Warning: The following article about Critical Role bringing back a key Sam Riegel character contains spoilers for the “Choose Their Adventure…Again!” one-shot
Sam Riegel surprised Critical Role fans during the show’s recent Red Nose Day one-shot by playing a younger version of his Vox Machina bard, Scanlan Shorthalt.
Riegel dusted off his lute for the charity one-shot “Choose Their Adventure…Again!” which saw Critical Role partner with Red Nose Day and Comic Relief US to raise money for Giving Tuesday. Prior to the one-shot, fans were able to use their Critical Role Foundation donations to vote on players’ Dungeons & Dragons class, with Critical Role cast member Liam O’Brien being assigned a bard. Critical Role leveraged O’Brien’s subsequent scheduling conflict to bring back a bard from the show’s past in the form of pinch hitter Riegel.
Riegel played a more reserved and unsure version of the character, a far cry from the Scanlan Critical Role fans had grown accustomed to through the show’s first campaign and its animated adaptation, The Legend of Vox Machina. Scanlan wasn’t the only musician from Critical Role’s past who made an appearance in the Red Nose Day one-shot, with Matthew Mercer reprising non-player characters Dr. Dranzel and Kent Plucker. Though the charity one-shot was set in Exandria prior to the events of Campaign 1, these types of Critical Role adventurers approach canon with a degree of levity.
Riegel’s not the only player in Critical Role’s history to have brought a fifth-level version of their Vox Machina hero to a one-shot of this nature. In CelebriD&D with Joe Manganiello, Marisha Ray and Taliesin Jaffe likewise played level 5 versions of their Vox Machina characters, Keyleth and Percy. Critical Role boasts a variety of loosely canon or canon-adjacent one-shots featuring versions of main campaign player characters, a trend they’re particularly fond of utilizing in charity streams.
“Choose Their Adventure…Again!” saw Riegel reprise Scanlan alongside Critical Role castmates Jaffe and Laura Bailey, who brought their respective fan-voted classes to the adventure with new characters. Special guests for the one-shot came in the form of Veep alum Sam Richardson and Tony Hale, both newcomers to Critical Role‘s table. Though fans were undoubtedly delighted to see Scanlan appear in the one-shot, Critical Role has still promised to deliver an O’Brien-played bard at some point in the future to remedy the scheduling conflict.
