Critical Lit

We're gonna need @stras.bsky.social to reskin Band of Blades for Curse of Strahd. The Party fights eastward against hordes of undead, to the final showdown at Castle Ravenloft against The Cinder Count. Broken: The Abbot, the Mad Mage, Argynvost. Rally to your Chosen Ally. Bring siege engines.

Bullet time still hits, friends. In this month's bonus content, this film holds up far better than other, more Star Wars-y attempts to launch a sci-fi movie trilogy in 1999. What does body horror look like nearly 30 years later? I have no thumbs and I must scroll? www.patreon.com/CriticalLit/...

It's the Curse of Strahd Q&A! You had questions, both thought-provoking and simply provocative. Some mechanical, some hypothetical, some satirical, even some heretical. And we have...opinions. Hot takes! Recommendations! podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/c...

Is this sandbox too spooky? Try a less grim take on Barovia with these more heroic (and more linear) options. And we pick clean the corpses of the other official Ravenloft books that have dropped in recent years. podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/c...

The viral dialect quiz doesn’t ask about janklee at all :(

Strahd gets knocked down, but he gets up again. And again. The Epilogues in Curse of Strahd offer endings, of a sort. Happy, not so much. All your favorites and least favorites are accounted for, except for the ones who are not. Vasilka we hardly knew ye. podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/c...

Strahd is an ISTJ btw

I tried to bring in a bit of Hans Gruber into mine

Last call for all your Curse of Strahd questions before we record the Q&A! DM or email hugepitfilledwith200spikes at gmail

In Ch. 15 of Curse of Strahd, the werewolf pack gets their claws out. Which of these lucky young newcomers to the den will come out on top in this single elimination competition? And will child endangerment laws get in the way? podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/c...

We’ve spent a year crawling through Strahd’s guts. After two dozen episodes of critical analysis, it’s time for the Curse of Strahd Q&A! We’ve read every word of this book, so feel free to get into the weeds. Send questions via DM or email hugepitfilledwith200spikes at gmail.

The dream of the '90s is alive in Port-land. In this month's bonus content, the Matrix perfectly captures the wrongness predicating the imminent fall of empire. We were adrift at sea, locked in cubicles. Ah, simpler times. www.patreon.com/CriticalLit/...

In Ch. 14 of Curse of Strahd, Yester Hill is a planned community for retired berserkers with zero secrets hidden beneath a thin layer of sod. Evil druids unleash their blood-filled wood upon the world & even Strahd himself comes here to pine among the pines. podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/i...

We are always saying this!!!!

Ch. 13 of Curse of Strahd concludes with the best rewards in all of Barovia. If it's wrong to murder your loved one and drink their blood or sacrifice dozens of innocent souls in order to ensure your immortality, then I don't want to be right. open.spotify.com/episode/2oye...

Ch. 13 of Curse of Strahd continues. Deep within the Amber Temple, alone in the dark, lurks the most helpful lich in the multiverse. Play your cards right and there's free drinks and body modifications, too. You didn't need those eyeballs, right? podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/c...

Bonus content on Patreon! Take one part anti-war treatise, two parts nature travelogue, one part snack diary and zero parts sex appeal, combine, trim, and set to sick beats. The result is the most definitive version of The Hobbit ever put to celluloid. www.patreon.com/CriticalLit/...

Our final look at the Caves of Chaos takes 17 man-turns to unpack. The cult fit is very Queen of Hearts & matches the canonically evil furnishings. But the real villain is in accounting. Who else could set up such an enormous slush fund for magic amulets? podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/k...

Everything's vine down at the Wizard of Wines! Chapter 12 is the nexus of nearly every plot hook in this book, but it's knee-deep in stick monsters and teetotaling druids. Remember, they're not dirty because they're evil; they're evil because they're dirty. podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/c...

Bonus content on Patreon! Even Level 15 Divination Wizard Annie isn't enough to save the juke joint crew from the depredations of Remmick von Zar O'vich. www.patreon.com/posts/sinner...

It's a Dance Dance Execution at the door of Khazan's Tower. Chapter 11 of Curse of Strahd also features a wagon as volatile as a meth lab. 100 you say? Try 101! Plus, we take a harder look at Strahd's potential enemies list from Chapter 1's Fortunes of Ravenloft. podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/c...

Sure, Strahd had one mother, but what about second mother? In Ch. 10 of Curse of Strahd, Baba Lysaga is a boy-mom wannabe with a parasocial fixation on our titular vamp. To impress him, she wages a feud against Barovia's goats and ravens. It's a blood bath! podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/c...