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TV: D is for...

Dungeons and Dragons

"But don't you see? Working together is so much better than working apart!" "Piss off!"CONVOLUTED CRAPOLA cartoonery designed to cash in on top early eighties “quiet” children’s pursuit. Selection of dreary yank kids go on a “magical roller coaster ride” and end up in fantasy (read – dull, cliche-ridden) land of orcs, goblins and “Venger – the force of evil.” Step up “Ranger” (blond twatty leader, real name Hank); “Cavalier” (wanky “coward” bloke, called Eric); “Presto” (comedy nerd magician, name “Magician”); “Bobby” (hateful child with club, aka “Barbarian”); “Acrobat” (or Diane, token black woman) plus miniature unicorn for “I’m going back to save him!” factor. There was another lady, Sheila, who was Bobby’s big sister. She could turn invisible by pulling the hood of her cloak over her head; her handle was “Thief”, Midget Dungeon Master was the gnomic overseer. Five minutes in, all children in the country were registered “outdoors”.

9 Comments

9 Comments

  1. Matthew Rudd

    August 7, 2009 at 6:47 am

    Every time they met another child who’d suffered the same fate, they’d always manage to get that child back to “their world” without returning themselves. Every time.

  2. Applemask

    November 3, 2009 at 4:56 pm

    Always kind of liked this myself, largely because of Eric bringing some sense of perspective to the thing.

  3. Paul

    November 6, 2009 at 2:54 am

    My favourite cartoon as a kid – still holds up well watching it today. a very character led show rather than action action action. I think the review is unfairly harsh. It was quite a dark show at times and excellently voiced/acted…sometimes the animation was a bit ropey

    Favourites

    The Dragon’s Graveyard (where they nearly kill Venger)
    Quest of the Skeleton Warrior ( the kids face their deepest fears to help a celestial knight)
    The Traitor – Hank betrays the others…or does he (of course he doesn’t!!)
    The Box – The kids help to find Zandora – a female Dungeon Master – they go to other worlds in her box (including their own – where they have to come back of course!)
    Day of the Dungeon Master – Eric becomes Dungeon Master for the day

  4. Danforth

    November 6, 2009 at 11:27 am

    Never liked this as a kid, even though I did dabble in D&D and other pen/paper/polyhedral dice games, Fighting Fantasy gamebooks etc. For me the problem was that I had no empathy with the central characters and actively hoped they’d be offed – which of course they never were. Also I noticed some of the music was the same as The Incredible Hulk cartoon, which to my seven year old mind was plain lazy.

    Besides, it was based on an RPG but removed the one innovation of RPGing – i.e. *you* are the hero. Ever had to sit and watch a bunch of people playing a game – any game – and not be allowed to join in? And everyone who *is* playing is really crap at it? That’s what watching this cartoon was like if you were a gamer…

    Similarly, the people I know who loved this show all though the *game* was shit. So I guess as a market-broadening sort of a cash-in, it was a success 🙂

  5. Applemask

    December 9, 2009 at 11:43 pm

    It was co-written by Steve Gerber and the one normal character was played by Donnie Most, Superstar. It is impossible for it not to have at least had its moments.

  6. Shifty Bench

    August 2, 2010 at 1:27 pm

    I agree with Paul. I loved Dungeons and Dragons as a kid, I have every episode on dvd and it still holds up today. It’s a well-written, well performed adventure show that sadly only lasted 27 episodes with no ending to speak of.

    ‘Convoluted crapola’? Bloody hell!

  7. Great Bustard

    October 2, 2010 at 4:43 pm

    It was a bit production line, but miles better than something like He-Man which was a half hour long advert and shameless about it.

    The best episode had Eric (Don Most was great in this) unleash the vaguely named and massively powerful “Evil” by mistake, which devastated the land, all very dramatic and tense.

    There was an unfilmed final episode that revealed Venger’s true identity and gave the kids the chance to go home. The actual last episode was sadly the worst they ever did, but on the whole, D&D was surprisingly good. Rather this than the ghastly film with Tom Baker as an “elf” or something.

  8. Richard Davies

    October 3, 2010 at 12:23 pm

    Here’s a some inside info on D&D, from the site of one of the writers.

    http://www.povonline.com/cols/COL145.htm

  9. Matty

    April 26, 2011 at 8:47 pm


    Paul:

    The Box – The kids help to find Zandora – a female Dungeon Master – they go to other worlds in her box…

    I bet they did etc.

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