"The Legend of Vox Machina" Season 1 Review

 by Karl W.

"The Legend of Vox Machina" Season 1 Review
[Critical Role Productions/Titmouse]

 

    It's kinda amazing seeing the continued growth and popularity of Dungeons and Dragons in the past few years. Hell, I just got into this game a few years ago and mostly thanks to my friends and their interest in the hobby through various streams and videos. The influx of great D&D streams and podcasts is truly something to behold nowadays, where nearly everyone wants a slice of that pie now, something I never would've thought had been possible for such a niche game in the past. Though there are some large shows out there, none have gotten quite the popularity and recognition as Critical Role, originally a game started by friends in the voice acting industry has grown into a franchise. Critical Role has hundreds of episodes of content, comic books, and merchandise up the wazoo. That's also not mentioning how Critical Role's Matthew Mercer had a hand in creating a lot of the newer content in official Wizards of the Coast D&D material. Well, with The Legend of Vox Machina, the crew at Critical Role tackled their most ambitious project yet: creating an animated show. Starting off as a Kickstarter project, The Legend of Vox Machina was originally going to be a short animated special, but it broke its Kickstarter goal and then some within the first hour of launching! The Kickstarter was so popular that it funded for ten episodes of a new series instead, and it was renewed for a second season prior to the first season even releasing. This was primed to be a smash hit amongst D&D fans and hopefully a big undertaking for Amazon Prime and Critical Role. One misstep, and this could've been doomed, but with the people behind Critical Role having the passion and the funds to create this show, it seemed like this could be the quintessential D&D show.

    The Legend of Vox Machina takes place during the events of the first campaign, set in the world of Exandria, a group of down-on-their-luck adventurers called Vox Machina enter the call to protect the land from a dangerous threat. The first two episodes are meant to be the primer of the series, introducing the main characters and the world they explore...and they're kinda a mess. The pace of these first two episodes is breakneck, and the tone shifts wildly between rather juvenile comedy to intense scenes of mass destruction and villages being destroyed. The first two episodes follow the group of adventurers who rarely work together and clash a lot with one another, up until the final fight where they all pull their weight and work together to defeat a greater foe. It's standard affair, and doesn't quite set the best bar for the series ahead. However, from Episode 3 onwards, the plot becomes a lot more consistent and a lot better, as Vox Machina attempt to investigate the city of Whitestone to uncover the corruption of their current leaders, the Briarwoods. The tone becomes a lot more consistent, with points of comedy and levity helping alleviate a rather grim, gothic setting. This season in particular seems to focus the most on Percy, whose family was murdered by the Briarwoods, who goes through a rather intriguing and captivating quest for revenge that leads him down a dark path. Though, everyone in this series gets a chance to shine. Twins Vex and Vax have some fantastic moments together and separate as the most collected members of the group. Keyleth is the bright light of the group whose naivety and bright personality brings some levity to the group. Pike has a compelling arc about trying to find herself and rekindle her connection with her god. Grog is the muscle of the group that has moments both parts hilarious and rather heartwarming. Even the bard Scanlan, the jokester of the group, has his fantastic moments in the group where he pulls his weight and then some.

    With the help of Titmouse, the characters and the world of Critical Role truly come to life. The show is one of the most gorgeous animated shows out on streaming services right now, with its actions scenes being the true highlight of the series. The series does a good job in capturing the various abilities of each member of Vox Machina as well as the various side characters and villains of the series. The voice acting is also phenomenal, though, that's to be expected from a series created off the backs of talented voice actors. The voice actors have made these characters and have been playing them for years now, so it's only fitting that they slide into these roles effortlessly. Even still, the voice talent they got for this series pulled their weight as well, ranging from other voice actors such as Grey Griffin and Khary Payton, to popular actors such as David Tennant and Dominic Monaghan. The score is alright. Certainly nothing horrible, though nothing that's exceptionally memorable (save for Scanlan's various tunes throughout the show).

    The Legend of Vox Machina is a show that's mostly meant for D&D and Critical Role fans, to be sure, as the references to D&D and Critical Role are abundant and plentiful, meaning fans would get the most mileage out of this show. Still, I wouldn't say that the charm of this show is completely lost on everyone else. For those looking for a good fantasy series, or even a good animated series plentiful on the violence and gore (seriously, this ain't a kids show folks), I would wholeheartedly recommend The Legend of Vox Machina. It might not be a natural 20 (at least not quite yet), but hey, it still manages to hit.

8/10 (Great)