In a world without filler episodes, The Legend of Vox Machina still makes room for crucial downtime

If The legend of Vox Machina continues, the show tackles more and more, coming not only from the original Critical Role campaign, but from subsequent actual play sessions and the entire world of Exandria that has been built out since then.

And yet, even when the stakes are at an all-time high, the creative team is behind it The legend of Vox Machina never loses sight of what actually makes the show special: not the fighting or even the world-building, but the characters and their relationships. The result is not only an epic fantasy show with a grand scope, but a show that responds to intimate personal stakes.

(Ed. remark: This review contains spoilers for The legend of Vox Machina season 3.)

The third season of The legend of Vox Machina Picks up where the last one left off: Raishan (Cree Summer), one of the dragons in the group bent on taking over the world, contacts the adventuring party and offers them information about a magical item that could destroy the tyrannical dragon. can stop leader.

But predictably, Vox Machina’s adventurers have a lot to do this season, and not just when it comes to slaying the big bad dragon. For example, Bard Scanlan (Sam Riegel) wants to repair the relationship he has with his estranged daughter. Druid Keyleth (Marisha Ray) and the rogue Vax (Liam O’Brien) dance around a romantic relationship while dealing with their own internal struggles, as do Vex (Laura Bailey) and Percy (Taliesin Jaffe). Pike (Ashley Johnson) struggles with her faith, and the barbaric Grog (Travis Willingham)… well, Grog is actually pretty peachy this season. There’s a world and lore to expand and little character backstories to flesh out, and yet even with all that packed into 12 half-hour episodes, the show doesn’t really feel like it’s taking on too much.

It’s because the creators know when to slow down. Improvised banter is built into the original campaign, but it proves to be a valuable tool in figuring out when to take a break from the emotional beats. The characters may be facing higher and higher stakes and bigger enemies, but they also feel the effects of those things.

This is incredibly valuable to the public. These days, a lot of high-stakes shows don’t bother to really hone in on the downtime or the moments between big world-ending plot points. Eight hour-long episodes pass in a breathless haze. But The legend of Vox Machina checks in with the characters, how they feel about themselves, their mission and each other. Even when things happen, they aren’t on all the time. There’s a whole bit where they take some time to rest and recover in Scanlan’s fantastic dream house, for example, and it’s a chance for them to pause and reflect. And some of the best decisions the creative team makes involve integration more of these moments that didn’t appear in the original campaign.

Example: Percy’s death. During the tabletop session, he was dead for a while, but quickly came back to life. And for a D&D game with friends, that makes sense, because you want to keep the game going. But for a television show, an easy resurrection would turn a big follow-up moment into just a wave of the hand. Dr. Anna Ripley (Kelly Hu) could easily be dismissed as a threat, and there would be no chance for the rest of the characters to think. Finally Percy do come back (in a different way, with new ramifications), but making it an arc of a few episodes really just emphasizes the personal stakes in a way that this show does very well.

The writers and directors have a difficult task on this show: hours and hours of adapting (and o’clock) of actual play in 12 half-hour episodes. The fact that they’ve so cleverly honed in on what’s important to the characters and the story is impressive, as is the fact that they know when to change those beats and make them fit within the structure of television. Leaving Percy’s death lingering allows the other characters – particularly Vex – to really reexamine their own priorities, while also reinforcing the fact that characters shall die if they don’t defeat the great evil.

That’s not it The legend of Vox Machina has more episodes or running time to fill out these emotional beats than other fantasy shows; it’s that the makers know how to give them just as much weight as the epic battles and big confrontations with villains. The action scenes are certainly fun and intense, but they don’t drag out or take more precedence than quiet moments watching a sunrise. The appeal of Critical Role has always been the characters (and the actors behind them), and that focus on both the small and big stakes is what takes it up a level. The legend of Vox Machina. And in the third season, when So There’s a lot going on, but there’s still room to breathe so much. It’s clearer than ever that this show is something special.