Gear up for some boozin’ and brawlin’ animated adventuring, Critters: “The Legend of Vox Machina” series from Critical Role will storm onto Amazon Prime Video next February.
Season 1 of “The Legend of Vox Machina,” an adult animated fantasy-adventure series based on Critical Role’s first Dungeons & Dragons campaign, is scheduled to premiere Feb. 4, 2022, exclusively on the Prime Video streaming service worldwide. Amazon Studios has ordered a total of 24 episodes across two seasons.
Amazon announced the premiere date at a virtual New York Comic Con panel Friday with the founders and cast of Critical Role. It also released the show’s title sequence (watch below or at this link) and the Critical Role cast’s F-bomb-laced live read of a scene from “The Legend of Vox Machina” (below or at this link).
The show follows Vox Machina, a band of seven unlikely heroes who — in a desperate attempt to pay off their mounting bar tab — find themselves on a quest to save the realm of Exandria from dark magical forces. Critical Role, which began livestreaming the Vox Machina campaign in March 2015 (and concluded in November 2017), was formed by a group of friends who met as voiceover actors and began playing D&D role-playing games together.
“The Legend of Vox Machina” is a production of Amazon Studios, Critical Role and animation studio Titmouse for Amazon Prime Video.
The series stars Critical Role founders and cast members Laura Bailey, Taliesin Jaffe, Ashley Johnson, Liam O’Brien, Marisha Ray, Sam Riegel, Travis Willingham and game master Matthew Mercer. Brandon Auman (“Star Wars: Resistance”) and Titmouse’s Chris Prynoski (“metalocalypse”) serve as executive producers alongside the eight CR founders.
“The Legend of Vox Machina” animation project kicked off in 2019, when Critical Role launched a Kickstarter campaign to produce a 22-minute animated special. They surpassed their original funding goal of $750,000 in less than an hour — ultimately raising $11.39 million and setting the record for the most-funded film and video project in Kickstarter history. The outpouring of support from CR’s fans (aka Critters) caught the eye of execs at Amazon Studios, which picked up the series to bolster its adult-animation slate.
Sung Jin Ahn (“Niko and the Sword of Light”) is the series’ supervising director, with character art created by Emmy-winning artist, animator and designer Phil Bourassa. The score is by Neal Acree (“Overwatch,” “World of Warcraft,” “Stargate SG-1”). Peter Habib and Mr. Fantastic wrote and produced all of the original songs for the bard Scanlan Shorthalt (alongside Riegel, who voices the character).
Separately, Critical Role is about to commence its third D&D campaign, which premieres Oct. 21 with an episode that will be simulcast on Twitch and YouTube and at 30 Cinemark theaters nationwide. The yearslong Campaign 3 will take place after the events of CR’s “Exandria Unlimited” mini-campaign and the group’s second campaign, which followed the exploits of the Mighty Nein adventuring party.
Watch “The Legend of Vox Machina” title sequence:
Watch the the CR cast’s live read:
