D&D General Best on screen adaptation of D&D

[bedir than]

I have to give a shoutout to The Kid Who Would be King. The group dynamic is vital, characters clearly level up throughout the movie, there's multiple boss fights, a dragon, and Sir Patrick Stewart

 

[atanakar]

Willow is my number one. It delivers many of the D&D tropes right. An «unlikely» adventuring party, a quest, a prophecy, an evil sorceress, the turn coat daughter. And it has lots of humour. Which is a staple of pretty much every D&D group I know of.

 

[Sacrosanct]

Unfortunately the poll went as all polls go. No matter how many options you give (and you have to keep it somewhat limited for various reasons), 90% of the responses are telling you what you should have included as a poll option that wasn't.

 

[lowkey13]

*Deleted by user*

 

[practicalm]

It's more a cliffhangers setting but The Mummy (1999) with Brando Fraiser, Rachel Weisz, John Hannah, and Kevin J. O'Connor is the best roleplaying movie. Hands down. Fight me.

The group dynamics just feels like a RPG group with everyone kind of working together but also doing their own thing.

 

[Tales and Chronicles]

Are we including tv series? If so, I'd go with the Dragon Prince on Netflix and some of Miyazaki's work. As with many thing D&D, I feel that some japanese studios understand the themes of D&D the best. I always felt FF games were the closest thing D&D after the old crpg.

 

[Garthanos]

Are we including tv series? If so, I'd go with the Dragon Prince on Netflix

Definitely excels arguably they nerf injured the two weapon ranger so she would be similar level with the untrained wizard (and handed him a magic item to boot) and similar tricks

 

[Panda-s1]

Community isn't on here? no? okay

 

[Lidgar]

1. Conan the Barb (original recipe)
2. LOTR (2000)
3. Jason and the Argonauts. Has all the elements.

Honorable non-Classic Fantasy mention: Big Trouble in Little China

 

[Sacrosanct]

Community isn't on here? no? okay

Criteria outlined in the OP

Edit which I"m ashamed of myself for totally forgetting about Lodoss War. I mean, it was literally based off of a b/x game...

 

[Sacrosanct]

I have to say I'm a bit surprised that Conan the Barbarian got more votes than the Destroyer. The Destroyer just screams "we made a D&D movie and just called it Conan."

 

[robus]

I've said it before and I'll say it again: Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle.

 

[Stormonu]

Surprised folks still remember Hawk the Slayer. I mean, it’s very D&D, but when the Fireball spell is obviously someone shooting ping pong balls about, you can’t exactly describe it as watchable/enjoyable without ascribing it to parody.

For me, the best hands-down fantasy is PJ’s LOTR and the animated Hobbit. Lots of 3rd places, and I’d put the latest Conan above the two ones from the eighties. Dead last would be the Dragonlance animated abomination. What a waste of one of TSR’s best story arcs.

Also, no Eragon*, Beastmaster or Dragonheart?

* Book is good, movie baaaaad

 

[Panda-s1]

Criteria outlined in the OP

Edit which I"m ashamed of myself for totally forgetting about Lodoss War. I mean, it was literally based off of a b/x game...

what criteria does Community not fit? I'm really not sure, especially if The Gamers gets to be on the list.

 

[Istbor]

I Voted for Willow and Witcher.
Also Other.

I know I risk getting punched in the face here, but there are a few Anime series that try and actually pull off worlds that emulate close to being D&D. A couple where they actually track how many spells they have available to them even on a given day.

 

[lowkey13]

*Deleted by user*

 

[Sacrosanct]

what criteria does Community not fit? I'm really not sure, especially if The Gamers gets to be on the list.

It's a modern show that has what? One, maybe two references to D&D in the entire thing? It doesn't exactly fit the criteria of being limited to medieval fantasy only.

 

[Panda-s1]

I Voted for Willow and Witcher.
Also Other.

I know I risk getting punched in the face here, but there are a few Anime series that try and actually pull off worlds that emulate close to being D&D. A couple where they actually track how many spells they have available to them even on a given day.

I mean OP said they felt bad they forgot about Record of Lodoss War so I doubt you'd get much umbrage (unless they're like fuckin' lewd af). for that matter, where is Slayers?

It's a modern show that has what? One, maybe two references to D&D in the entire thing? It doesn't exactly fit the criteria of being limited to medieval fantasy only.

there's 2 entire episodes where they basically just play D&D. I've only seen the first one if I'm gonna be honest, but last I checked it's considered one of the best depictions of playing Dungeons & Dragons in any media.

also where's the D&D sketch(es) by Dead Alewives?

 

[Tony Vargas]

Surprised folks still remember Hawk the Slayer. I mean, it’s very D&D, but when the Fireball spell is obviously someone shooting ping pong balls about, you can’t exactly describe it as watchable/enjoyable without ascribing it to parody.

Hawk the Slayer made the rounds on cable pretty heavily right about the time D&D was at it's height, I believe.
(And, yes, it was pretty awful).
Even more obscure, there was a made-for-TV pilot, Fugitive from the Empire. IDK if it was trying to be D&D, but for a few years afterwards, there sure were a lot of players wanting "Heart Bows" with exploding arrows. (And, y'know, 3e finally did give us exploding arrows.)

Unfortunately the poll went as all polls go. No matter how many options you give (and you have to keep it somewhat limited for various reasons), 90% of the responses are telling you what you should have included as a poll option that wasn't.

Yep.
And, there's really two things going on here. There's things that informed and inspired D&D (or at least riffed of the same stuff), prior to D&D even hitting the shelves - like Harryhausen's 7th Voyage and Golden Voyage of Sinbad - and things that were unabashedly influenced by D&D, like Slayers or Record of Lodos War.

 

[Istbor]

I mean OP said they felt bad they forgot about Record of Lodoss War so I doubt you'd get much umbrage (unless they're like fuckin' lewd af). for that matter, where is Slayers?


there's 2 entire episodes where they basically just play D&D. I've only seen the first one if I'm gonna be honest, but last I checked it's considered one of the best depictions of playing Dungeons & Dragons in any media.

also where's the D&D sketch(es) by Dead Alewives?

Well. One of the Anime series is Goblin Slayer. And that first episode is pretty... graphic in its violence. So I would say it is pretty lewd.