Dimension 20: A Crown of Candy is Incredible and You Should Watch It!

Author’s Note: This piece will contain spoilers for the first episode of Dimension 20: A Crown of Candy. Deal with it.

Last week on Wednesday evening (US time), A new season of Dimension 20 premiered on Dropout. This season is called A Crown of Candy and its main idea is Game of Thrones meets Candyland. Now, if you’re like me, you absolutely love a good story. I have watched every other season of Dimension 20 to date and Brennan — The Dungeon Master — always delivered such great stories. I went into this episode knowing that this time won’t be any different.

Imagine my surprise when Brennan blew my mind away.

In this piece, I’m going to go over the cast members' characters and some personal thoughts about the show. I’ll give some predictions, too! The episodes air weekly on Dropout so if you wanna catch the episode before reading this article, be my guest.

Ruby wants to be in the circus. That’s one of the main things you learn about her from the first two minutes of her introduction. She’s also one half of the Rocks twins, the other being Jet that we will talk about in the next section.

From what I gather so far, Ruby is a rogue and is pretty chaotic. She always runs off with her sister and doesn’t attend lectures with Lapin, the chancellor. What I love about Siobhan’s portrayal of this character is that it shows how much fun this is for her. This isn’t the grandiose Misty Moore from The Unsleeping City, nor is it the anxious Adaine Abernant from Fantasy High. This is Ruby Rocks and Ruby truly rocks. She’s fun and funny. She doesn’t want to be in the castle and bear crown responsibilities. She’s actually happy that Jet came out first from their mother’s womb because it means she will never be queen.

But, this is the first episode and I foresee many struggles and character development for Ruby. The end of the first episode — where she actually dies — is a testament to the danger that lurks in the world.

I think that Jet Rocks will get along very well with Fig, Emily’s character from Fantasy High. They are both chaotic in a way and determined to fight. Jet is also bored with lectures but instead of forfeiting positions of power like her twin sister, she wants a masculine position — head of the army.

In a way, there is something very Arya-like about Jet but I don’t know if that was intentional on Emily’s part.

In the first episode, we discover that Jet receives a missive from an acquaintance in Comida, which is sort of this world’s King’s Landing — a city where the emperor of all of the six nations in Calorum rules. The fact that it doesn’t cross her mind that this could be bad speaks volumes about Jet’s future in this show. She’s impulsive, fun, reckless, and going to step into so many traps.

Granted, this is Emily Axford we’re talking about so in addition to the above, I also foresee some great shenanigans and creative moves coming from her.

I don’t know what’s going to happen next but it seems Jet and ruby are going to be in the thick of it. Both she and her sister are children-turned-adults — meaning 18 — on the day of the first episode. I expect great things to come from both rogue sisters.

Lou has always been one of my favorite cast members. I love all of them but there’s a special place in my heart for anything Lou does. I loved Fabian, I adored Kingston, and I’m fond of Amethar as well.

It’s already discussed at length on social media but Watching Brennan and Lou improvise a married couple is one of the highlights of this episode for me. What you need to know about Lou’s character, Amethar, is that he is the perfect representation of a medieval king. He’s illiterate, impulsive, and tactless. But, he has a golden heart. Just like Robert Baratheon. He loves his girls more than anything in the world and he doesn’t really want to be king.

Lou plays a barbarian this season which means we might see him go into a rage a lot. Up until now, Lou played a Fighter and a Bard in Fantasy High, and a Cleric in The Unsleeping City. This season, a barbarian is a new experience and I’m excited to see where Lou takes this character!

The story is moving forward when Amethar receives a letter inviting him personally by the emperor to attend an event in Comida. The queen speculates that the emperor will name him as his heir there. This turn of events prompts the party to travel to Comida albeit reluctantly on Amethar’s part. He didn’t want to be a king and he doesn’t want to be an emperor, either. I wonder how that will play out for him.

This season Ally chose to play a young boy who is given as a ward to the House of Rocks. He’s not a prisoner though it’s portrayed as though this is how he feels. It’s a little like Theon Greyjoy from Game of Thrones. The difference is that Liam kept his identity and is pretty much not trusting anyone in castle candy.

