Our ragtag crew of irreputable rebel scum, codenamed “Sunshine Harvester”, were:

• Nadia Collins as Princess Armadillo – the only galactic princess who can curl up into an armoured ball when threatened! (And seriously: check out the costume in the photos below. This is why we love having Nadia back – she backs up her puns with arts and crafts.)
• Bernard Caleo as Gary Solo, an actor in interspecies erotica with Outer Rim Pictures, forced to retire after he lost some vital “equipment” on a Tatooine shoot with the Sarlaac.
• Rama Nicholas as Looter “Lootsy” McLooterson, pilot of the surprisingly sexy starship the Hefty Rancor, and secretly suffering from hair loss.
• Danny McGinlay as Bendak “Benders” Starkiller, Jedi Academy dropout and pod race fan from the far Outer Rim, specifically the planet Dandenong. Turned out to be familiar with most of Gary’s work, with favourite films including Some Like it Hutt, Wampa Stomper, Dagobabes and Naboobs.

The team meet with Mon Mothma, leader of the Rebel Alliance, on a secret starship base. Recently evacuated from Hoth, Mothma stops counting all the Bothans lost bringing her information, secret plans and breakfast long enough to explain that she left a very important briefcase behind at the Hoth base, and she wants Sunshine Harvester to retrieve it for her. Landing on Hoth, the crew find no evidence that the Imperials are still there – but they are attacked by a wampa! Thankfully, though, it turns out to be Fluffy, Lootsky’s old pet who’s now all grown up – and she knows just where he likes to be scratched. He refuses to come along for the ride, though, as he has become enamoured with Princess Armadillo – especially when she curls up into a ball. While he’s distracted, Gary accesses the base computer systems and finds that the Stormtroopers all shipped out to Bespin – and they took the case they’re after with them.

They fly to Cloud City, now renamed Death City by the occupying Imperials, who’ve painted it black and put skulls everywhere. Oh, and built a Pieface. There they meet Brian, an unfortunate bachelor whose mates froze him in Carbonite as a buck’s night prank. He’s been there a while and seen the Stormtroopers come and go, but it’s not until Armadillo accidentally breaks his arm off that he talks: the Trooper with the case sold it on eBay to a guy from Coruscant.

The Hefty Rancor makes short work of the trip to Coruscant, the planet made of cities and home of Bender’s source of income, Coruscanterlink. There they meet a bounty hunter named “The Dude” who seems to be the real deal: he’s wearing a vest, and during the back and forth over what he knows, shoots first – badly wounding first Lootsky and then Gary. Both entreat Benders to “use…the…f…”, but he’s confused until Gary utters the word “fridge”. Using his mastery of the Force, Benders grabs a bar fridge and smashes it into the Dude’s face, whereupon his bravado evaporates and he admits that he found the vest and gun on the body of a dead bounty hunter – along with a GPS tracking device that can find the case.

After applying healing salve to their fallen, all four of the Sunshine Harvester crew grab flying Segways and head to the source of the case’s signal: the Emperor’s Palace! And, in fact, it’s right in the Emperor’s throne room – where the Emperor himself appears, taunting them with the bag they’re after! His lightsaber turns out to be somewhat inadequate, however, and Armadillo manages to fell him with her own saber, whereupon he vanishes. One of the Imperial Guard reveals that he let the Harvesters in as a prank, and they go through the bag, finding nothing much important beyond some receipts. They plan to return to Rebel headquarters, but Gary has a great idea – he’ll put on the Emperor’s robe and play a joke on Mon Mothma! It’ll be hilarious!

Well, it’s less hilarious and more…deadly. Mothma has a heart attack on seeing what she thinks is the Emperor, and is never able to explain what was so important about the bag. Our heroes, though, decide to get paid anyway, by stealing her credits, and they fly off into the stars to fulfil their dreams…

Thanks to everyone in the cast, to our audience, to Jess and Darryl for the props and costumes, and of course to Rob Young, who took all the amazing photos you can see below. Plus special congratulations to Danny McGinlay for winning “Pun of the Match” – partly for all the Star Wars porn movie titles, but mostly for the comment that everyone had a “vested interest”. See you next month!

