Dimension 20 On a Bus Season 2 Episode Dropout: Katie Marovitch

SPOILER ALERT: This story contains spoilers for “Dimension 20: On a Bus” Season 2, streaming now on Dropout.

Comedy streaming service Dropout stepped up to the plate on April 1 with the launch of a “second season” of “Dimension 20: On a Bus.”

The second season, which consists of one episode, was released on Wednesday in a surprise release and serves as a sequel to a viral short video released last year alongside an episode of Dropout’s “Game Changer,” pitching a season of “Dimension 20” with “Dragon Master” Katie Marovitch leading players (and “D&D” experts) Jasmine Bhullar (Little Army Man), Aabria Iyengar (Blue M&M), Matthew Mercer (Lint) and Brennan Lee Mulligan (Hat) as they board a bus trip from North Hollywood to Los Angeles’ LAX airport.

Tabletop RPG newcomer Marovitch says: ‘Dimension 20’ creator and star Mulligan and Dropout CEO and “Game Changer” host Sam Reich didn’t expect the video to attract more than 6 million views. But once that happened, conversations quickly began about making a full-length episode of “On a Bus.”

“We talked about it pretty early on, shortly after the original two-minute, 30-second Season 1 premiered,” Marovitch said. Variety. “We didn’t know it would be such a big thing. It was very exciting to see everyone at conventions dressed up as me in my outfits. I don’t think we expected that. So it made sense to do something different quite soon after the premiere.”

Although not originally planned as an ongoing series, the second season of “Dimension 20: On a Bus” was filmed in January with the original cast and their characters (with the exception of Iyengar’s original Blue M&M, “because Aabria kept eating Blue M&M,” Marovitch), with gameplay resuming according to Marovitch’s rules.

What started as a joke (and is now the highest-rated episode of “Dimension 20” on IMDb) remains a joke for most of Season 2, but Marovitch says she wanted to pay tribute to the art of “D&D” while DMing the group of hardcore players.

“There’s a fine line between making fun of something and then honoring it, because of course I respect that [this]Marovitch said. “They’re all incredible, and they’re so much better at this than I ever could. So I definitely don’t want to offend anyone while I’m doing it, I just want it to be fun.”

Marovitch “can’t emphasize how little” she knew about “D&D” in the original “Dimension 20: On a Bus,” but says she put a lot of effort into the plans for Season 2.

“I really did a lot of preparation. I spent a lot of time thinking about the pieces and being like, oh, is this crossing a line? Is this going to be offensive to Brennan and the other people at the table, or is this something that’s just fun for everyone?” said Marovitch. “Also, I’m a type A, so for me it wasn’t reading about ‘D&D’ and it was really hard to know everything about it before going in. But Brennan, when I talked to him beforehand, he said, the less you know about it, honestly, the better. Like, it’s funnier to make you go in like an idiot. But my impulse is definitely like, oh, I have to prepare to actually know what to do, and then a little But no, this time we actually had something like that from: prepare your pieces. And I prepared my pieces a lot, but I really tried my best not to go beyond that.

Read more from Variety‘s interview with “Dimension 20: On a Bus” star Marovitch about season 2 and plans for additional episodes below.

At what point during the preparation for “Dimension 20: On a Bus” Season 2 did you decide that additional dice types might be useful here? Or that you need to include more than one rule in the game mechanics?

The first season, the two minute and thirty second season, I went in knowing that I literally had no idea what I was going to say about the dice system. And the six, the ‘perfect six’, just came to me, and then we went with it. But for this one, since it was obviously a much longer season, I thought that might not be enough. So you will notice that there is a different system this time. It’s much more complicated. A TI-83 is involved. It may be difficult for viewers to follow. Maybe I’ll write something, some kind of manual, maybe my own book. I just want people to know that other systems can be used besides the perfect six.

At the end of Season 1, did you leave room for where you would like to go if the story continued beyond that bit?

Not at all. I can’t emphasize enough how little I knew going into season 1. Really, I had no idea what I was going to say. The only thing I came in with was that a bus was coming. And obviously I put a lot of time into the field for season 2, I really did. In talking to Brennan, he really said, no, don’t try to think about the plot too much because that actually makes it harder. If the DM knows exactly what they want to do, and you’re obviously working with other players, then it all depends on what they say. So for me, season 1, I can’t emphasize enough how little attention was paid to it. I had to rewatch the season several times. I thought: what did I actually say? I have no idea what I did.

