MYTHIC QUEST: QUARANTINE / DIRECTOR & SCREENPLAY: VARIOUS / STARRING: ROB McELHENNEY, CHARLIE DAY, MEGAN GANZ / WHERE TO WATCH: APPLE TV+
Given the current state of the world right now, the pace of new content has (predictably) begun to slow down. This hasn’t stopped film and TV makers from trying to find clever ways round the problem whilst also staying topical. Videogame industry-inspired comedy drama Mythic Quest: Raven’s Banquet is a show perfectly suited to the ‘everyone is on Zoom’ format of storytelling.
The show’s quarantine special starts with someone waiting to start a Zoom-style chat and the format pretty much continues along those lines, with some clever staging to keep things interesting throughout. What’s notable here is how much that doesn’t matter; Mythic Quest has always been about the various characters bouncing off each other. It’s a show about conflicting creative egos and human frailty. It’s the people that make it work, not the set.
The formula is still strong: take one joke, stretch it, tell another, stretch it as well, finish telling the first joke, continue the chain of gags until either the audience stops laughing or some conflict is required to move the plot along. What’s interesting here is that this one 30-minute special somehow carries all the emotional weight of the original series.
Even though most of the drama involves actors staring into a single camera whilst chatting, we still get the full impact of all the character development that’s gone before. Even better; the trollish idiot character of Lou (Craig Mazin ) gets a little more to do in this one beyond simply being a living cliché.
The one big weakness here is that this another Mythic Quest episode where the ‘videogame’ element to things really doesn’t matter. In the main series, the industry serves as a sort of ticking clock to drive momentum forward; release deadlines and the like. With the world coming to a full stop in many ways, this element can’t be used and it shows. The special leans into this for maximum drama, but this only goes to showcase how integral making of games is to the show. Overall, this is a welcome addition to the series and you should check it out as soon as you can.
