Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves

For the record, there is a tie-in novel about Doric that explores her backstory, although I understand the "It's not in the movie so it doesn't count" mindset. I haven't read it myself, I just know it exists.

I just came from the movie and wow, it was so much better than I expected, and i expected a good movie. The way the brought D&D to movie screen was pitch perfect. I'm thoroughly impressed by the deep understanding of not just the lore, but also how a D&D campaigns actually go - that is to say a mix between high adventure and a farce, full of rapidly changing plans that keep falling apart, wild detours to set up those plans, and the characters (players) bumbling about and arguing only to then improvise a brilliant solution on the spot. A great mix of comedy, adventure and real emotions. I like how they didn't water down the D&D elements, there were plenty of easter eggs and deep cuts. I just lost it on the graveyard scene, it was the most D&D thing ever. And oh god, the cartoon characters cameo.

Might be my favorite movie in years, 10/10 no notes.

I'm back from seeing this movie!

kitten Tabaxi getting swallowed by a fish!

Did you like it?

yeah!

Watched this movie four times now. Still love it every time though it's firmly in the "I need to watch other things for a year" camp.

Opening Night was an anniversary date. Then I had a shitty day and needed to get out of the house. Third was flying to LA to see it with my Dn D Party I never otherwise see in person. And the fourth was because Dn D was inexplicably canceled and the other players wanted to see it a second time as a means to save the night.

And I've caught new details every single time. This will be my new "I need ice cream, sweatpants, and a feel good movie" ... movie. Right next to Stardust for me.

Glad to hear you had fun. I watched it with friends as well.

This is def something you bring people with for maximum fun.

I just go back, and I must say that this was one of the funniest movies I've seen in a while. The story wasn't anything super-special, but the the characters were a lot of fun to watch.

And I had a good laugh about the party from the animated series showing up, even though they probably died.

Nah, they probably made it out.

Yeah, they heard Edgin say the cage was a trap, they got just enough screentime to have Significant Looks about it, and they had plenty of time between then and the Beckoning Death to get away.

We're sitting toward the end of the film's run and the Box Office Numbers aren't... great.

So, we talked earlier on how to calculate budget vs. profit; Take the initial budget, double it to get the marketing factored on and then add about .5 of the budget on top for a decent profit rather than breaking even.

Dn D had $150 million on it's base meaning it needed to earn probably around $375 million.

And it earned... $179 Million Worldwide.

That's a bit of an acclaimed flop territory. :(

To compare, John Wick came out the weekend before and has $363 Million while Mario, the weekend after, has $892 Million.

A lot of people are pointing to release date; it got delayed from November into March and punted between John Wick and Mario. Many are suggesting that a better release would have been to hold out for a mid-to-late Summer where there are currently no tent pole action movies scheduled.

Bye Bye to potential sequel, potential Spin-off and/or potential animated adaptation.

Edited by LucienRen on Apr 27th 2023 at 2:41:26 AM

Not inherently. Flops have turned out other projects and Hasbro created an entire entertainment company to churn out adaptations and franchise options from their products. There could very well already be projects in the works that a significant amount of effort and capital have been dumped into that cutting them would result in a bigger loss.

Also, we've had flops get sequels before. Justice League, between its 2017 initial launch and the later Synder Cut, were BOTH flops. Yet did not sink the franchise. It wasn't until after the flops of Black Atom and Shazam that the reboot was announced and yet their still going hard trying to turn a profit on The Flash.

Also we're finding that a lot of movies are finding audiences on streaming just like back in the days of DVD/VHS.

Probably further to the film's advantage is the more inherent anthology potential of the franchise; they don't need to bring back Chris Pine and Michelle Rodriguez for a sequel. Something even fans of the film might agree with anyway simply to have a fresh cast for a fresh new Dn D campaign; how many people bring the same character to a completely new table?

They could do a much smaller budget sequel without compromising too much inherent integrity of the series.

I’m also going to note that Paramount has already greenlit a TV show that isn’t directly connected to the events of the movie.

Hasbro may also count any surge in general D&D purchases as connected to the film. So if they combine a secondary benefit with poor release timing they might be willing to give it a second try.

True. Movies also do find legs in "MERCHENDIZE EVERYTHING".

However, that also depends on where dnd products are sitting due to the OGL failure last year.

It's complex. I also don't want to sound overly optimistic. Just trying to see different perspectives rather than looking at the box office and going "MOVIE FAIL". Which is a rather unnuanced approach.

It's basically a D&D commercial. Is its metric for success not how many copies and assorted merch it pushes?

Edited by Chortleous on Apr 28th 2023 at 7:12:01 AM

But it is ALSO a film and needs to succeed on that front too.

It might have done well. If they didn't put it so close to the mario film (the biggest of the year).

Yeah, it's a bad release date decision to release it between John Wick and Mario.

I wanted to go see it, but my mom and I can't really afford to go to the cinema anymore so we'll watch it when it's out on digital/streaming. Reading one of the prequel novels while I wait.

Shame about the bad release timing. Hopefully they give it another shot.

I wonder if the Amazon promotion was a last minute bid to hopefully get the word out on the movie. I mean, it was a good attempt but then thats like putting a bandage over the arrow the shot themselves with.

It's a shame that there are good movies out there that are not able to do well in the box office because of the bad release dates they got. That's what happened to the first Shazam! movie as they released that movie between Captain Marvel and especially Avengers: Endgame. I just hope that Sonic the Hedgehog 3 still does well, even though it's premiering around the same time as Avatar 3.

Seems even word of mouth has limits.

Yeah, there's only so much word of mouth could do, especially if a lot of people are not familiar with the franchise at all.