Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves Spiel

by Rian

My first experience with the Dungeons & Dragons IP was actually the movie, Dungeons & Dragons from the year 2000. The film was a failure in both box office figures and critiques. One thing I do know since is that the half-century old TRPG doesn’t have a “main quest” that can be adapted to a film nicely and squarely. It is a tool, and that means you better know how to yield it.

Dungeons & Dragons as a table-top RPG serves one of the strongest hardcore fans, and their IPs go deeper than what 2-3 hours long movie can provide. That being said, unless Honor Among Thieves wishes to take some radical approach to the fantasy formula, the beloved game becomes an unyielding tool for storytelling. As a follower of the franchise, I understood some of the contexts and found it enjoyable. But had I watched the movie with, say, family, who knows nothing about D&D, it does beg the question: how would I explain the differences between a druid, a sorcerer, and a wizard? These are all different classes, and anyone experienced in the ways of fantasy RPG games would know it. But what about the general audiences who are not?

Out of four party members, the “good guys” if you will, two are a bard and a barbarian. But the duo is more than just their classes. They are the lead protagonists; the film is mostly about Edgin and Holga, not their party. Are their quips and jokes funny? Calling a fat dragon “pudgy” is not a comedy; it’s rephrasing. Not knowing a popular celebrity is not a comedy; it’s a failure on the part of minstrel. Good spirited nature of the two leads do bring the party together, but considering how we the audience already know the party will come around eventually, it’s as though they are going through the formality just for the heck of it.

The actual strong suit of the film is the transcribing dynamic motions of Doric, who can shape shift into animals as Wild Shape. If you’d recall the great scene from X2 where Mystique, a shapeshifter, infiltrating the enemy base and disabling it alone, Doric’s ability to change into animals creates fluid, yet packed, sequences of espionage that rivals the Ethan Hunt’s in Mission Impossible. Had I been given a choice to weigh how much time would be allocated, I would double Doric’s stealth without a question.

Compared to Doric’s display, Edgin and Holga’s shares in combat are just about flat. Edgin, the bard in the party, performs best when he is being diplomatic and humorous, otherwise all he does is smashing his enemies with his lute. Holga grabs and swings anything she touches, including her fists if none other available, but as we are unfortunately aware, Hollywood often tries to make next Jackie Chan movie, but fails. Holga’s fight follows the latter.

Conclusions: A Movie for Gamers, But What about Others?

I wasn’t surprised to learn the movie wasn’t a box office success. It had its merits. It had its moments, but it came with the high bar that is a live action adaptions of classic TRPG. It’s fun for gamers to talk about how magics can’t solve anything. It’s fun for fantasy lovers to talk about how supernatural doesn’t always equate to all-powerful. But it is undeniably irritating in the eyes of others when a character is constantly reminding us of the arbitrary limit imposed on the game for game’s entertainment, not the movie. The film delivers when it is developing its own story, but when it is mending the bridge between the game and the movie, it falls short.