D&D General What Are Dragonlance's Weis & Hickman, and Actor Manganiello Cooking Up?

Actor and D&D superfan Joe Manganiello and Dragonlance co-author Tracy Hickman have both posted a cryptic image on their respective social medias showing themselves, along with Margaret Weis standing together in front of a large dragon statue at Wizards of the Coast's offices in Renton, Washington.

Hickman's image was accompanied by the words "Something is coming...", and in Manganiello's case "WE'RE BACK", to which Wizards of the Coast replied "Welcome back to the table!" A later photograph from Weis also included Laura Hickman and Dan Ayoub, who was named head of Dungeons & Dragons back in July of this year.

The posts have sparked speculation as to what they might mean, with guesses ranging from a revival of Manganiello's Dragonlance TV show project--which was no longer in development after he stated in February 2024 that "Dragonlance is not a property WotC are interested in developing further currently"--to a new Dragonlance-based D&D adventure.

Weis and Hickman co-wrote a new Dragonlance trilogy in recent years following a legal dust-up with Wizards of the Coast which was ultimately dismissed without prejudice, so it would seem that any bad blood from the dispute has been left in the past.

The question now remains--what are they all cooking up this time?

 

[pukunui]

I guess two decades after Peter Jackson's trilogy the FXs have kept evolutionationing.

"Evolving" is the English word you're looking for there!

 

[Levistus's_Leviathan]

stone-age Anglo-Saxons

I’m not aware of any time or place in history where those existed.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

The nature of differing mediums means that changes to the core story are inevitable. The original AD&D adventures for Dragonlance changed a lot of aspects from the novels. And the 15th Anniversary of said adventures practically dynamited the railroad tracks in favor of a more open-world campaign that allowed for alternative solutions to various events in the Chronicles. It's a huge change, but one that I imagine many gamers would welcome, as the railroady aspect of the original campaign detracted from peoples' enjoyment of Dragonlance.

So too is a movie or TV series based on the original Chronicles/Legends going to be different. The real question is what changes are worth it, and what original content is worth preserving.

Regarding the casting of ethnicities, Goldmoon's original portrayal of having blonde hair and blue eyes is based off of a racist myth about Native Americans. The very religion that propagated that belief has revised and acknowledged its inaccuracy nearly 20 years ago, has attempted to distance itself from in a variety of ways, so even among the faithful it's something that people are shying away from. Edit: My initial reading on the religion's stance over Lamanite curse was mistaken in believing that they were more overtly condemnatory of the belief, where it more likely appears that they just want to downplay its influence.

On a similar note, the silver dragon D'argent sometimes disguises herself as a Kagonesti elf in the Chronicles and some versions of the adventures. The Kagonesti are noted in-universe as being darker-skinned than other elves, as well as having a culture closer to nature and being hunter-gatherers. But D'argent's elven disguise notably has light skin and hair.

In the real world in the United States (which houses a significant amount of D&D players and Dragonlance fans), there's an increasing mainstream acceptance of white supremacist viewpoints. The richest man in the world, the very same man who threw a hissy fit over a D&D history book, gave two Nazi salutes on national television and made social media posts claiming that Jewish people are fomenting a genocide of white people via mass immigration from non-European countries.

I do not believe that Weis, Hickman, or other DL writers have white supremacist sympathies. On an older Facebook post, IIRC Hickman notably left the Republican Party because of their embrace of Trump, a Nazi sympathizer, who ran for President and won.

As for how this ties back into Dragonlance...what message does it send to have not one, but two female characters coded as Indigenous, being the most prominent and powerful of said groups in-universe? But who both have light skin and hair not typically associated with Indigenous people? Is this something worth preserving and carrying over, given what kinds of people we know will latch onto it?

Mod Note:

You’ve been a part of ENWorld’s since 2013; you have no excuse for disregarding the site’s “No politics” rule so flagrantly, in such particular, explicit detail. You could have easily pointed to the issue with generalities.

But here we are.

Don’t do this again.

 

[QuentinGeorge]

I’m not aware of any time or place in history where those existed.

You don't think the Angles or Saxons or their ancestors ever existed in the stone age? Ok. (I assume it was a "gotcha' at me because "Anglo-Saxon" as an identity only existed post classical era but you knew what I meant so no need for pedantry)

 

[Parmandur]

Funny you bring that up, when the movie of which had an English actor playing the role of a mixed-native American.

Oh, very intentional comparison (Irish/Jewish, somewhat technically, but certainly not Mohican).