A few days ago we got the word that the Dungeons and Dragons movie has wrapped filming. While I’m a big fan of D&D as a whole, I’m still a little wary for this project. While I desperately want this movie to really nail the D&D experience, looking at what Videogame movies have been like for the past years I can’t help but be a little worried.
What’s the deal with videogame movies?
So before I talk about how I’d like to see the D&D movie work, first I want to explain why I’m worried. I don’t think I’m saying a weird thing when I claim videogame movies aren’t all that great. The thing with them to me, is usually how you can’t really balance them so to say. Let’s take Assassin’s Creed as an example. If you don’t know anything about Assassin’s Creed, the movie is probably not going to make a lot of sense to you. On the other hand, if you have played the game(s), watching the movie doesn’t really give me the feeling the game did. If you’re actually familiar with the IP, personally it does take away from the experience of the movie itself.
I would still like to note that these are of course my personal opinions and thoughts on the matter. If you feel different about it, that’s totally fine of course and I’d actually love to discuss it with you!
To me it really boils down on one thing. It is that games are interactive, and movies are not. You can not replicate the feeling of playing Assassin’s Creed if you aren’t playing Assassin’s Creed, but rather you’re just watching the story play out. That doesn’t really work for me personally. The two experiences can’t really be intertwined.
How will the D&D movie work?
But how does that relate to D&D? Well, personally I feel like the two are in quite a similar spot. Since D&D is also an interactive experience, and arguably even more so than a video game if you ask me since you’re visualizing everything in the world yourself. There might be one person setting the stage for the story, but it’s really the players actions and dice rolls that shape how the story goes .It’s also a very collaborative experience, requiring at least 2 people (a player and a Dungeon Master) to tell the story. That itself is a feeling that is very hard to replicate, but there’s still ways that they can go about making this that could make it feel more like a D&D game.
How would I do it?
While the chances are low we’ll actually see it happen that it’s a narrated adventure like a D&D campaign, there are a few things the movie could do to make it feel more like a D&D movie rather than a movie set in the world of D&D. For example, I would love it if all of the unimportant (Read: Non-party members) were for example played, or at least voiced by the same person. Since, of course there’s always one person (the DM) voicing NPC’s in the game. They could also do something silly with killing off a party member, only for a new character to come around later but played by the same person. It’s goofy things like that that would make the movie feel more fun and authentic to the D&D experience to me, since D&D from what I’ve played is just a goofy game, but one that I love playing and really hope gets some good on- screen representation.
Of course these are only my personal opinions, so I’d love to hear what you have to say about it! Thanks for reading and have a wonderful day!
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