and be drowned in exposition, but instead, the movie only tells you what you need to know at that moment. And that kept the movie's pace going. I also didn't feel like I was being talked down to by the characters explaining what was going on at any given moment. They explain just enough for you to know what is going on and then move on.
Romance - Besides a small side plot about the romance between Simon and Doric, there isn't much romance in this movie. It would have been so easy for them to push a romantic plot between the main characters, Edgin and Holga, as they fight to get Edgin's daughter back, but that isn't what happens. Edgin and Holga are just friends dealing with the loss of their own partners. They comfort each other but not to the point of using the other to replace what they lost. I am a strong believer in seeing more male and female friendship that doesn't evolve into romance. I'm also a believer that not every movie needs to have a romantic element at all. Though there is a subplot between Simon and Doric, it is in the background and easy to ignore in favor of Simon's main character arc of the story.
Visuals - This movie is nice to look at. The set design is good and full of life. The CGI was good and blended well into the world and narrative of the story. And some of the designs of the fantasy races are good.
But speaking of character designs...
Nat 1 (The Bad)
Character Designs - A common complaint among D&D fans is that the cast of characters is very human looking. With Edgin and Holga being humans, Simon being a half-elf, and Doric being a very basic-looking Tiefling. When I imagine a Tiefling, I imagine a creature with big horns, red, purple, or other color skin, and solid color eyes, like seen in the picture below. Instead, we got a very human-looking character with small horns that made me think she was a fae instead of a Tiefling. Her tail was so skinny that both I and my friend didn't even realize she had one until she actively used it halfway through the film. I feel like that was a disservice to Tieflings. The reason for Tieflings' hatred and fear is because of their similarities to demons. But Doric doesn't look demonic to follow that train of thought that the movie uses in her backstory for why she was abandoned.
It really does feel like the creators played it safe with the character designs instead of giving us a colorful cast of characters that most D&D parties have. They're even all around the same height. You couldn't have made them at least different sizes? Maybe the six-foot-tall human has a hard time squeezing into a door made for halflings, or a 4'2 gnome has a hard time climbing onto the counter made for half-orcs. There were things you could have done that I think were ignored.
Character Classes - When it comes to class acknowledgment, Simon and Doric were done well. While Doric's wild shape ability breaks the typical rules of D&D, it is still fun to see, and Simon being the magic user of the group as a sorcerer is fine. But then there is Edgin and Holga. Holga, even though she is a barbarian, never felt like a barbarian to me. She felt more like a regular fighter. Maybe I don't need her screaming, "Rage!" before going to kick butt, but perhaps we could have seen more of the raw strength that barbarians are known for.
Holga is okay, but Edgin had it worse. I spent the movie thinking that Edgin was some oath-breaking paladin turn rogue, but I found out that he's supposed to be a bard, and he never casts a single spell. Magic through music is what bards are all about, but Edgin spends more time swinging his lute around like a weapon than playing it. While I can see wanting to give spellcasting to Simon to make sure he is important to the group, I still think you could have still found a way to have two spellcasters. Bards' magic is a lot of enchantment and illusion. There is a scene in the movie where Simon casts a minor illusion spell that Edgin could have easily cast himself, and Simon could focus on other forms of attacking magic. Otherwise, it feels like there isn't much Edgin does besides be "the plan guy," as he says in the movie.
Overall, the movie is fun, and I think it is a good step forward for D&D theme movies. I think something I would want to see in the next movie is a new party. Show different party dynamics and classes. These characters were fun, but they had their time. Let's see a new and, hopefully, more diverse set of characters going on another adventure.
