Critical Role's The Mighty Nein Reveals First Look, Season 1 to Air on November 19th

The Mighty Nein will come to Prime Video in November. Alongside news that The Legend of Vox Machina would be picked up for a fifth season, Prime Video also revealed a first look at The Mighty Nein animated series and announced that the show would start airing on November 19th. You can check out a "sneak peek" of the season down below, which features six of The Mighty Nein's seven characters being interrogated after an incident at a traveling circus.


The Mighty Nein will star Critical Role's founding cast members (Matt Mercer, Marisha Ray, Liam O'Brien, Travis Willingham, Taliesin Jaffe, Laura Bailey, Ashley Johnson, and Sam Riegel) and will feature a group of misfit heroes swept up into the political intrigue of two feuding nations. While The Legend of Vox Machina is a prototypical heroic quest, The Mighty Nein's heroes are much more reluctant and face much more personal threats over the course of their adventures.

 

[Mournblade94]

I really wish there wasn't so much swearing in these. I am helping a new group of new generation gamers that are all 11 years old and I feel like these cartoons are inappropriate for that. Not demanding a change, but I would love a piece of media that shows D&D animation without that stupid Gnome bard's antics or the immersion breaking swearing. I would love to watch this with my daughter but I just can't in good conscience.

 

[Crimson Longinus]

I really wish there wasn't so much swearing in these. I am helping a new group of new generation gamers that are all 11 years old and I feel like these cartoons are extremly inappropriate for that. Not demanding a change, but I would love a piece of media that shows D&D animation without that stupid Gnome bard's antics or the immersion breaking swearing.

You think eleven-year-olds have not heard all these swear words and use them regularly?

 

[Mournblade94]

You think eleven-year-olds have not heard all these swear words and use them regularly?

Nothing I said indicates I don't think 11 year olds use swear words. There's a difference between them learning that on their own, and a local father suggesting other people's kids go home and watch Vox Machina. Plus that Bard is just an awful example of a bard. My daughter plays a bard in one game, and one boy plays a bard in her game. There is no need to make them think that Gnome (I still say he's a halfling but everyone swears its a gnome) is normal. I know college kids swear too but I don't swear when I'm teaching them and I was a bartender and a Sailor.

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

I really wish there wasn't so much swearing in these. I am helping a new group of new generation gamers that are all 11 years old and I feel like these cartoons are inappropriate for that. Not demanding a change, but I would love a piece of media that shows D&D animation without that stupid Gnome bard's antics or the immersion breaking swearing. I would love to watch this with my daughter but I just can't in good conscience.

Yeah, Critical Role is not going to be kid appropriate for more than a few minutes at a time.

Maybe Dragon Prince? But that's not D&D, so ...

It is mildly surprising that the success of the Critical Role animated show hasn't lit a fire under getting a D&D branded show to market yet. It seems like we're forever years out from that happening.

 

[overgeeked]

Yeah, Critical Role is not going to be kid appropriate for more than a few minutes at a time.

Maybe Dragon Prince? But that's not D&D, so ...

It is mildly surprising that the success of the Critical Role animated show hasn't lit a fire under getting a D&D branded show to market yet. It seems like we're forever years out from that happening.

I mean…they don’t really need to. CR is already doing it. The purpose of the OGL was to outsource the design and risk of supplements. WotC is just doing the same here with marketing. Between Stranger Things and CR, they don’t need to market D&D. With the CR cartoons, they don’t need ro make their own. They get (almost) all of the benefits without any of the risk or expense.

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

I mean…they don’t really need to. CR is already doing it. The purpose of the OGL was to outsource the design and risk of supplements. WotC is just doing the same here with marketing. Between Stranger Things and CR, they don’t need to market D&D. With the CR cartoons, they don’t need ro make their own. They get (almost) all of the benefits without any of the risk or expense.

Except, as he was saying, Critical Role isn't serving (and isn't trying to serve) the family friendly audience that a D&D cartoon would try to serve. I would expect anything with the actual D&D brand to be more along the lines of DADHAT, tonally.

 

[Seramus]

Yeah, Critical Role is not going to be kid appropriate for more than a few minutes at a time.

Maybe Dragon Prince? But that's not D&D, so ...

It is mildly surprising that the success of the Critical Role animated show hasn't lit a fire under getting a D&D branded show to market yet. It seems like we're forever years out from that happening.

I think Dragon Prince is a good recommendation for a kid friendly D&D-similar cartoon. And apparently Liam O'Brien is joining the cast for the Dragon King (taking place 7 years after the events of Dragon Prince).

Trollhunters: Tales of Arcadia and 3Below: Tales of Arcadia are also pretty fun, though they are much more modern games (Trollhunters being the closest, fantasy tropes combined with modern kids).

 

[Clint_L]

All that being said, Daggerheart does absolutely seem designed for the way the cast plays. Its not really my thing, but listening to Age of Umbra, Daggerheart seemed to work great for them at the table. I really do hope they use it for their next major campaign, and that by doing so it injects some life back into the group. (I also think rotating the cast and having smaller adventures, Dimension 20 style, would help as well, but that's blasphemous to a lot of critters.)

Oh god, I hope they don't do a whole campaign of Age of Umbra. What a slog.

 

[humble minion]

You think eleven-year-olds have not heard all these swear words and use them regularly?

The swear words are all a bit meh in my opinion, but from memory Scanlon’s very first appearance in the cartoon is a sex scene, which I would not be showing to my 9yo nephew.

But I just bounced off Scanlon hard as a character in general. I never watched many of the actual play sessions, but the n the show I found him dislikeable to the point I wanted to turn the show off when he was on screen. I think that sort of thing is a hazard of the medium. You’re condensing hundreds of hours of game down to a dozen or so hours of show. All the big drama and conflict moments (or moments of Scanlon being particularly obnoxious) have to stay in because CR fans remember them and will look for them - but there’s so many of them that there’s no space to breathe between them or buildup or fallout and the whole thing just seems crowded and weightless.