Critical Role’s Legend of Vox Machina indulges in D&D tropes to mostly fun effect

polygon.com:

Critical Role is a hugely popular actual play phenomenon, drawing in millions of viewers and creating dozens of spin-off projects. The campaigns are run by Dungeon Master and voice actor Matthew Mercer, with a crew of fellow professionals who show up to improv a grand fantasy tale. Critical Role has grown into an absolute behemoth, large enough to raise $11 million through a Kickstarter campaign to distill nearly 400 hours of role-playing down into a season of television with no entry knowledge required. The end result is a solid pulp adventure and a rollicking good time… once the show gets over its own insecurities.

The Legend of Vox Machina is an attempt to create an on-ramp to the deep lore of Mercer’s fictional setting, a world called Exandria. The first thing we see is a montage of the world, with legendary heroes and dire threats. Just when the big picture has been established, the show throws a curveball at the viewer by instantly and brutally slaughtering a squad of heroic adventurers. They die horribly, shouting cusses the entire way, and this sets the stage for the first two episodes of the show.

The viewer is introduced to our main cast through the reliable trope of a good old-fashioned bar brawl. The adventuring group Vox Machina is made up of half-elven twins Vax and Vex, goliath barbarian Grog, gnomish bard Scanlan and cleric Pike, anxious druid Keyleth, and the traumatized gunslinger Percy. They’re your typical Dungeons & Dragons adventuring party — hot messes with battle axes and magical powers — and their first big fight goes as badly as you’d expect.

It’s frankly a little much. Within the span of a dozen minutes, we get to see our main cast get drunk, puke everywhere, chop off a few limbs, and a gnome