From humble beginnings as a Dungeons and Dragons home game between friends to a full-fledged media empire, Critical Role’s flagship animated series The Legend of Vox Machina has brought the beloved first campaign to the small screen for two seasons of drama, intrigue, romance, and a healthy dose of foul-mouthed antics.
After making history as the highest-funded film/TV project in Kickstarter history, The Legend of Vox Machina was quickly scooped up by Amazon Prime Video, who not only served as distributor, but green lit a second season before the first had even dropped on Prime Video—a glowing stamp of approval if ever there was one. In the wake of resoundingly positive fan and critical reception, Amazon similarly renewed Vox Machina for a third installment midway through the release of season two—but just how long will critters have to wait before returning to Exandria?
Who’s in The Legend of Vox Machina season 3?
Of course, the main cast of The Legend of Vox Machina is comprised of the titular Vox Machina adventuring party, all of whom are brought to life by the players/voice actors who created the characters and originated the roles in the Critical Role home game and live streams.
The series stars Laura Bailey and Liam O’Brien as twins Vex’ahlia and Vax’ildan, Travis Willingham as barbarian Grog Strongjaw, Taliesin Jaffe as gunslinger Percy De Rolo, Marisha Rey as druid Keyleth, Sam Riegel as bard Scanlan, and The Last of Us’ Ashley Johnson as cleric Pike. In addition to the full main cast of Critical Role, Vox Machina wouldn’t be complete without dungeon master Matt Mercer, who voices a number of recurring characters across the series.
Beyond Mercer and the original party members, The Legend of Vox Machina has also featured all manner of guest stars lending their voices to the project, including David Tennant, Indira Varma, Henry Winkler, Bill Boyd, Gina Torres, and the late Lance Reddick (to name a few), though exactly which guest stars will return for season three (or which new faces may join the roster) isn’t clear quite yet.
What will The Legend of Vox Machina season 3 be about?
While the full cast of Vox Machina season three remains a relative mystery, what’s not as big of a question mark is what season 3 will be about—the series is, after all, a relatively faithful adaptation of a fully-completed campaign, meaning writers have a step-by-step road map of exactly how Vox Machina’s future will pan out.
Admittedly, the formats of The Legend of Vox Machina and the original Critical Role campaign itself are drastically different—the former clocks in at nearly 450 hours of play over 115 episodes, while the latter tells the same story in ten 20-minute episodes per season. With such a massive disparity in length, there are bound to be subplots dropped and details altered, but for the most part, Vox Machina has followed closely to its much-loved source material.
When we last left off, Vox Machina had finally vanquished the black dragon Umbrasyl, a member of the Chroma Conclave—a terrifying faction of five chromatic dragons hell-bent on wreaking havoc on and controlling Tal’Dorei, the continent that Vox Machina calls home. With two of the five dragons in the dirt (the blue dragon Brimscythe having been defeated early in season one) that leaves Vox Machina with three more targets in their sights.
They won’t be alone in their mission to take down the Conclave, though—season two ended with the reveal that Keeper Yennen, a cleric from Whitestone, is actually one of the chroma dragons Raishan in disguise. Raishan proposes an unholy alliance to give Vox Machina the firepower they’ll need to put a stop to the Cinder King (a.k.a. the chroma dragon Thordak), with whom Raishan made the original deal to form the Conclave. It’s also worth noting that Thordak was the dragon who killed Vex and Vax’s mother Elaina—so Vox Machina has more skin In the game than ever when it comes to getting rid of the dragons once and for all.
When will The Legend of Vox Machina Season 3 come out?
With the cast all returning and the story continuing to follow the beats laid out in the original campaign, the only real question remaining is when exactly Vox Machina will once again grace our televisions—and the good news is we likely won’t have to wait too long. As of right now, there’s no official word from Critical Role and Amazon Prime Video as to when fans can return to Exandria, but there’s been heavy speculation of a January 2024 release date—that’s right, barely two months away, if rumors are to be believed.
Given how speedily Amazon was able to crank the first two seasons out, a one-year wait in between seasons two and three is on par with previous production schedules: both seasons one and two were released in January of their respective years. Until then, though, fans can get their Critical Role fill with the currently airing Bells Hells campaign, and rest easy with the knowledge that if Mercer and Co. have anything to say about it, The Legend of Vox Machina will continue on for seasons to come.
(featured image via Amazon Prime Video)
