The popularity and success of The Legend of Vox Machina was a surprise. I started listening to Critical Role in podcast form in late 2017, and was able to hop in at the beginning of the group's second campaign (they're now a little over their year into their third). I'd gotten into the streamed D&D game after I had started running my own games in 2015, and while the early sessions of Critical Role were a little rough to get through (technical issues, a lack of experience making D&D as a performance, and one player who would leave the show whose spotlight-hogging was not conducive to making the show entertaining) in the long run, it was a remarkable creation of characters you cared about, and where the roll of the dice could lead to unexpected turns and moments.
The cast of Critical Role are all voice actors, many of whom you might recognize from animation and video games (as a World of Warcraft player, I initially knew it to be "that D&D game with the woman who plays Jaina Proudmoore in it") and so, of all the "actual play" shows that have cropped up (Critical Role was not the first, but it certainly helped popularize the genre) to blow up as a big hit and, on top of that, find life in adaptation as an animated series, this one makes the most sense, given that these are people already immersed in that facet of the entertainment industry.
Still, while I was a fan of the characters and story and world of Critical Role, I had no idea that the show would be such a smashing success. As much as I want to believe that its success is solely due to the passion and investment its creators have in it (how many voice actors get to play starring roles in a show as a character they themselves invented?) it also seems that the show must have something else that is really resonating with people.
With the show's second season, I actually think they've improved - which is funny, because the plot is, in a certain way, more formulaic.
In very game-like fashion, the plot of this season (and, spoilers, probably season 3 as well, though I suspect they can wrap up this arc and move on to the final one by season 4, assuming they get one) revolves around a quartet of dragons known as the Chroma Conclave who have allied to bring destruction and devastation to the world. The two-episode intro arc of the first season showed us this group's fifth member and his demise thanks to our heroes (in the streamed game, the blue dragon of the Chroma Conclave had already fallen by the time we met the characters) before skipping ahead to what most consider "where Critical Role got really good," namely the "Briarwood Arc."
Still, in this arc, the heroes are presented with a group of bad guys to slay, and a set of mythical artifacts to help them do so - a set of artifacts that conveniently allow each player to get one (actually, come to think of it, I think at least one of them gets two). This is a tried-and-true formula for video games that is sometimes called "plot coupons," and I was worried that it might not work as well in a series like this.
But I think that there were moments in the first season where I think the show was also trying too hard - to be edgy and adult, sexual and violent, as if to flash a warning beacon saying "yes, it's a cartoon, but no, it's not for kids." Maybe I'm just now better used to the look and feel of the show, but I also think that the team has developed a bit more restraint.
It is really exciting to see moments I remember being adjudicated via die rolls now written in big action sequences. Of course, there have been some wise adaptational changes (splitting the party is generally a bad idea in a game, but dramatically it allows for the story to give the proper focus on the relationships between pairs of characters) but also some faithful recreations of wonderfully memorable moments (the final moment of a fight with one of the characters' evil family members goes precisely as it did in the D&D game).
The announcement of another series adapting Critical Role's second campaign, "The Mighty Nein," has me very excited, because I think that almost all the players made bolder choices with their characters and the show's novelistic storytelling benefited from having gone through a whole campaign previously, not only allowing us to see these characters truly at the beginning of their journey together, but also giving us dramatically meaty stuff without the awkward growing pains that the animated show was forced to skip.
I do wonder what people who have never played D&D think of a show like this. I imagine a lot of people think that it (and other tabletop roleplaying games) is video-game like, but those who have tried it know that it can be a fantastic way to tell an improvised story among friends. The triumphs and heartbreaks all lend to the weight of drama.
Anyway, it's good to see this show hitting the mark even better than it did in the previous season, and I'm already excited for more.