This was recorded in January. How long did it take to film?

It was one day, and it actually started late, and some people were already on set in the morning. So it was a long day that started a little late, and it was fun. I have to take my baby to get settled and it’s fun being a new parent and trying to work on pumping and breastfeeding and all that. But it was great.

In this episode you use a lot of props from previous seasons of ‘Dimension 20’. Did Brennan give you full access to the props room, or did you suggest certain pieces to use?

The team behind this was truly incredible. Obviously I don’t know anything about ‘D&D’, but they really helped gather all the props from different seasons that they thought might work. And it was really a collaboration on the pieces, with people who knew a lot more than me bringing something forward. Like the crucial role Vecna ​​​​– which obviously I would have no idea about, I couldn’t think of that bit, because I’ve never seen it. So that was definitely someone else who came up with that. It was truly a collaboration. And certainly the best pieces are from other people who have much more knowledge than I do.

During the episode, you announce that you’ve been approached by Critical Role to take over as a “replacement” for an unnamed person on that show. Are those conversations still ongoing?

I like to believe they will continue. And yes, I kind of choose to believe that that will happen. Whether that was true remains to be seen. But for me, I choose to believe that those conversations are happening.

You also told Brennan that you were given a much larger budget than the average season of Dropout’s “Dimension 20” gets. How much more would you say?

I think they said I got about triple the budget? And of course, I mean, you’ve seen it – yes, we’ve used it. We used the money. I think the Cheeto budget alone was $5,000. And of course we have all experienced it.

These new additions – the “Mr. Questions” badge, the Cheetos-filled dice tray – do you see these being incorporated into the standard gameplay of Brennan’s future seasons of “Dimension 20”?

I like to believe that they will not only apply to “D20”. I like to believe they’ll be pretty much exactly what everyone does in all of “D&D” in general. I like to believe this will just be part of the gameplay from now on. And that’s kind of the reality I choose to live in.

At the end of the episode, you quote one of Brennan’s iconic long monologues from “Dimension 20: A Crown of Candy.” Why did you choose that particular speech for this moment in “On a Bus”?

It was so weird because I didn’t even know that was from that. I just started talking from the heart and then the people behind the scenes shot me over that thing, and I was like, oh, my God. We are, again, me and Brennan are so in tune. We come up with the exact same monologues, word for word, all the time, and it’s just an example of that. So yeah, for me, no, I’d never seen it. And no, I certainly wasn’t stealing it. It was independent, yes, for sure.

Was this a one-time expansion of the bit or will there be more? Is a season 3 of “Dimension 20: On a Bus” in the works?

Yes, I plan to annoy Sam and Brennan enough as they do everything they can to shut me up. So I can promise you that we are working on a season 3. Although [the Dropout PR monitoring this interview] is going to say, “No, Katie has no right to promise things like that. Please don’t put that in the article. Katie has no authority.” But I’m telling you, Jenny, I promise there will be a season 3, there will be a season 4, there will be a season 5.

All in one bus? Or do you think “Dimension 20: On a Bus” could itself be a franchise with even more spin-offs?

I like that question. I see ‘Dimension 20: in an Uber’. Not to surprise you, but I could see it in a Waymo. Here we are in 2026. We have to start thinking big. I could definitely see it in a spaceship. You know, let’s go to space. I think there’s so much. It’s such a rich world and I’m so ready to just keep exploring. “Dimension 20: On a Bus” Season 10 could definitely take place in space, or underwater, that hasn’t been decided yet.

Well, in season 2 you’re already getting on a plane, so it’s moving quickly. While shooting the episode, did you plan in advance for each of the cast members to step into the DM chair at different points to take over, or did that just happen?

No, I had no idea I was going to do that. I did it briefly with Matt. That was my first. And then I thought, wait a minute, this is a way to move the story forward much better than how I could do it, so maybe this is a good idea and I should keep doing it. I don’t think all of their turns, like the full length, obviously didn’t work out. But really, the best parts of the episode are when I’m not in the driver’s seat.

Did you take what they said, learn from it, and use it throughout the rest?

Yes. And actually, I think you can see from my face that every time I had a kind of light bulb moment where they said something that was so much smarter than anything I could have ever imagined. And I thought, oh yeah, we should do that. We have to keep pursuing whatever that was. You can really tell that when I’m not in the chair, I’m like a little kid, giddy with excitement because someone else is saying something much smarter than what I could say.

This interview has been edited and condensed.