New Dungeons and Dragons movie starring Chris Pine

We too loved the chonky dragon.

Managed to still catch this on the big screen last week. Was very enjoyable, and it also had some decent creature vfx work that helped it, in particular Owlbear and chonky dragon. I also dug the heist part because I thought it was a moment when the plot suddenly throws an unexpectedly clever bit your way and executes it well.

The Paladin not getting irony and sarcam was a bit curious because it was reminiscent of Drax not getting irony and metaphors. Bit of an odd move for a movie that most definitely had Guardians in its pitch deck. Also wished they had given Hugh Grant some prosthetics or an outrageous wig because, well, his character just looked like Hugh Grant in a costume.

I didn’t get a Guardians vibe to it at all, to me it was just a play on the stereotypical themes of a paladin walking the straight and narrow, having a “stick up his butt”, and playing the straight man. It seemed to me it wasn’t that he didn’t get the irony and sarcasm, occasionally he’d slyly smirk at things, rather that these were distractions to the real problems at hand and he wasn’t going to react to and propagate them.

Might very well be the case! I’m not super-familiar with D&D and its classes/tropes.

Yeah, that was my take as well. It was someone playing a straight and narrow paladin who just takes everything too seriously and has no sense of humor. Quite frankly it’s the best portrayal of a paladin I’ve ever seen on the big screen.

The scene were the paladin was walking away showed the movie was giving us the perfect stereotypical paladin. Apparently the funniest bit was improvised. link has some minor spoilerage.

Was it just me or were they hinting at the reveal of the paladin at being a secret bad guy?

Loved this. The intellect devourer scene especially made me giggle.

HAh, perfect.

meme

I think the hinting was that he was originally a Thayan, and his heel-turn, as it were, was sharp enough that he became a paladin because of it.

It’s difficult to be a secret bad paladin because IIRC paladin powers are divine in nature. It’s more likely lorewise to become a fallen paladin though.

Now streaming on Paramount+, FYI.

It was, kinda meh.

D&D is so much about group-party combat and that doesn’t really happen until the very end.

Too much solo fighting with one character while the rest stand by terribly idle as if stunned for 12 rounds.

This is not a thing in actual D&D at the table or otherwise.

And I was bored through most of it.

But then this happened:

Reminded me a bit of this, but less furry:

Several years ago I watched this two-part rant about dice by legendary tabletop gaming figure Lou Zocchi, and I noticed that he used “dice” for both singular and plural. I thought, wow, this guy has thought more about dice than anyone ever and yet he doesn’t know the correct singular for dice.

But according to some he was not wrong.

And this is your friendly reminder that months of Paramount+ are always free - see the P+ thread for discount codes.

Super weird decision, that. I’m an hour into this thing and aside from a few Forgotten Realms location and group references I’d have no idea at all this was a D&D movie.

Finally saw this by renting it for $5.99 through Prime and was quite entertained by it. There were a lot of funny moments and unlike a lot of fantasy things I see, the look of it never felt cheesy to me.

The story was a bit so-so but I did enjoy how one adventure immediately led to another and then to another and so on. The action scenes, of which there were plenty, were well done, and I really enjoyed the depiction of magic. Some of the spells were cool.

Chris Pine was great, quite funny. He got most of the good lines, but his timing was good. One slight disappointment was that his bard abilities hardly got used – not sure they were used at all. The Edgerton guy as the paladin was great too.

I’d hope they do another but I know it’s struggling to break even. It may when it’s all said and done with rental and sales, but I wouldn’t be surprised if they don’t film another, or at least film another with the same cast.

Hopefully some of the same good stuff in this movie will transfer to the TV series under development, though I guess that’s now on hold due to the writer’s strike.

I found Simon to be very charming and the standout member, although all were good. I would watch a spinoff with him as the lead (Doric can come too).

@Mark_Asher

The Bard constantly talks as Holga beats the crap out of everyone. My son felt that he ws exercising his Bard Support with his running commentary during the fights. ; j