People who watch The Late Show but who have never picked up a twenty-sided die may see this game and decide to try out the game that their favorite talk show host plays. Stephen Colbert is a nerd icon beloved by non-nerds. And it’s exemplified in the difference in attitude between the good-natured but exclusionary posturing in Colbert’s interview with Joe Manganiello and the rapport between Colbert and Mercer, a man renowned for throwing wide the gates of D&D to thousands of new players over the past few years. The difference is subtle, but meaningful. It’s not so much that it’s “hip to be a nerd now,” but rather that being a nerd isn’t uncool anymore.
Critical Role, and by extension Mercer himself, is emblematic of an influx of new players into D&D driven not by the bogeyman of trend-chasing, but by an authentic and inextinguishable love for nerdiness. Someone who might be, as Colbert later said to Joe Manganiello, was a bandwagoner who was reading a book he may have once been teased for loving, just because “because it’s hip to be a nerd now.” Now, staring at Matthew Mercer from the other side of a DM screen, Colbert no longer needs to defend his turf. When Colbert roasted James Franco for daring to challenge his knowledge of The Silmarillion on The Colbert Report, he was stridently defending his passions from a Johnny-come-lately. The list continues, but suffice to say, D&D has suffused pop media in a hitherto unprecedented way-save perhaps for when an official D&D cartoon was on the air. These days, it’s easier than ever to find a group to play D&D with, thanks in part to its visibility on livestreamed shows like Critical Role loving parody appearances in children’s cartoons like The Amazing World of Gumball and She-Ra and the Princesses of Power the celebrity endorsements of actors and personalities like Deborah Ann Woll, Vin Diesel, Terry Crews, and Stephen Colbert. His nerdy passions were just another comic bit for a mainstream audience to laugh at, even though Colbert’s pride was authentic.
#BEATING MERGE DRAGONS CHALLENGE 19 TV#
Colbert’s love of Tolkien and D&D always seemed like a fluke that a nerdy guy managed to make it to late night TV was indicative of how he was able to compartmentalize his geeky traits and present a respectable and relatable appearance. But it’s always been a very personal thing. Colbert has been quietly injecting the pride of being an unabashed nerd into the mainstream for years, ever since he was a correspondent on The Daily Show. In that interview, Colbert and Manganiello discussed the need to have friends to roleplay with, and lamented their occasional inability to gather friends and roll dice, citing the “secretive” nature of D&D, thanks to its lack of coolness and the moral fright now known as the “Satanic Panic.”Ĭolbert appearing side-by-side with Matthew Mercer, in many ways the face of the modern age of D&D, is a landmark moment. Tolkien is well known, and he takes huge pride in being an “OG nerd…back when nerd meant something… hip to be a nerd.” Last year, he invited actor Joe Manganiello on the Late Show to talk about their love of the original “red box” D&D set, and about Manganiello’s ‘80s heavy metal-inspired streetwear brand, Death Saves. His love of ( and encyclopedic knowledge of) the works of J.R.R. Ultimately, the Critical Role fan community blew past their original goal of $50,000, with the highest single donation exceeding $1,000. You can watch the video now, or join the Critical Role community to watch it "live" on /criticalrole at 6 PM today (). Fans of D&D, Critical Role, and Stephen Colbert could donate to affect the game, with every $20 pledge counting as a vote towards adventure elements such as: the plot of the adventure, who the villain of the adventure would be, and what legendary artifact Colbert’s character would find during the adventure. This game wasn’t just a flight of fancy, but a fundraiser to benefit Red Nose Day, a charity with a mission to end child poverty.
This game is now available to on YouTube you can find the video embedded below. All that changes today.Ĭritical Role’s producer Marisha Ray and its Dungeon Master Matthew Mercer flew out to New York just days ago to sit down for a one-on-one game of D&D with Stephen Colbert. Though his love of D&D is no secret, we’ve never had the chance to see him play firsthand. Late Show host and former The Colbert Report host Stephen Colbert is an unabashed fantasy geek and long-time Dungeons & Dragons player.
Monstrous Compendium Volume One: Spelljammer Creatures
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