By Chris Snellgrove
| Published
While the game has always been popular among tabletop nerds, Dungeons & Dragons has experienced an absolute explosion in popularity in more recent years thanks to everything from its prominent mentions in Stranger Things to the success of podcasts like Critical Role and its animated spinoff, Vox Machina. This is a roleplaying game where most of the fun comes from imagining the fantastic characters and locations described by your Dungeon Master, but players have always been hungry to see these worlds brought to life in live action. Fortunately for those players, Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves is now streaming on Netflix, and it’s the best game adaptation ever made.
If you’re already a Dungeons & Dragons player, then you’ll probably be impressed by how much Honor Among Thieves captures the spirit of an over-the-top tabletop session when you watch it on Netflix. The plot involves the usual group of improbable characters coming together for an equally improbable quest…in this case, getting a magical tablet to bring a special someone back from the dead. But like any D&D session filled with weird players and their correspondingly weird personalities, it doesn’t take much time for things to go off the rails in the funniest possible ways.
Fortunately, Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves has a better cast than most fantasy films on Netflix, starting with Chris Pine, a character still best known to genre fans for playing Captain Kirk in the Star Trek reboot films. It also stars Michelle Rodriguez, still best known for her Indy hit Girlfight. Rounding out the most memorable members of the cast is Hugh Grant, who is arguably best known for Love Actually and About A Boy.
Long before Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves landed on Netflix, it barely passed its DC check at the box office. Against a budget of $150 million, it earned $208.2 million. This modest profit was enough to make the studio consider a sequel, but official plans were never announced; what was announced was a TV show from Hasbro Entertainment, though it’s been nearly a year since we have gotten any real updates on its status.
Fortunately, Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves rolled a Natural 20 when it came to impressing the critics. On Rotten Tomatoes, the movie has a critical score of 91 percent. Critics generally praised the film for its mixture of humor and heart and how accessible it was to general audiences who may never have rolled a character or rolled for initiative.
If that’s not enough reason for you to stream Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves on Netflix, you should know that this is one of the rare fantasy films to get the right balance of humor, heart, and adventure. It’s not trying to be a serious epic like Lord of the Rings, nor is it a groan-worthy goof-fest like the earlier Dungeons & Dragons film. Instead, it’s something that anyone who likes comedic adventures can enjoy, though if you play the tabletop game, you’ll be especially charmed by how much this film channels its freewheeling spirit.
Will you enjoy Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves as much as I did when you stream it on Netflix, or will you bail and go watch some more Vox Machina on Amazon? You won’t know until you stream it for yourself (no rolling a new character required). Afterward, you can join us in saying “Jarnathan” in the silliest possible way whenever you see a bird.
