Netflix should just let go of The Witcher after S4

Talk about a TV show that has everything stacked against it for a new season. While the 1st season of The Witcher was enjoyable, season 2 was a step back and season 3 was just awful. To most people, including me, the best part of The Witcher was always Henry Cavil as Geralt. So you can imagine the backlash when Henry decided to part ways with the show, specially considering how it was related to disagreements with the writers and their faithfulness to the source material. I have not read the books, and even though I’ve played Witcher 3 a few times, that was a while ago, so I am not one to talk as an expert. That said, even to me some of the choices regarding casting and the attitude of different characters and events were jarring to say the least. Those aside, the show was just falling apart towards the end of season 3. The writing was all over the place, the lack of cohesion made it difficult to follow what was going on in the world, outside of the story of our protagonists. I am trying but I just can’t seem to even remember anything about that season, other than Geralt being injured in the end and the trio being separated, along with some other small things.

When I learned about Henry Cavil being replaced, I was thinking what are they actually going to do then? Are they going to take the story in a direction to explain this, maybe using the dimensions and such, or are they just gonna do it without any explanation? The answer is given immediately as the first episode starts, as we are shown scenes of Geralt from previous seasons, only it is now Liam Hemsworth in all of them. Basically he has been the Witcher all along as far as the show is concerned. This meant that this season was going to be a direct continuation of what came before, which does not put it in a good position. Considering all the lackluster world building and subpar writing of what came before, would this season be able to overcome that and turn things around?

This season starts with Geralt, Yennefer, and Ciri separated and lost to each other. Each will go on their own journey with their own goals. Geralt of course wants to find Ciri again, who he believes is with the Emperor. Geralt, Jaskier, and Milva embark on this quest together but along the way they will be joined by others who will be fighting along side them and helping Geralt get to the emperor. Yennefer, while also aiming to reunite with Ciri, must first deal with Vilgefortz. Not only is he also after Ciri, but he also is assembling his own army to wipe out Yennefer and anyone loyal to her, so Yennefer must also try to find allies and recruit other sorceresses to her aid to defeat Vilgefortz. Ciri finds herself among a group of thieves, who call themselves the Rats. She believes that she brings death wherever she goes to whoever cares about her, so she is hesitant as to whether she should embrace her new friends and becoming part of a new family, or to keep moving and running by herself to avoid putting anyone else in danger.

While each of these subplots can be criticised on their own, let’s talk about the season in general. First of all, there are too many goddman new characters. The show already had a lot of characters and moving pieces that it was struggling to manage properly, and now each member of our trio will be with a whole bunch of new people that we are introduced to. The new roster of people will be explored on different levels, some new characters just include a name and wired gimmick/quirk to make up their whole characters, while others are at least given a backstory and some personality. This by itself is not necessarily a problem, but it does become one when the show dedicates time to these superficial characters and tries to get you to care. A lot of time is spent with characters that don’t have much to them, and then they are put in these situations that are supposed to be suspenseful and dramatic, but fall flat because I did not care. The show thinks that being quippy or having a single character trait is enough but it felt like a waste of time with a lot of these new additions to the roster. Furthermore, some characters didn’t even feel like they belong to this dark fantasy world, especially when it comes to the way they talk or they way they look. If you have watched the show you probaby know what I mean. Out of everyone new, I was interested only in one really, one of Geralt’s new companions, Regis. One things that got me a little interested was the involvement of Laurence Fishburne who plays this new character. He is one of those actors to me that I just enjoy watching hin regardless of the type of media he’s in. To me he was the best of the new characters. There are some others that I think were fine, but I will get into the details of that later.

