#cr 2 ep 141

[missing-a-place-ive-never-been]

so i just finished campaign 2

in 6 months pretty much to the fucking day. and what a half a year it was. i don't know how to write down how much i love these characters, just... watching them evolve from the very beginning of the journey was just so special. i started campaign 1 in the briarwood arc (and i honestly should probably rewatch that just bc i was so confused about what was happening still at that point) and i loved seeing these characters from their first meeting as a group and how their experiences and relationships formed them into the people they were a year(-ish??) later.

Although c3 is the one that got me hooked and will always be special bc of that, and c1 felt more of a idk how to say it a story because of the separation and a more clear path (going from the briarwoods to the dragons to vecna just felt more natural to me instead of what mostly felt like side quests next to the war storyline and the lucien storyline), i feel the most connection as a group with m9. their individual development but also their group dynamic in which each of them felt like an integral part to the story and all were important to each other and had special moments together... idk something so very compelling and i will be thinking about them for a long fucking time.

As for the numbers, this means that on average i spend over two and a half hours a day for the past half a year watching critical role and i honestly cannot say i regret it. i don't know if i will ever play d&d myself as i think cr has set such a high bar of expectations and i don't really know the right people for it (at this moment) but i have grown to see the value in role playing games. though the stories might be fantasy, the emotions these people bring to the table each week is are just raw and real and have made me work through some of my own issues, i can't even imagine the impact on their own lives throughout all of it.

in the end, i would have loved to see more of essek and caleb interacting. liam and matt's interactions in the final part of 141 broke me and made me yearn for more. i haven't seen the wrap up of the reunion eps yet but at least for the reunion i don't think we see essek until the last few moments, which is bittersweet; while we don't see it directly play out, we get a good glimpse into their combined futures and i think that open ending does leave for a lot of own interpretation (and def a lot of great fan art!). overall, the characters i enjoyed most were caleb (i adore liam and his faithful representation of a bisexual disaster) and jester (do i need to explain? wonderfully chaotic and the kind of enjoyment of just life and its beauty i admire and aspire to), but even the characters i had less of a personal connection with (for me ford) i really loved for their interactions and relationships with the others.

i laughed and cried so much while experiencing this campaign, and i am just feeling full with love for the cast and crew and their incredible work and play. this is just a rambling of my thoughts at the moment and kind of a time capsule for myself, but if you are a critter and read all of it, thank you to you as well <3 the community (i mostly only interact with the one on tumblr) makes the experience def more valuable and i'm happy we're on the same journeys together!

[stay-funky-ponyboy]

Hi! Uhhh. I see you freaking out about critical role all the time and I'm intrigued. Would you like to tell me a bit about it? And where would you recommend starting to watch (or is it listen??)? Right at the beginning?

Hey! I’m glad my ramblings have gotten you intrigued. Critical Role is a web series featuring a wonderful cast of voice actors who play Dungeons and Dragons (aka D&D). I’m not sure how aware you are of D&D as a whole so I will give a brief intro to that. D&D is a role playing game typically set in fantasy worlds. Dice are used to determine certain actions and their success. CR is set in Exandria, a world created by Matthew Mercer, who is also the Dungeon Master for their games. Essentially, he is the narrator and organizer for the campaigns.

You can listen to it as a podcast, or you can watch their videos on YouTube! Personally, I prefer watching it because you can see their reactions to things, as well as see the maps Matt creates for combat.

There have been 3 main campaigns so far. Each one features a different party of fun characters. They used to livestream their episodes on Twitch and Youtube weekly every Thursday night at 7pm (pacific time). Because of the pandemic, they switched to pre recording them.

They now stream every thursday night, except for the last thursday of the month, since campaign 3 started.

Where to start? There are a few options:

Starting at the beginning with campaign 1 is perfectly fine. When it comes to D&D, sessions can take hours to complete. It's wild to see how long the episodes for CR are at first, but you get used to it.

The nice thing about each campaign is you can jump into them without having prior knowledge!

For campaign 1 (aka c1) there are 115 episodes. Some audio issues are present, and there is one disruptive cast member that leaves pretty early on. Some fans will say to skip to ep24, simply to avoid these early issues. Ep 1 or ep 24, either works.

