Dungeon Crawler Carl Creator Reveals the 1 Requirement He Had for the TV Show, And It Was Perfect

July 30, 2026, 7:01pm

If you’ve been paying any attention to geek and book spaces in the last couple of years then you already know about Dungeon Crawler Carl. Written by Matt Dinniman, what started out as a self-published LitRPG novel has become an actual pop culture phenomenon, turning into a powerhouse of a novel series, beloved audiobooks, webcomics, graphic novels, games, and more. That wild popularity has in turn brought the beloved book to the realm of television as well with a live-action Dungeon Crawler Carl series in the works. But when something is as beloved as Dungeon Crawler Carl has become, there’s always some concerns when making the leap from page to screen and now, Dinniman is opening up about the one thing that was a requirement for the television series and it’s something that will make fans happy.

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Speaking with ComicBook at San Diego Comic-Con, Dinniman explained that even before they sold the rights to make the series, he knew that whoever took it on had to have not only read the books but understood them as well. As it turns out, Chris Yost, who is writing and executive producing the series for Peacock, fits the bill perfectly.

“One of the first things I did when we decided, started talking about who would we give the rights to sell the show is I wanted to make certain that anybody who had the rights and who was working on the adaptation was someone who had read it and I talked to and they understood it,” Dinniman said. “And Chris Yost, who’s heading up the writing on it right now, is a huge fan. He was a fan before any of this press stuff started. He’s on my Patreon. He’s completely caught up with everything. And he understands the story very, very well. And as long as you have people who understand the story and then they want to be protective of the tone and any sort of like small changes that are necessary for TV. And I mean, let’s be honest here. We have to have some changes, but as long as we keep that very important core of the story in both spirit and making it as awesome as possible, then I think everyone’s going to go along with it.”

Having a Fellow Fan in Charge of Dungeon Crawler Carl Will Make People Very Happy

The revelation that Dinniman required someone who not only had read Dungeon Crawler Carl but understands it to take the project on is something that will make fans very happy. One of the major concerns that comes along with any book to screen adaptation is that whoever takes the project on might not be invested in the story quite the same way if they aren’t familiar from the jump. With Yost being a fan — and not just that, but a part of Dinniman’s Patreon type of fan — it feels a lot more like the Peacock series will be series not only for the fans but made by them as well. That bodes well for authenticity, even with the changes that Dinniman acknowledges that must be made.

Knowing that Yost is a fan of the source material is also another level of great news for fans when it comes to having faith that the Peacock series will live up to expectation. At SDCC, it was announced that the series had cast its first star by casting Jeff Hays as the voice of Princess Donut. This is another huge win for fans as Hays has long narrated the audiobooks for the Dungeon Crawler Carl series, using his voice to bring to life numerous characters, but especially Donut. For many, there is no Donut without Hays providing her voice so knowing that the series will have that plus a fan of the books writing the scripts, fans can breathe just that much easier.

Of course, there are still some lingering fan concerns about what the series will actually look like in terms of it being live-action rather than animated, but Dinniman had an explanation for that as well and it comes down to wanting to bring the story to as wide an audience as possible — which makes a ton of sense given how popular Dungeon Crawler Carl really is.

“There was a lot of talk about that at first and we ended up going with live action because they saw the biggest how, you know viral the was going and growing and they wanted to reach the largest possible segment of society,” he said about live action versus animated discussions. “And when we talked about it, I said well, let’s go for it because it’s going to be a very difficult task and there’s going to be a lot of naysayers at first, but I have a lot of confidence in the people that are making this and I say don’t knock till you see it. I think it’s going to be pretty awesome.”

If Matt Dinniman thinks it’s going to be pretty awesome, that’s good enough for us.