Talking about characters, let’s address the elephant in the room: Liam Hemsworth replacing Henry Cavil as Geralt. Let’s face it, the odds were stacked against Liam. He had big shoes to fill and had to work with the leftover of messy writing and frustrated fans from the previous seasons. No one was expecting him to really live up to the bar set by Henry Cavil. I have nothing against him and to be honest I wouldn’t wanna be in his shoes. It’s a tough situation that you can’t really win. With all that said, how does he do? I’m still not a fan of this casting. Liam does his best portrayal of Geralt but you can’t help but see him just as a replacement for Henry. I have no idea what Netflix was thinking moving ahead with The Witcher and recasting this lead role. Liam lacks the presence that Henry had, not just because of his physique and being leaner and smaller than Henry, but his facial features just don’t match what I expect to see when I think of Geralt. Also his tone of voice can be inconsistent, sometimes it feels as if he’s doing a Christian Bale Batman impersonation, other times he sounds like his big brother Chris Hemsworth, other times it’s flat and not rough in any way. I’m not gonna put the blame on Liam as he had an impossible task. It is the producers that have made all the mistakes and are now left with a role that they cannot fill properly.

The previous seasons suffered greatly from a lack of cohesion when it came to the world, is politics and factions, and the geography and relationship of different plots/characters. This problem still persists, maybe to a lesser extant but nevertheless it is there, the world feels a bit like a mess. At times I felt that characters were sort of jumping between places and I had no clue how different locations are related to each other. The existing factions I just didn’t care about, the 2nd and 3rd seasons did them no favours. There is a huge important was going on, but it just felt distant. Even though we do see some consequences of it and some of the main characters get involved in it, it felt like a background for other events to take place in. The cohesion is again something that depends on the subplot and faction, ranging from bad to ok.

The fighting scenes are also inconsistent. The one-on-one or small fights are choreographed the best and actually include some cool movements and moments. Anything that involves actual, physical weapons is generally done well, even though the CGI blood can be a little too fake/obvious at times. The monsters and beasts designes are also good, the CGI is decent and I could believe the fight that was taking place, most of the time. While those fights are good, I cannot say the same for fights involving magic. I don’t know how it is in the books, but the magic that sorceresses use to fight is very unimaginative and boring. Most of the fights involving mages revolve around throwing energy beams or attacks at one another. Either that or some telekinesis, force fields, or fire. There are some other spells here and there, and they do some cool choreography even with these limited spells, but overall I couldn’t help but feel underwhelmed with what I was seeing.

I have pointed out mostly negatives about the season with some goods. These qualities have been different in each sublot of the season, with the Ciri subplot being the absolute worst and what really ruined the season for me. In the first episode, they do this thing where one of the Rats sits down with Ciri and explains each member of their gang in one or two sentences. I immediately knew that these characters will not get any more depth and that they may be killed at some point for shock value. Each episode includes some time dedicated to this gang but I couldn’t care less. The show wanted to force you to care about them in as little time as possible but there is just nothing to them. They are not likeable nor are they interesting. At some point I started speeding up whenever it would cut back to the Rats because of how uninteresting and at times annoying and cringe they were. It is a shame because they do end up getting an antagonist that is actually threatening and you wanna see in action, but this antagonist comes into play in the second half of the season, too late. Yennefer’s subplot is better but that’s because at least initially it involves characters that we already know. That said, they don’t do anything interesting with them. Everyone gets recruited easily after a short interaction, even people who were former enemies. Then a whole bunch of new sorceresses are introduced in preparation for the final battle and it’s just more faces that have nothing to them. Geralt's subplot is the best out of the three. The new characters in this subplot are overall more flushed out and the show actually does something interesting with them. The standout episode of the season is the 5th one that is centred around Geralt and his new companions. The make some creative decisions to tell the stories that the characters have to tell about themselves that at least felt different. Some may consider lazy and an attempt to get us to like this crew but at least it sort of worked. The same I cannot say for Ciri and her crew that just made me role my eyes most of them or sigh out of boredom.

I don’t think this season was particularly good, but I don’t think it was an absolute disaster. There are lots of bads but there are some things to be enjoyed. Despite the few moments and little things that I thought were good, towards the end I just found myself not caring about what was going. I just wanted to finish the season and where each of the trio would end up. This season was a mistake, the only thing about The Witcher that was good through and through without inconsistencies was Henry. After his departure, this series was The Witcher mostly in name.