This is a pretty simple question to answer. There are a lot of common media out there in our genre these days and a lot of people are likely going to mention the Lord of the Rings (LotR) movies or books though I find it not unusual that people have not read them. Sure – they are the literature that likely inspired a lot of the games out there but they are dense tomes and long movies – not for everyone. My surprise factor centres around one movie in particular which I think is all about story telling and brilliant characters!
The Princess Bride
There is only one movie that does this and does it well. The Princess Bride is a beautiful movie from start to finish. I have also read the book that hit the shelves in the past few years seriously. I am not sure if it was a book before the movie or that they just decided to expand out in that way. Either way it is a good read but I do not expect people to have read it – but watched it I certainly do.
We had an example of a girl that recently joined our Pathfinder group and one of the other players fell foul of a poisoned spiked pit trap. His character took a bunch of Strength damage (so much so that he dropped to 2 strength) and I tried to explain it in terms of when Wesley awoke after the miracle pill. the poor girl had not seen the movie so I mentioned that it was probably something she should really do for herself.
So there you have it. If you do not want to watch it and have never watched it all I have to say to you is…
As you wish.
For those that have, keep rolling!