Miss or a Hit?
The Witcher is based on book series of Polish author Andrzej Sapkowski’s epic series of fantasy novels and short stories. However, it is famously known through “The Witcher” video game series. Now, to be honest, I have neither played the game nor have I read the novels. But what Netflix has created here is the best of both worlds and tried to give an experience to all fantasy and fiction lovers.
The Witcher Cast
Henry Cavill starred as, ‘Geralt of Rivia’, a witcher not a witch, but a mutated human created with supernatural abilities. Hence, that allowed him to battle wild beasts and monsters. The series depicts how Geralt travels from town to town and accepts missions to hunt monsters in exchange for “coins”.
Anya Chalotra starred as ‘Yennefer’, plays the role of a powerless and abused woman who has a hump on her back. Yet, when she is introduced to a world of great magic she becomes the most powerful witches in the series.
Freya Allen plays Princess Ciri, who is considered to be the least developed protagonist among all three. However, her role is defined in relation to her parents and her grandmother, Queen Calanthe. Across the eight episodes, she travels in order to find her destined path; the one that her grandmother wanted her to continue.
The series is filled with action sequences. Especially the first episode can be argued to have displayed the best fight scene I have ever watched. I agree with the critics who claim the fight scenes in the “The Witcher” put Games of Thrones to shame but I won’t recommend this for those light-hearted audiences. The series is filled with blood-shed and can be at times horrifying.
The Story
The Witcher moves in three different timelines, with all three protagonists. And this might not be clearly apparent in the beginning but it becomes visible after a couple of episodes.
Cavill’s depiction of Geralt looks like a match-in-heaven with all the sword fighting deadly scenes to his seldom funny acts. But rest assured Geralt is neither a hero nor an antihero; he is depicted as a loner who just wants to do the right thing.
The series gets a lot of things right but having unnecessary nudity is not one of them. The scenes that can be considered irrelevant to the plots could have been easily avoided.
If you are thinking of watching a show with magic, witches, dragons, elves, and dwarves, then this might be the show for you. But whether or not it can be considered as the next Game of Thrones is quite debatable.
