Brennan Lee Mulligan discusses connections between EXU: Calamity and Critical Role’s third campaign. Mulligan was the Dungeon Master for EXU: Calamity set centuries before the events of Critical Role’s main campaigns, exploring the events leading up to The Calamity, an apocalyptic event that changed the course of Exandria’s history. Campaign 3 led to a cataclysmic event with the Apogee Solstice and is exploring the fallout.
In an exclusive interview with Screen Rant to promote Dimension 20’s new season, The Ravening War, Mulligan shared his excitement about the EXU: Calamity Easter egg in a recent Critical Role episode. He also discusses the ramifications of EXU: Calamity on Campaign 3, revealing what he and Matt Mercer talked about during their preparation for EXU: Calamity. Mulligan also teases the larger cosmological connections, saying a lot of ties between Campaign 3 and EXU: Calamity have already come into play. Check out Mulligan’s full quote and interview below:
Brennan Lee Mulligan: When Laerry’s name came up, I went, [Gasp]. There’s this wonderful moment especially because the moment is Aabria at the table being like “Lauren?” It has such a joy to it. Thinking about the ramifications and the fallout of Calamity, and how they moved throughout campaign 3. In early conversations about Calamity we were talking through leylines and Apogee Solstice and a bunch of the bigger cosmological things.
One of the benefits of going that far in the past is that Avalir can have whatever shape it needs to have, because it’s destroyed X amount of centuries before the events of campaign one. But the cosmological stuff is incredibly pression. Those things have big world spanning, leylines and the moons and all of that stuff. It’s quite, quite significant. So I think that in a lot of ways, a lot of that has come back into Campaign 3 already.
How EXU: Calamity Could Play Into Critical Role Campaign 3
Campaign 3 has been the most interconnected of Critical Role’s campaigns, tying together elements from Campaign 1, Campaign 2, and Exandria Unlimited. Episode 51 saw the Apogee Solstice come to pass and Ludinus Da’leth enact his goal, revealing he wants to end the Gods control over Exandria. During his monologue, Da’leth revealed that he has been working towards this goal for a thousand years, pointing to him living through the Calamity.
The Calamity changed everything, ending the Age of Arcana and separating the Gods from Exandria either by banishment or the Divine Gate. A recent episode of Critical Role dropped the name Laerryn, Aabria Iyengar’s EXU: Calamity character, and with Da’leth potentially living through the Calamity, this could be the first of many direct tie-ins. EXU: Calamity only shows the start of the cataclysmic event from one group’s perspective, but it did show the catalyst that set the events in motion. This could be crucial to understanding Da’Leth’s motivations.
The cosmological elements that Mulligan references have played a major part in Critical Role’s Campaign 3 from the start. However, EXU: Calamity left a lot of loose ends, including Cerrit escaping with his children and the Otiluke’s Resilient Sphere sent to them by Patia Por’co. Hopefully, the actions taken by those lost in the Calamity could prove to be the key to stopping Da’leth, potentially redeeming them for having a part in starting the Calamity and allowing them to finally be remembered.
