fictional01 replied to your post:I am just amazed that we get 3-5 hours of new...
Curious, does it pick up in terms of characters feeling a bit more interesting and individually usd? I dont know how to phrase it. I got to episode three and was a bit bored by generic adventure.
Yeah, I was definitely in the same boat when I got started (I was just sort of assuming it’d be nice background noise and I knew enough of the actors from other stuff to be like “oh hey this’ll be neat”). And the thing about this show is that every character fits some variation on Generic Fantasy Trope until they... really, really don’t. The first arc is verrrry standard D&D dungeon-crawling, and even though there are some fun bits and neat little twists here and there, it seems kinda like everyone’s still feeling out how they want to push into streaming this thing. Once things push out of the Underdark and Matt can start worldbuilding in earnest and dragging people’s backstories out, they’re really off to the races.
There’s some good RP relatively early on, but I think around episode 24 is when everyone starts feeling out whether it’s okay to really get into their characters, and things escalate from there. The characters really start to come alive around then, too, and suddenly it’s less watching a bunch of people playing a game and more listening to a bunch of people telling a really good story. There’s still a lot of goofing off, but everybody’s level of investment goes through the roof and suddenly they’re all playing off each other’s enthusiasm. I mean, there are episodes where half the cast is genuinely in tears. And there’s an absurd level of character development--it was really strange going back to the early episodes knowing where each of the characters is headed.
The appeal of the show to me is that when you’ve got one player for each main character, you’ve always got someone in that character’s court, with laser-focus on that character’s development and relationships. So nobody gets forgotten or left in the dust, and nobody’s just sitting idle; past a certain point in the story (again, mid-20s is when things start to really shift), each character has a very focused series of goals that evolve over time. There’s intra-party tension, there’s found-family dynamics like you would not believe, there’s characters keeping secrets to protect each other, there are NPCs who’re incredibly well fleshed-out and feel like player characters... and the plot escalates. Hoooo boy does it escalate. There are plot threads that have payoff thirty-five episodes later. There was recently an entire four-hour episode that was basically just a series of conversations and it was riveting.
Episode 24 is the start of the first really major character-driven arc in the series where by the end of it I had a pretty good feeling I was gonna get fannish about the show. There are ups and downs, and you miss out on a bunch of running jokes that way, but if you’re impatient with the early stuff, that might be a good place to try jumping in again; you can always backtrack if need be. Episode 39 is the current arc’s starting point, but the mood whiplash of going from the goofier early episodes to something that becomes extremely dark might be a little much. If you’re really not sold but still want to give it a shot at the risk of spoilers, try playing a later episode and see if it grabs you. I’m also happy to summarize any stuff you might miss along the way.
Basically, for whatever my personal opinion is worth: I have no idea how it got to this point, but right now I am so amazed at this show that I can’t even really work out how to write fic for it, because I know canon will somehow do it better.
