Dungeons And Dragons: Honor Among Thieves Even Wins Over Non-Fans

I never played Dungeons and Dragons as a kid. Yes, I’m ashamed to say as a child of the 80s that I never even really understood what it was about. In fact, I only recently gained some sense of the game through watching Stranger Things.

But I love Chris Pine and Michelle Rodriguez, so of course I went to the theater to see Dungeons and Dragons: Honor Among Thieves. Then, when it began streaming, I shared it with my kids, who loved it just as much as I did. 

To be clear, this movie is long. Like, really long. At more than two hours, Dungeons and Dragons: Honor Among Thieves could have easily cut 30 minutes from this film and still made for a great story. At the same time, it doesn’t feel super long, so I’ll forgive the writers and director for dragging it out a bit.

This movie is set, ostensibly, in the same world as the game, but it really focuses on one person, Edgin Darvis (Pine), a man who worked with the Harpers, a band of peacekeepers to maintain order in the land. 

We see Edgin and his lovely wife madly in love, laughing and playing with their young daughter. But when Edgin tires of being poor and takes a chance to steal from a Red Wizard he captures, the Wizard retaliates by killing Edgin’s wife.

Bereaved, Edgin leaves the Harpers and befriends a heavy drinking barbarian, Holga Kilgore (Rodriguez). Together, and purely platonically, the two become master thieves and raise Edgin’s daughter, Kira, in a happy home. In this Dungeons and Dragons it seems there is honor among thieves. 

At least until the pair befriend a con artist named Forge Fitzwilliam (Hugh Grant) and his friend Sofina. The group, along with a novice sorcerer named Simon (Justice Smith), attempt a daring break-in and are betrayed by Forge and Sofina.

As a result, Edgin and Holga find themselves in prison for two years. Standing in front of a tribunal during a pardon hearing, Edgin and Holga escape before hearing that they would have been pardoned.

They find that Forge has become a lord of the local land and has been raising Kira to believe her father is greedy and selfish. Dungeons and Dragons: Honor Among Thieves really takes off at this point. 

Edgin and Holga must now defeat Forge, who is powerful in this region, with the help of Simon and a druid named Doric (Sophia Lillis). There is magic, mystery, a wild ride into the underworld with a masterful paladin (holy knight), named Xenk (Rege-Jean Page), the raising of the dead, and the conversion of the living to the undead.

Seriously, there’s enough fantasy in Dungeons and Dragons: Honor Among Thieves for three or four movies. 

GFR SCORE

The buddy chemistry between Pine and Rodriguez is unmatched in recent films, and the emotion between Pine and the actress who plays his daughter, Chloe Coleman (of Big Little Lies and My Spy), is beautiful. And of course, Hugh Grant as the idiotic, slimy, greedy villain is epic as always. It is no wonder Rotten Tomatoes has this film scored at 91 percent positive reviews from critics and 93 percent positive reviews from audience members.

Stream Dungeons and Dragons: Honor Among Thieves to see for yourself. I know I’m looking forward to the spinoff television series coming soon to Paramount Plus.