Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves Has Practical Creatures Built By The Team Behind Grogu [Comic-Con]

Creating a "Dungeons & Dragons" movie that will satisfy all of its many fans is as difficult as tackling a Great Red Wyrm all by yourself, but the writing/directing duo behind "Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves" are rolling the dice anyway. Besides hiring an all-star cast including "Best Chris," Chris Pine, one way to potentially help keep older fans happy is to make sure the creatures look cool, and it sounds like they're going to do just that. At a panel at San Diego Comic-Con, the writing and directing team Jonathan Goldstein and John Francis Daley revealed that they've been careful to balance practical and digital special effects to create monsters authentic to the world of "Dungeons & Dragons." To do that, they've hired some famous folks behind one of the most lovable animatronic creatures in recent years to help them bring the owlbears, gelatinous oozes, mimics, and more to life. 

Some of the creatures that will appear in "Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves" are shown in the trailer that just dropped at SDCC, and they look pretty darn good. The owlbear is nice and fluffy, the ooze is, well, oozy, and the mimic is properly terrifying. During their panel at SDCC, the creators of the film revealed that they've hired two digital effects giants, ILM and MPC, to do the digital special effects, but that they've hired Legacy Effects, the team behind Grogu on "The Mandalorian," to help them create their animatronic creatures. When asked what he was most excited about people seeing in the film, Goldstein explained that it was all about bringing the worlds of fans' imaginations to life:

"... it's the chance to bring these creatures, these people, these places to life that we've only ever been able to imagine in our heads, and to give solid matter to that, it's such a thrill. You're going to see things today and then eventually when the movie comes out that you've been playing or hearing about or imagining for years, and now we have the visual effects technology, and also the practical effects in the movie were able to bring those to life and that's so exciting to me."

Daley went on to explain that they've hired Legacy Effects, and that it was extremely important to both of them to use a "fusion" of practical and digital effects. Combining practical effects like puppets and animatronics with digital effects can create some of the most authentic and believable creatures in cinema, so they're definitely onto something there. We'll have to see if there are any puppets as adorable as Grogu when "Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves" hits theaters on March 3, 2023.