As mentioned last night, the Emerging Writers’ Festival is coming up at the end of the month, and Dungeon Crawl fans may be particularly interested in their Revenge of the Nerds slide night on May 30. Hosted by your regular Dungeon Master, Ben McKenzie, it’s an evening of pecha kucha style quick-fire presentations from writers exposing the geeky sides of themselves. The line-up is amazing and includes Dungeon Crawl alumnus Andrew McClelland and political comedian and all-round amazing woman Courteney Hocking. It’s all happening from 7:30 at the Workers Club in Brunswick Street, Fitzroy, and admission is a measly $12 ($8 concession)! Check out the full Emerging Writers events programme for lots of other cool stuff.

You might also notice a little bit of reorganisation on the site; the main Dungeon Crawl page is due for an overhaul, and as a preliminary strike, I’ve moved the summary of our past adventures to a new page, The Campaign Chronicle. You can check it out for brief descriptions of all our previous Crawls, with links to the full recaps where they exist. Not that you need to in order to follow the plot of our latest adventure; every Dungeon Crawl is self contained (at least so far). Watch out for further improvements to the site in the coming month.

And as if that’s not enough to entice you, check out this secret transmission intercepted by Bothan spies: Richard McKenzie‘s interview with SYN’s In Joke program.

So fire up the beam emitter, polish the focusing crystal and watch where you point that new lightsaber as you join us for adventure. May the Second be with you!

Dungeon Crawl Episode V: The Empire Crawls Back starts at 8:30 PM tonight – Wednesday, May 2nd 2012. Tickets are $15 at the door, or $14 inc. booking fee if purchased online at bellaunion.com.au. Doors open from 7:30 PM.

On April 11, Andrew McClelland morphed into Gax Garyguy, a shape changer with the power to inspire sexual repression; Brenna Courtney Glazebrook was “Queester”, Queen of Easter, who brought easter eggs (good) and diabetes (bad); Dave Bloustien was hypnotist Dr. Zhivago (no relation); and Christophe Davidson brought the majesty of Sweatheart the Barbarian, who had maximum points in Patience, Conflict Resolution and Empathy (he was raised by fairies). They went on a quest to recover the sacred jewel of Mansiontown, a town in the shadow of an old mansion on a nearby hill. Despite encountering the zombie of a previous adventurer who failed the same quest, they pushed on into the house, where a two-headed ogre (guest monsters Dingo & Wolf) was defeated by convincing one of the heads that the other was being mean about it, before patching up their friendship and sending it on its way. They managed to retrieve the gemstone and return it to the monk who gave them the quest, who turned out to be evil – but also Queester’s brother, so it all worked out in the end.

On April 19, Adam McKenzie became Havugottit, an elvish swordsell (he sells swords), and was joined by three first time crawlers:  Matt Elsbury as Arfice Highbuckle, the six foot dwarf (it’s a pituitary thing), Mark Gambino as Takeshi Takeshi, a samurai priest allergic to egg timers who once kissed a dog, and Dave Callan as Thundercock the Warlock, whose magical blades “Truth” and “Justice” gave him 50% mana recharge and +69 to sex. Their quest: to save the city of Snowtown in Somesortaland by finding the ancient Temple of Livejournal and its font of power blessed by Glob, God of Blogs. There they must enchant a weapon to kill Buttons, the evil dragon god who plagues Snowtown. They defeated the evil cultist who had taken over the temple, suffering only the loss of Arfice’s wombat familiar and a curse which turned Takeshi into a were badger; they did, however, pick up everything that wasn’t nailed down, giving the loot to mobile shopfront Havugottit. They eventually chose to enchant a chair in the font of power, and brought it back to  Snowtown; they convinced Buttons to sit in the chair, at which point he was transformed into a dog and…well, things took an unexpected turn, but the town was saved!

How on Earth do we follow up a couple of sessions like that? Well, by heading off Earth! This Wednesday, May 2nd, is close enough to Star Wars Day that we’ve decided to make a tradition: every May show will be Star Wars flavoured! So come to Dungeon Crawl Episode V: The Empire Crawls Back, and join rebel leaders and Dungeon Jedi Masters Ben “Obi-Wan” McKenzie and Richard “that thing in the trash compactor” McKenzie, plus guest comedians and improvisers Jack Druce (Too Short For A Stormtrooper, Introvert Def Jam), Nadia Collins (The Big Hoo-Haa, Museum Comedy), Danny McGinlay (Food Dude, The Project, Danny McGinlay Learns Ukrainian) and Rama Nicholas (Impro Melbourne, Late Night Impro) as they travel to that galaxy far far away and totally get things a bit wrong.

