The Guild Season Three – Review

Title: The Guild Season Three
Published by: Siren Visual (Australia / New Zealand)
Based on: An original live action (web) series produced by Felicia Day
Genre: Comedy
Audio: English Dub
Subtitles: English
Aspect Ratio: 16:9
Runtime: 96 minutes + Extras
Cost: $19.95
Classification: This title is classified M for Sexual References and Coarse Language
Special Thanks: Special thanks goes to the Siren Visual PR Team for providing me with a review sample of this title.

After reaching much acclaim as a webisode series and well into its fifth season now, The Guild is in the process of receiving physical DVD releases, with Australia being the next country to receive them with complements to Siren Visual. Unlike what the series title might suggest, there is a heavy focus on the real-life hijinks of the guild members over actually taking place in the game world. This is my first live action series to review, so the review structure might be a little bit disorganized over the styles I am usually used to – however I hope you enjoy reading into my review of The Guild Volume 3!

Season 3 finds our favourite Guild falling apart after the disastrous party that ended Season 2. Waiting outside a gaming store for their game’s latest expansion pack, they encounter the Axis of Anarchy, a rival Guild led by Fawkes. Vork resigns in shame, leaving Codex in charge of keeping the Guild together in the face of Axis of Anarchy’s efforts to destroy them. Will the Guild members overcome their differences to survive?

While I am sure at least a few people got the impression that this game was going to be about a whole bunch of online gamers sitting at their computers debating about skill upgrades and uber l33t equipment, it infact has very little to do with any of that (Besides main character Codex – played by Felicia Day discussing upgrades at the beginning of the season). After a rather tragic ending of Season 2, the entire guild is in disarray, with Vork (Played by Jeff Lewis) quitting and going on a road trip, Tinkerballa (Amy Okuda) defecting to rival guild The Axis of Anarchy and the other characters Zaboo (Sandeep Parikh), Bladezz (Vincent Caso) and Clara (Robin Thorsen) having their own problems – leaves Codex as leader of a now defunctional guild, and pitted against a rival guild while attempting to reunite everyone….. but will it be possible for someone who is shy, prone to anxiety attacks and is indecisive about everything?

The storyline comes out well, and shows that Felicia Day is becoming increasingly better with her scripts as the seasons progress. The storyline is strangely reminiscent of most games I have played *Coff* Granado Espada *Coff* where guilding is serious business, with guilds often going up against one another in the aim of riches and equips. Sure this series may have pitted The Knights of Good and the Axis of Anarchy at the deep end of the rivalry pool, they managed to introduce some new characters to freshen things including the serious and sarcastic Fawkes (Played by Wil Wheaton) who is a recurring character in future seasons. The guild element is the primary focus of this season and while they like to deviate from it at points, it allows much in terms of quirky jokes and character development… so overall enjoyable. The “plot deviations” come in the form of the individual character plots, such as Zaboo trying to escape the clutches (and desires of his crotch) of  his new girlfriend Riley (Michele Boyd) who distracts him from the game by paintballing (him), dressing him up in sexy maid outfits and locking him in clothes driers and Clara who tries to remain in game despite her husband (Played by Brett Sheridan) who wants her to become a family woman and give up on the game. These intermingle with the main plot and give the characters that extra dimension to their personalities.

Overall, I doubt this season, or any of them for that matter would have been half as popular with it centered in the game world. However to briefly mention a few areas of improvement, the storyline does drag on at points and tries to overuse the same concepts at times while there could have been many other potential plot elements added. Despite this, I think it was a fun little season with an eccentric cast along with plentiful comedy and I can see why it has maintained a strong fanbase since its conception.

Given the evident budget for the series, it doesn’t have the highest production values however is acceptable for what I was expecting. The way I could describe it is that everything looked natural and realistic, showing that these are real people, with real problems and no fantasy components to remove that element from the storyline. The video quality is what I would consider consistent moderate quality, however the DVD release is without a doubt the best quality means of watching the series with 16:9 widescreen.

My comment on making everything realistic also goes for the acting and voice quality, with both of these encompassing your average assortment of characters and respective personalities. The actors/actresses pull off their roles well and give the impression they ARE a group of guildies casually chatting – after all… how many times would you play a game and all the people in your guild decend into discussing nothing but the games and their custom characters lore? Unless on an RPG server in World of Warcraft, not too frequently I assume. For music, there isn’t much on offer and as this is no fantasy or game land – I was okay with it…. but would have been nice for perhaps more than a few tracks scattered throughout the episodes.

If the quality and resolution benefits were not enough for you to warrant the purchase of this (fairly priced) collection, many bits and pieces of exclusive bonus content has been included on the disc. For those who want to jump over my descriptions, here is a list of content available on the disc:

• Do You Wanna Date My Avatar music video / Making of video.
• Tips for Making a Web Video
• Halloween Video
• Guild Applicant Rejects
• How to Build Vork’s Sword
• Audio Commentary with the Cast
• Audio Commentary with the Creator, Director and Producer
• Interviews with the Axis of Anarchy
• Gag Reels
• Script PDF File

First of all is the music video for the song “Do You Wanna Date my Avatar” featuring the cast of The Guild in it, with a “Making of” video to complement it. While I am sure many of you would have heard the song or seen the clip somewhere, it is a very creative and catchy song, with lyrics and a video clip more than appropriate for the intended genre. For those aspiring to make a popular webisode series, they have also added a video with comments from Felicia Day, Kim Evey and Sean Becker which passes on their tips to be successful. For those after more in-series content, they have a bonus Halloween Episode focusing on the eccentricities of each character as they hassle a couple for food and other amenities and a full Guild Applicants Reel which was shown in part during the season. Other content includes a How to Build Vork’s Sword, Interviews with the Axis of Anarchy and Audio Commentary with the main cast and brains behind the series. The gag reels of any series are almost always a hoot and there was no exception for this release.

Overall, for those of you who have enjoyed the first two seasons, I see no reason why you should drop it now for a rather enjoyable third season. Sure there is room to be improved upon, but it is nice to see a storyline about a game that does not involve a solely in-game focus with the occasional peek at reality (I am looking at you .hack).