Alternatively, if the ep count intimdates you, and you like animated series, you can watch The Legend of Vox Machina. This show covers the entire campaign (so far it has covered the first 50 eps) in a shorter format. It's great.

Campaign 2 is where I started my journey into critical role, and it is the longest with 141 episodes. Audio issues are resolved and the beginning is smoother. We have confirmation of it getting an animated series, but we don't have dates for it yet. I will always recommend watching c2 at some point, because it is truly a lovely story. Take your time with it.

Finally, campaign 3 is also a place you could start. It is currently airing, having 70 eps at the moment, so you could catch up the quickest here. This one does reference c1 and c2 a handful of times (characters, places, plotlines) so without context it could feel confusing. I don't think it is absolutely necessary but I know I prefer having context to things. Mind you, I haven't watched c1 in full, only c2. c3 has been very enjoyable to me all the same.

If you do start with c3, I would recommend watching Exandria Unlimited Prime (an 8 episode miniseries, the dungeon master being Aabria Iyengar), and the first season of The Legend of Vox Machina before you get into the campaign. It will provide insight into some of the references you may miss otherwise.

I hope this helps you a bit. If you have any other questions you can message me or send another ask!

[blackbird-brewster]

omg you love critical role toooo did you hear about Laudna and imogen!!! I lover your blog bc of cm took a tumblr break for a few years. Came back and in those years my wife introduced me to criticle role om love that you enjoy that too im an imodna stan allll the wayyy. (Also will for ever be a jemily, temily, and j'temily stan)

Helllllloooo Fellow Critter!

So great to have you here! While this blog is 90% Criminal Minds, I have a multi-fandom blog for DND stuff and other fandoms: @nonbinary-taralewis feel free to follow me over there too.

I love CR! My partner started watching CR in 2020 (Mighty Nein early episodes) and I got sucked in. We ended up watching ALL 141 episodes of Campagin 2 in 13 months.

I have since relistened to the entire campaign via podcast -- and I listened to all 141 episodes in two months lol (I listen to long pods on 3x speed)

Spoilers for C3 Under Cut

I haven't followed Bells Hells as closesly, mostly my partner gives me updates, or it's on in the background while I'm doign stuff. But YES, even though we haven't seen last week's ep yet -- IMODNA!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! SOOOOO rad! Laudna is my partner's fave CR character of all time. Hyped to see where Imogen and Laudna go from here.

[jesterthetrickerycleric]

"A tale of seven friends, who became eight, and then nine. This story comes to a close tonight, but the tale of the Mighty Nein lives on."

[majoraajoram]

Hello! I did some sketches last week, and I wanted to share them here!

They are my emotionnal support wizards and I hope they’ll be happy 😔💜🧡

[rokiie]

Jester as a pirate doesn't sound too bad if we add a few decades...

[hails-bop]

Essek: “This world was so much easier when it was black and white.” Beau: “But it’s so much more beautiful in all the shades of colors.” HAPPY PRIDE MONTH EVERYONE

[last-of-the-lot]

Campaign three comes around and the gang ends up on darktow, which has a new purple tiefling king, with a sharp tongue and even sharper sword...

[bloofirefae]

love.

[bloodyshadow1]

just out of curiosity (this isn’t meant to be a rude or sarcastic question), what was it that bothered you most about the kingsley thing?

for context, I haven’t actually seen the ending yet, i’ve only heard vague spoilers about what happened, but I am curious to hear your thoughts on it (i don’t mind hearing more spoilers abt the ending!)

sorry it's taken me so long to answer, I've been trying to word things right because I've been told I sound abrasive over text and I want to be clear that it isn't directed at you anon, it's just how I am as a person. Discourse under the cut

