Within moments of beginning my conversation with Tasha Huo, it becomes unmistakably clear that she is a genuine devotee of the expansive universe of *Critical Role*. Barely a minute into our exchange, we find ourselves effusively discussing the mystical allure of wizards—the sort of enthusiastic tangent that immediately signals I am speaking with someone who truly lives and breathes this world. As the showrunner of *The Mighty Nein*, the second animated series derived from the beloved *Critical Role* campaigns and produced in collaboration with Prime Video, Huo stands at the creative nexus of storytelling and fandom. This new series builds upon the remarkable success of *The Legend of Vox Machina*, whose 2019 Kickstarter campaign famously garnered more than $11.3 million in seed funding, a record-breaking demonstration of audience dedication. Now, years later, Huo, once merely a passionate viewer, has become the creative engine guiding this ambitious adaptation forward.
Speaking from her base in Los Angeles, Huo recalls her origins with tabletop storytelling. As a child, she was initially exposed to *Dungeons & Dragons*, that quintessential role-playing game famous for its boundless imagination and improvisational creativity. Yet, as life progressed, those early dice-rolling sessions faded into distant memory. It wasn’t until adulthood that her journey would fortuitously circle back. A friend, eager to introduce her to a new gaming group, encouraged Huo to watch a certain livestream to better grasp the rhythm and style of modern *D&D* gameplay. That stream turned out to be *Critical Role*. At that point, the company’s eight cofounders were deeply immersed in their second campaign, *The Mighty Nein*. What began as a casual viewing suggestion evolved into a full-fledged artistic obsession. Huo describes how she devoured every episode of the 141-part series—listening during her commute, binge-watching late into the night, and immersing herself completely in the characters’ journeys. Her fascination grew so completely that it became both a creative inspiration and, eventually, a professional calling.
By 2021, as *Critical Role* began the search for a showrunner to helm the upcoming adaptation of *The Mighty Nein*, several of Huo’s industry peers enthusiastically recommended her. With extensive experience in screenwriting and a deep understanding of fantasy storytelling, she fit the role perfectly. Huo officially joined the project in November 2022 as part of the Prime Video creative team, leading the writing phase and supervising a small yet passionate writers’ room. Each weekday, from nine in the morning until evening, she worked alongside three writers and one assistant, shaping the narrative foundations of the series. Armed with an MFA in screenwriting from Boston University, Huo brought an academic rigor and cinematic sophistication to her craft, honed through previous writing credits such as *The Witcher: Blood Origin* (2022) and *Tomb Raider: The Legend of Lara Croft* (2024).
Her early collaboration with the *Critical Role* founders was, in her words, “like coming home.” She first met with Sam Riegel, one of the company’s cofounders who helps oversee its substantial animation division alongside CEO Travis Willingham. Soon after, she connected with Willingham himself, as well as the ever-charismatic Matt Mercer—the chief creative officer and the legendary dungeon master behind *Critical Role’s* sprawling campaigns. Those first meetings, Huo recalls, were filled not with corporate formalities but with unrestrained geekery. They bonded immediately over their mutual reverence for *D&D*, trading anecdotes and expressing genuine excitement about the opportunity to translate the magic of improvised storytelling into a serialized visual medium. In those early conversations, she sensed the effortless alignment of passion and purpose—a convergence of creative energies sparked by a shared love for the game that first inspired them all.
Inside the *Critical Role* writers’ room, Huo found herself at the center of an intense yet exhilarating creative process. She and the eight cofounders frequently engaged in deep discussions about their respective characters, exploring the foundational emotions and motivations that informed each one’s decisions during the original campaign. Her primary challenge was both monumental and delicate: condensing hundreds of hours of streamed gameplay into just eight episodes, each lasting approximately forty-four minutes, without sacrificing the authenticity or complexity that fans cherished. Much of the work revolved around dissecting pivotal story beats, identifying which moments carried the emotional weight necessary to define the season’s arc. In the team’s office, a massive whiteboard dominated one wall, covered with magnets and notes representing intricate plotlines. Each day, the writers returned to it, rearranging pieces like an elaborate puzzle, determining which character arcs or turning points would best anchor the unfolding narrative.
The process was as much about editing as creation. Given the wealth of source material, Huo and her team faced the unenviable task of deciding which portions of the saga to highlight first. Ultimately, they concluded that the story of Caleb Widogast—the troubled wizard portrayed by cofounder Liam O’Brien—was essential as the emotional keystone of Season One. His journey, marked by guilt, ambition, and redemption, provided the connective thread necessary to make the sprawling fantasy cohesive. As Huo explained, so much of Caleb’s history intertwined with the broader conflicts and hidden machinations that defined the group’s larger storyline.
Nevertheless, the adaptation process offered opportunities to expand creatively. The team included subtle details and narrative nuances that had never appeared in the original Twitch stream. Additionally, one of Huo’s personal delights was engaging Matt Mercer directly to unearth story elements that existed only in his private campaign notes—particularly the origin stories and motivations behind the Volstrucker wizards, the enigmatic antagonists inhabiting *The Mighty Nein’s* shadowy corners. This gave the writers unprecedented insight into unseen lore, transforming fragments of Mercer’s imagination into rich on-screen texture. “It felt like crafting a hidden espionage series within our main show,” Huo observed. “Each conversation with Matt was like mining a treasure trove—he already possessed a fully formed understanding of every character and secret, and we were simply distilling those ideas into narrative gold.”
When asked what advice she would offer aspiring writers hoping to land their dream creative roles, Huo’s insights reflected both discipline and heart. Her first recommendation: relentless dedication to the craft. Writing, she emphasized, demands persistence through uncertainty and rejection. Many talented individuals, she noted, fall short not because of a lack of ability, but because they stop creating too soon, weary of the industry’s inevitable obstacles. The key, according to her, lies in perseverance—continuing to write even when progress feels invisible.
Her second insight carried an emotional candor that mirrored her personal journey: never conceal your passions. She recounted her first meeting with Sam Riegel, admitting she initially worried she had been overly enthusiastic, perhaps “fangirling” too much. Yet that unpolished authenticity turned out to be the very quality that endeared her to the team. Passion, she discovered, is not a liability in creative spaces—it is a superpower. In the end, what began as a fan’s fascination with a fantasy world became the foundation of a professional dream fulfilled. Huo’s story stands as a vivid testament to the idea that genuine love for one’s craft, when paired with relentless effort, can transform admiration into authorship, and fandom into leadership.
Sourse: https://www.businessinsider.com/critical-role-mighty-nein-prime-video-tasha-huo-showrunner-job-2025-12
