Critical Role's next big adaptation is finally here, with The Mighty Nein hitting Amazon Prime Video, giving us a deeper look into the world that Matt Mercer and crew built all those days ago back in Campaign 2. It's only a few episodes deep so far, which means we can't really get an accurate picture of how it's shaping up right now, but we can confirm that its adaptation is the best, from second to second. The Legend of Vox Machina.
If you had to criticize The Legend of Vox Machina, it would probably be how rushed everything is, with as many pieces of Campaign 1 crammed into as little time as possible. It was an odd decision that thankfully didn't affect the show's quality too badly, but it was apparently one that Critical Role didn't have much choice over.
Critical roll will “take its time” with its mighty Nein alignment
Earlier this week, Critical Role CEO Travis Willingham was interviewed by Polygon at New York Comic Con 2025 (thanks PC Gamer), during which he explained that the reason The Legend of Vox Machina felt so rushed in places was because he had no idea if they would have more than two seasons.
“What we learned from doing Vox Machina was that we didn't know, after the two-season order, if we were going to get anything after that,” says Willingham. “So, we really crammed a lot of stuff into Season 2. I think our pacing has suffered a little bit for that in some places.”
Thankfully, this won't be a problem for The Mighty Nein's adaptation, as Willingham seems to have taken the lessons from making The Legend of Vox Machina and will “throw caution to the wind and take our time” with the first season of the adaptation. We can even see a bit of that with how The Mighty Nein has started, choosing to adapt the off-screen sessions used to get players comfortable with their characters.
Of course, even if Critical Role takes all the time in the world, it's going to be nearly impossible to adapt an entire campaign under the constraints it has, so obviously some things will be cut or changed to make things a little more streamlined. We're confident in knowing that Critical Role won't try to take in as much as it physically can, which should make The Mighty Nein a very enjoyable watch.