There are many things I dislike about the Kingsley thing, I'm not going to rant here (even though I did looking back and I apologize), but I'll give you some that I think are what bugs me the most. The first being that nothing that happened with Kingsley couldn't happen with Molly, after the initial waking up scene. We only had 26 episodes with Molly, we didn't know him that well and he's been dead for almost a year, anything except the not remembering anything, from walking away from a fight that he is clearly underleveled for, to going to be on a boat as a pirate could have all been Molly. It would have achieved the same thing, except he would have had the bonds with the Nein that started to grow as Molly, seeing them as they were at level 5 to now saving Exandria, but that didn't happen. I never really understood the Yasha Molly bond, since Yasha was gone for most episodes that Molly was around for and she was very quiet during those episodes, they never got a chance to really talk about anything deeper so it feels like an informed relationship, but Yasha the character cared for Molly yet because he's Kingsley, they barely have any interaction again and it feels empty and hollow. He barely interacted with any of the Nein, and certainly not on any deep level. He didn't even bother to ask their names, and only seemed like a kid dashing to do the next thing he could think of, only being able to do so because he is around a bunch of rich and powerful strangers that are treating him well without any actual care or curiosity about them. We got a shallow shadow of Molly and Lucien in Kingsley who doesn't add anything to the story.

There's also the fact that spells that bring back the dead don't work like that. There needs to be a target and a willing soul, that's what Matt's revival rituals are for, to coax the soul back to the body. I'm all for bending the rules of dnd for cool stuff, but it is part of extra rules in critical role that needs bending and it makes Lucien's argument of Molly never existing as anything but a shadow fragment of himself have a lot more weight if he didn't get brought back through magic and a literal goddess stepping in. Also greater restoration shouldn't have done anything but bring something back, it restores, it's in the name, it shouldn't have created a new personality and it definitely shouldn't have destroyed molly's old one if that's what happened.

Additionally, if this happened in an episode that wasn't the finale of the campaign, then I would feel differently. But it was, there isn't any more story, he's there for a bit part of the finale and nothing more. It's like if Liam came in with a half-elf rogue at the end of campaign 1 I would be pissed off at that character too. The story of the Mighty Nein is over, yeah there will probably be oneshots, or specials maybe, but it's over over, no more episodes every, the fellowship is broken, and they are living their own lives not as their adventuring party. I nothing Kingsley because there is nothing to care about, if he wasn't wearing the Molly/Lucien body he would be a random NPC, but because he is, he is just there with nothing really to get attached too. I know some people like him, I honestly can't understand why people do. He's Molly without any of the time or bonds that made Molly interesting, he's just a boring version of Molly and there's no time to get attached or understand anything more than. There's a reason why in almost every form of media, they refrain from introducing a new character in the last episode or chapter, because they come off flatter than the other characters the audience has followed, and for the most part they're right. Maybe they'll do a oneshot that focus' on him but I don't know why I should care.

The biggest thing though, is that it feels like defeat was snatched out of the jaws of victory. The whole final arc, the Nein has gotten nothing, no real treasure or magic items, not even renown and respect like Vox Machina did in defeating Vecna and saving Vasselheim, it seemed like actually getting Molly back was the one thing they wanted..., and then they didn't. He's a stranger wearing their fallen friend's body, who doesn't even seem to care about what they struggled for, that gods had to beat luck to bring him back and they're nothing to him. They got more from curbstomping Trent and bringing him to justice than the whole rest of the final arc and Kingsley is just another reminder.

Sorry for this rant, you did ask, but I just needed to get this out. I wasn't actually that attached to Molly, he was a fine character but I think the fandom got way too attached to him and instead of actually caring about his canon self, they pushed their head canons on him and that has it's own problems for me. But Kingsley just coming in literally right before the series ended just felt like a kick to the groin. Other people feel differently, I'm definitely not someone who says the cast is playing wrong, it's just something I hated about the finale of the story I loved and followed for so long.

[shits-of-exandria]

tex-blade returns!

[beaureblog]

The moment at the trial of Zeenoth and Thoreau where Matt described the shift in the room when Beau rose to testify... The respect, her authority, the victory of justice... such a powerful ending for Beau's journey.

[watchmaster--bryce]

God like I get it but also CALEB

HE WOULD LOVE YOU AS AN OLD MAN

YOU DESERVE HAPPINESS AND LOVE YOU SAD MAN

[somewheremidatlantic]

Ashley as assertive Yasha is so freakin hot 🥵

[jesterthetrickerycleric]

"Oh, you're going to look so great in a flower crown."

"What?"

"Reani, she makes them."

[hails-bop]

$10 Uk'otoa (Uk'otoaaa) shows up in hour five to sjquare ujp with fjord