Dungeons & Dragons: The Queen's Cradle

*"Dungeons & Dragons: The Queen's Cradle is a thrilling addition to the world of D&D, delivering a compelling story filled with intrigue, adventure, and the magic fans of the franchise have come to expect. The campaign setting is rich with detail, immersing players in a realm where political scheming and ancient mysteries collide. The Queen's Cradle itself is a fascinating focal point, providing a perfect mix of lore and challenge for adventurers to unravel.

The character options and encounters are diverse and engaging, encouraging creative solutions and rewarding strategic play. The balance between combat, exploration, and roleplay is well-executed, keeping the pace lively and unpredictable. However, a few sections feel overly complex, which could overwhelm newer players. Additionally, some DMs may need to tweak certain encounters to maintain party balance.

Despite minor hiccups, The Queen's Cradle is an imaginative and satisfying adventure, offering a memorable experience for any D&D group. Highly recommended for fans seeking a mix of intrigue and action!"*

I'll preface this by saying I play DnD, but I am not a blind fanboy. I've seen plenty of terrible DND slop. This short was amazing for only having 16 minutes to try and introduce a full party of characters, villains, and motivation. Sure, if you don't know DND you won't be picking up on moments like "oh cool, the paladin did lay on hands there!" but do you need that to enjoy it? Not at all.

So many of these bad reviews are criticizing it for not having more time to flesh things out and it's like...it is a short. They gave a short snippet of an adventure as one would expect. You can't get everything in such short time. An entire short where it's nothing but fighting would look cool but then people would complain that we don't know who we're watching or care at all. A whole short where we are just learning of the characters as they travel would be interesting to some and maybe it would be enough time to care about a character or two, but most would complain that nothing substantial happened (look at any anime where a whole ep has no action and tons of fans complain). These guys had 16 minutes to introduce us to the cast, give each of them a little moment of characterization, and then give a cool and visually stunning fight. I wish we had more and I hope this is a sign to WotC that a beautiful DND series would be amazing.

(I will agree that the wizard looked uncanny though. Not sure what it was with her animation vs the others but I was not a fan lol)

The photorealistic visuals are breathtaking, after all its the same team that made Beyond the Aquila Rift in Love Death + Robots. However, the story is not on the same level of distinguished quality as the renders are...it is predictable and ends on a cliffhanger, feeling more like an intro cinematic for a D&D game than a complete short film. More than its predictability, it is quite frustrating to see that the story is quite simplistic, with a classic team of different "classes" of characters "à la RPG", a bit of forest, mountains and some fantasy bridge or cave and you got the "adventure" mood. Some little action scene showing off each characters' ability and a final boss. And yet we don't quite get the why nor the how about this whole little journey.

While visually impressive, it lacks the depth expected from standalone shorts like those in some Love, Death + Robots episodes. All in all, after many D&D iterations and adaptations it leaves you wanting a more fleshed-out narrative. Especially for such a vast and diverse world.

I would have actually provided a 10/10 on this but was disappointed by the length but the cliffhanger left me longing for more. With it being such a short episode it was there just to get your appetite wet so jumping right in to the action with out much back story on the characters makes complete sense. Outside of the original D&D movie and then the most recent Honor Among Thieves this is the closest anyone has gotten to getting it correct. The visuals were stunning and the voice actors provided the perfect portrayals of each race and class they embodied. For those providing low reviews either expected a fully fleshed out story in 15 minutes or have never used the power of their imagination to immerse themselves in the multiverses you venture through in D&D.

I'd anyone reads these,make this d & d version into a series and I'd watch the 9 hells out of it! We need a show like this!

The characters were amazing and against normal trope types. Dwarf monk? Heck yeah! The halfling wizard reminds me of a player in my party. Then there was a half orc paladin with a backstory that was tasty even in such a brief form was welcome.

I could tell every spell and ability that was used!. It is refreshing to have a writer and crew that knows the game and has read the rules.

The animation on the creatures was superb and the wounds made me think I could almost feel them!