Critical Role is mulling a Marvel-style What If...? series for its D&D campaigns

Critical Role co-founders Travis Willingham and Laura Bailey have confirmed the studio has actively discussed creating a What If...? style project — one that would explore alternate-universe takes on its Dungeons & Dragons campaigns. The conversation came up during a Beacon-exclusive episode of Fireside Chat, where fans submitted questions to the duo.

Willingham confirmed it directly: "We have talked about that very thing in a variety of medias, so that's always a possibility. Great idea. Great minds think alike." Nothing is greenlit yet — the project is still firmly in the speculative stage — but the fact that it's been discussed across multiple formats suggests it's more than a passing thought.

The concept draws obvious inspiration from Marvel's What If...? franchise, which started as a comic series reimagining canonical events — think Captain America never going missing in WWII, or someone other than Peter Parker getting bitten by the radioactive spider — and later became an animated Disney+ series. Critical Role's campaigns offer similarly rich material: alternate takes could include Vox Machina's Grog as a wizard, Scanlan crossing over into the Mighty Nein, or Laudna surviving her encounter with Otohan Thull.

Critical Role has been expanding its IP on multiple fronts. CEO Willingham recently noted there's still plenty of Exandria left to explore, and the studio's ambitions stretch beyond The Legend of Vox Machina animated series into video games and books. A What If...? project would add yet another lane to that expansion — and given how vocal the Critter fanbase tends to be, the community response to even this early hint has been enthusiastic.