A Turtle By Any Other Name

is the sixtieth episode of the second campaign of Critical Role.

Pre-Show
We play Dungeons & Dragons! ...It is a slow descent into complete and utter madness.

Announcements

 * First and foremost, our returning sponsor for Campaign 2:
 * Sam claims that D&D Beyond doesn't really know what they're sponsoring every week. They know generally that Critical Role plays "the D&D and stuff", but they don't know what Sam is going to do in his ad spots.  Sometimes they get a song parody from award-winning Sam Riegel, sometimes they get a glimpse into history, and sometimes they get a shark costume.  As you all know, Sam was a huge fan of the 1980s sitcom "You've Got Gale", starring our very own Ashley Johnson.  The show was cancelled after the pilot aired, but that one episode was massively influential to Sam and his personal style of humor. [This explains so much.] Laura says Ashley was so good on that show.  Ashley thanks Laura: that means a lot!  As you all know, Sam goes to the UCLA Film & Television Archive every Wednesday.  Yesterday, Sam found something from "You've Got Gale" that he never knew existed!  CBS was so forward-thinking on this TV sitcom that they had actually begun production in 1985 on a theatrical film spinoff!  Sadly, production was cancelled when the TV show went off-the-air, but CBS had already finished filming and editing a theatrical trailer!  Unfortunately, UCLA has confirmed that the trailer has been lost to time: the only copies that CBS kept after the film's cancellation were recorded on Betamax tape.  However, the transcripts for the trailer still exist, and UCLA generously loaned them to Sam so he could stage a sort of radio play for the trailer for the "You've Got Gale" spinoff film that definitely existed.  Matt provides the narration, Marisha provides the sound effects, Ashley plays her old role as Gale (aka "Justice Bitch"), Liam plays Gale's special forces commander, Travis plays the evil Russian supervillain, Laura plays Gale's lover [Surprisingly progressive for the 1980s!], and Taliesin plays the President of the United States of America.  "Gale Force 5: A Gale in Your Coffin"...gagging spoons in theaters everywhere this Memorial Day! [Monday, May 27, 1985] Ashley claims that actually they had shot the whole film, but it was initially five hours long, so it got bogged down in the editing room.  Sam claims that those rough cuts were also recorded on Betamax tape.  Liam claims that "Gale Force 5" could have had the same impact on him as a kid that "Terminator 2: Judgment Day" had on him in 1991.  Taliesin was surprised that "Terminator 2" lifted such a good idea as the Los Angeles River chase scene off of "Gale Force 5".  Sam thanks D&D Beyond for bringing wonderful art like this back into their lives.  Please subscribe, if you haven't already.  Matt thanks Sam, and also mentions (since Sam didn't talk about it once in his D&D BEYOND ad) that D&D Beyond is a digital service that allows you to keep all your D&D character information online!
 * Denver Pop Culture Con: Critical Role is heading to Denver Pop Culture Con on the first weekend of June. It's coming up a lot faster than any of us were prepared for!  We have limited number of autograph and photograph opportunities available at denverpopculturecon.com.
 * The Legend of Vox Machina: We're going to thank the Critters again, because we can't say it enough. Thank you to everybody who helped make this Kickstarter as insane as it has been.  We closed out the Kickstarter at midnight with our friend Joel Hodgson present.  We had a little closing party you can see on Critical Role's YouTube channel, where we all got super-emotional and proceeded to down shot after shot of "totally alcohol".  Laura thinks they sold it well, though.  Taliesin says it was definitely not caffeinated and definitely didn't keep him up until 5:00 am.  Marisha didn't get any emails from Critical Role's Twitch reps, so she thinks the statute of limitations has passed!  Matt says they are now knee-deep in the pre-production and getting the animated series going!  But we are really excited, and it's been fun for the cast to go back and re-watch previous episodes of the first campaign and reliving those moments.  Marisha says it's crazy.  Liam is so excited: we're making a CARTOON!  Travis jokes they were so "good" at D&D back then! (i.e. "What's Advantage?")
 * merch update from Laura: You might have noticed on Twitter today that Critical Role has announced its new Grog Strongjaw tankards! Travis (Grog?) is very excited!  Sam says the box is f***ing LIT!  Laura does an unboxing.  You can separately buy an engraved leather to make your tankard especially "Grog-y" or "Yasha-y"!  Sam wants eight to decorate his dining room table.  Laura also wants to announce another item...this one isn't in the store, Laura just wants to brag about her brand-new Jester dice bag from Christina Ahrens!  It's pink, just like Jester's Fantastic Haversack!  And there's Jester-inspired doodles decorating the inside of the bag.  She shares Christina's Etsy page, because Christina makes custom dice bags, and she's phenomenal.  Laura was running out of room in her original dice bag, so now she can start filling the new Jester one!  Liam starts to take Laura's old dice bag and says she's going to have to wipe the slate clean, but Laura says shut up and rips the bag out of Liam's hand.  Ashley is going to get a Yasha dice bag commissioned from Christina.  Taliesin feels like custom dice bags are the beginning of a habit, and he is not ready for that.

The Mighty Nein

 * Beauregard
 * Caduceus Clay
 * Fjord
 * Frumpkin
 * Jester Lavorre
 * Nott
 * Yasha Nydoorin
 * Caleb Widogast

Returning

 * Soorna