Tickets $15 at the door, $12 + bf when booked online at bellaunion.com.au; but you knew that, right?

• Jack Druce (Introvert Def Jam) as dwarven Paladin Gold Pockets Petersen, show-biz agent to the dungeoneering stars with an itchty dagger finger set off by mime;
• Toby Halligan (Dr. Toby Halligan is not a Doctor, Political Asylum’s Late Night Riot!) as Matsumoto, a Gen-Y Samurai who tweeted and Facebooked his every kill, but who would be shamed into ritual suicide if he was not retweeted;
• Jimmy James Eaton (One Small Sketch For Man) as Dirty Old Gandalf (D.O.G.), the hip-hop wizard whose spells were as tight as his rhymes – though he could not cast spells in the presence of cats;
• Celia Pacquola (Tie Her To The Tracks, Delayed) as Yelp, the crone who everyone thinks is ugly, but really she’s just had something stuck in her eye for fifty years; she has premonitions of past events, and there’s a secret bat in her hair which she’s never noticed.

The party had been persuaded to come out of retirement to kill one last villain: an evil sorceress. Successfully infiltrating her lair, they are trapped in a slow crushing walls trap, but as seasoned adventurers they’ve seen it all before. They take a moment to rest, and reminisce about their first ever adventure…

Many years before, the quartet were apprenticing as adventurers in their village of Josefsen when a young girl – special guest star Geraldine Quinn (Titters, Spandex Ballet) – pleaded with them to find her missing sheep, Damian, who was not only her best friend, but Josefsen’s only Justice of the Peace. The heroes investigated the nearby sheep paddock and found it suspiciously empty; they retired for a nice pot of chai while waiting to see if the sheep returned on their own. They did not – but our heroes’ chai-sharpened senses reveal a mysterious set of tracks leading into the nearby woods. There the party faced their first challenge – a huge but emaciated wolf! While Gandalf distracted the wolf with a rap about positive body image, the others managed to kill it, but it becomes clear it has eaten nothing in recent times – certainly not a plump sheep. They follow the tracks further to an ominous cabin in the woods, where they find a key hidden behind a picture of another sheep which unlocks a hidden trapdoor. Descending into darkness, they encountered a dead cat, temporarily robbing D.O.G. of his powers – a cat killed by the giant rat who guards the underground passage! The rat is despondent, however: not only is it a genetically modified mutant with a hideous face and rabbit’s ears, but it has been supplanted by its master’s new pet. They get the rat on side and it leaves them to face the wizard behind it all! The wizard is quite happy to show them the sheep…because he had turned it and the other sheep into a horrifying sheep golem! Battle is joined, Yelp discovers the bat in her hair, and the others manage to kill the beast. They cut out the parts that were once Damian, and return them to the young girl, running off before she realises her sheep is dead – and therefore not hearing her bloody swear of vengeance…

Back in the present, the adventurers realise the crushing walls are only mimed, causing Gold Pockets to pull his knife. They walk right through them and confront the sorceress – who turns out to be Damian’s owner, all grown up and thoroughly evil in her twisted desire for revenge! She begins a foul ritual, summoning something from a vile black cloud; Matsumoto tweets that he is going to slash at the sorceress, but his followers, tired of him repeating himself, do not retweet him, and he commits sepuku, aided by Yelp. As his entrails spill onto the floor, the blood of a hero disrupts the foul sigils there powering the ritual, and instead of a vicious sheep monster, the clouds bring forth…a perfect, unsullied copy of Damian! Finally having redeemed a villain instead of killing her, the heroes are happy to retire; G.O.D. records a motivational album for the kids, Yelp uses her newfound skill at decapitation to become an execution in the employ of King Joffrey Baratheon, and Gold Pockets sells the watch he stole from Matsumoto’s corpse to fund his pension. All is well at last!

Thanks to all who came along and enjoyed the show – come back next week for another amazing line-up, including Andrew McClelland (Tie Her To The Tracks, One Man Stand), Dave Bloustien (The Social Contract, Grand Guignol), Brenna Courtney Glazebrook (Better Than This) and first-time crawlers Christophe Davidson (The Time of Your Life) and Dingo & Wolf (Winning at Life)!