D&D Movie/TV Joe Manganiello: Dragonlance TV Show No Longer In Development

Actor Joe Manganiello has confirmed that the anticipated Dragonlance TV show that he had been working on is no longer being developed. In an interview with ComicBook.com. According to Manganiello, following poor sales of Dragonlance: Shadow of the Dragon Queen and the Warriors of Krynn board game last year, "Dragonlance is not a property [WotC] are interested in developing further currently". This decision was also prompted by Hasbro's sale of its media studio, eOne.

In March last year, Manganiello confirmed during an official D&D video update that he was working on a TV show for WotC, and a D&D live action series was greenly by Paramount in January. It's not clear if these are the same property.

Manganiello also talked about his approach to the property, and the new designs he had for the world, the dragons, and even the casting. "I want to make [the show] because I want to see it and I just want to feel that excited and electric about something. The characters...like the casting, I have a look book with over 1,000 pages, but it's not what you expect. The design concepts I had for the world, for the armor, for the swords....I had a fresh take on what the dragons were going to look like, it was going to be nothing like anyone has ever seen."

He has been working on a script for years, and was told by TV executives that his pilot was one of the best fantasy scripts they had ever read. He even offered to buy Dragonlance from WotC.

You can watch the whole interview at the link above.

 

[Incenjucar]

For example, spells randomly failing for non-wild mages is not D&D, despite being a fantasy cliche.

 

[Dire Bare]

Not talking about VM, talking about the animated adaptation.

Yeah, so am I. The animated Legend of Vox Machina on Amazon Prime, adapted from the D&D LIVE STREAM from Critical Role.

It's D&D dude. Not officially, of course. But's it's D&D. Did they scrub out some IP to avoid issues with WotC? Yup. Still an animated adaptation of a live-streamed D&D game.

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

Yeah, so am I. The animated Legend of Vox Machina on Amazon Prime, adapted from the D&D LIVE STREAM from Critical Role.

It's D&D dude. Not officially, of course. But's it's D&D. Did they scrub out some IP to avoid issues with WotC? Yup. Still an animated adaptation of a live-streamed D&D game.

It even has color-coded chromatic dragons with breath weapons that match D&D. About the only thing on the animated show that doesn't match D&D by default is that the sphinxes they've shown are basically demigods, and not run of the mill sphinxes. But that's a quibble at best; the ones we see are clearly unique individuals and not typical of a general species.

 

[nyvinter]

D&D is a bit hard to pin down because the lore changes with every edition, but generally to feel D&D it needs to adhere as close as possible to the way the game works in practice without homebrew or DM fiat.

There we really disagree. Game mechanics are fine in a game, but they're there for balance and game play. Both of those are terrible things to build a story on.

It goes the other direction as well. If you're making an RPG based on a video game, you shouldn't transpose those mechanics as they are — what works in a single shooter RPG like Mass Effect for example is fun when you're the only player. It get's a drag doing those combat things in a group — I'd rather just play the video game then.

Same thing here. Spells slots, opportunity attacks, limited metamagic for sorcerers, monks needing ki for fast attacks. I'd play that, but I wouldn't care to watch something governed by the Player's Handbook.

It should capture the feel of the thing, not the minutia of it. And for better and worse, LoVM does that.

 

[Incenjucar]

There we really disagree. Game mechanics are fine in a game, but they're there for balance and game play. Both of those are terrible things to build a story on.

It goes the other direction as well. If you're making an RPG based on a video game, you shouldn't transpose those mechanics as they are — what works in a single shooter RPG like Mass Effect for example is fun when you're the only player. It get's a drag doing those combat things in a group — I'd rather just play the video game then.

Same thing here. Spells slots, opportunity attacks, limited metamagic for sorcerers, monks needing ki for fast attacks. I'd play that, but I wouldn't care to watch something governed by the Player's Handbook.

It should capture the feel of the thing, not the minutia of it. And for better and worse, LoVM does that.

Then you can never make a D&D show, even if it's a Forgotten Realms show or whatever.

 

[nyvinter]

The recent D&D movie doesn't really care about the game at all, and if you ask me, it's still a D&D movie.

 

[Incenjucar]

I enjoyed the D&D movie, but it was equally a Savage Worlds movie that happened to be set in Toril.

 

[Oofta]

It even has color-coded chromatic dragons with breath weapons that match D&D. About the only thing on the animated show that doesn't match D&D by default is that the sphinxes they've shown are basically demigods, and not run of the mill sphinxes. But that's a quibble at best; the ones we see are clearly unique individuals and not typical of a general species.

Even if you listen to the show there is no "IP scrubbing". Matt occasionally makes up monsters or changes some of their fluff, I assume most DMs that run homebrew campaigns do. He did make homebrew class for Percy's gunslinger because it was a carryover from their PF game. Obviously some things get tweaked a bit for the show, that's to be expected.

Not sure where this idea that CR is not D&D comes from.

 

[Incenjucar]

The issue is how distinctly D&D something is vs. just sharing the same tropes. It's like saying Lord of the Rings is a Narnia movie.

 

[Oofta]

The issue is how distinctly D&D something is vs. just sharing the same tropes. It's like saying Lord of the Rings is a Narnia movie.

What makes something "Distinctly D&D"? Using official spells even if the PC claims credit for Bigby's Hand? Fighting chromatic dragons that use appropriate breath weapons? Can you not use vampires and necromancers because they're too generic? Races straight out of the official rules?