I finally got around to listening to what some of y’all (hat tip to Library Lass, Lovely Bones, and spooky especially) have been gushing about: The Adventure Zone. TAZ is a podcast featuring three brothers (Griffin, Justin, and Travis McElroy) and their dad (Clint McElroy) playing D&D, most of them for the first time. It began in 2014 as a spinoff of the brothers’ flagship podcast My Brother, My Brother and Me but quickly became its own thing as Griffin, the DM for the first campaign (the “Balance Arc”), evolved the story well beyond its origins in the Lost Mine of Phandelver starter set. The show is hilarious from the outset, but over the three years of the Balance Arc it becomes something so much more — a story that is nuanced, intricate, heartfelt, and gripping, all leading to a finale that I made the mistake of listening to while waiting in line in the Popeye’s drive-thru, which is how I came to be crying as I exchanged money for chicken.

The first two chapters of the Balance Arc (Here There be Gerblins and Murder on the Rockport Limited) are available as graphic novels from First Second Books, and they are thoroughly enjoyable, but I recommend listening to the podcast first to get the McElroys’ voices (okay, especially Taako’s) firmly in your head.

I can’t wait to see what comes next, though it’ll have a tough time matching the adventures of Merle, Magnus, and Taako, who I already miss.

Hail and well met, my dudes! Have a great day!

(You can find the podcast here and also available for free download via iTunes.)