Things start to heat up when Liam receives a secret missive from his brothers that asks him to kill the king or he’s going to get a beating like never before. This interaction gives some clues about a possible abusive childhood on Liam’s part and I would love to see this played out. Ally portrays him as defensive and distrusting of others while also being a chill and helpful guy.

It seems so far that Liam and Theobald have a special connection. He respects Theo and went to great lengths to make sure Theo knew he wasn’t trying to get away when he left to wander in the forest.

In addition to an interesting personality, Liam is a druid who also has a pig companion called Preston. That pig is genuinely one of the cutest creatures ever! Preston is so cute that at some point Brennan turns straight to the camera and says, “if I kill Preston, you’re not allowed to be mad at me.” To which Siobhan answers, “If you kill Preston we are all leaving this set.” And if that’s what the cast themselves are saying, I wonder how the fan reaction to Preston will be.

Overall, it seems to me that Liam is harboring many secrets. He will have to learn to trust the company. Also, it’s not clear yet what the relationship between him and anyone other than Theo is. Theo seems to care about Liam and Liam reciprocates that.

You probably noticed there’s a trend in this article to compare the PCs to characters from Game of Thrones. Well, you’re not wrong! If there’s one GoT character I would use to describe Theo, it would be Eddard Stark. You know what? I would even take Rodrik Cassel or even Jorah Mormont as replacement.

Theo is a great companion to have. He cares about the company. In terms of D&D alignments, I think he’s the only actual Lawful good in this campaign. Liam is a druid so probably neutral good, the Rocks twins are definitely chaotic good. Their father approves of their deeds so probably chaotic good as well. Lapin seems indifferent about all of it. So probably Lawful Neutral (he did mend the broken glass at the behest of the fairy. I’m undecided about him until next episode)

In any case, Theo will do his duty to protect the Rocks twins and his king. He’s the captain of the guard for the Rocks noble family.

Also, I think this is the first time we see an eldritch knight in the game and I’m super curious where Murph will take the character!

Also, fun fact: Theo is a gummy bear.

Lapin is one bitter character. He’s supposed to be a chocolate bunny so I’m not sure what happened along the way. I think that Zac’s characters were always these cool dudes. Gorgug from Fantasy high had such a charming journey finding his dad and getting rid of his shyness and low self-esteem. Ricky Matsui was a firefighter in new york. If that’s not the most lawful good you can get, I don’t know what is.

Now though, Lapin is an abrupt divergence from the ‘good’ path for Zac. Lapin is also kind of insufferable. I think Zac himself is having a ton of fun playing him.

The first episode sees Lapin being outsmarted by the roguish Rocks twins and giving a lecture to scarecrows. There is something very secretive about Lapin. His actions, his demeanor. He seems like the type of person to hold many secrets.

Lapin is also a warlock so that could probably come in handy. His patron is a celestial which is going to be very interesting. Celestials are good by nature and therefore Lapin should have come up with a good reason to have a celestial grant him powers. I have reason to believe that the celestial who grants him powers, or at least connected to it somehow is the fairy we meet in the first episode. She seems to have Lapin wrapped around her finger.

I’m excited to see where Lapin will go this season. He seems like the kind of character who could do incredible things. We shall see.

So, After one episode there isn’t much to say. But I will say how reminiscent of the first season of Game of Thrones that episode was. The emperor sends a private letter in his own writing to Castle Candy asking the king to come to Comida because he is sick. In a similar fashion In Season one of Game of Thrones (or in the books), Eddard receives a missive about Jon Aaryn’s death and that the king is journeying north. When the king finally arrives, he asks Eddard in person to come to be his hand in King’s Landing.

Now, as opposed to Eddard’s naivety, our players can role for Insight, investigation, and charisma to make stuff go the way they want them to go. Especially the naughty Rocks twins. So, I don’t expect the party to die because of innocence. But, I do expect the concord to shatter, to the current emperor to die, and instead of the title going to The king of Candia, there will be war.

I could be totally wrong but I just don’t see the conflict in giving the title to Amethar. I also don’t expect a game of thrones’ like show to play out without knives in the dark. Someone in the NPCs could be a traitor.

That’s all well and good but I’m thinking far into the future. You should definitely watch this show! Every Wednesday on Dropout!

Thanks for reading! I hope you enjoyed that!