Summary
Theories about howThe Witcherwill replace Henry Cavill with Liam Hemsworth have been running wild, but one producer has started giving some shocking hints about what is to come inthe delayed season 4.
One of the most common hypotheses about how Geralt of Rivia will miraculously turn from Cavill into Hemsworth revolves around a multiverse. Marvel has recently popularized the notion of multiple timelines and different actors playing variants. However, this has been debunked byThe Witcherproducer Tomek Baginski after he spoke to the Polish outlet Wyborcza.
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“Many book readers forget what Andrzej Sapkowski did in the fifth volume of the saga. For me, this is one of the most important things in the whole story,” Tomek said, as reported byRedanian Intelligence. “I’m not talking about specific events, but the narrative framework that was introduced in this book. Suddenly, at the beginning of the book, we learn that everything we’ve read so far might not have been true. And this cannot be compared with, for example, the currently popular concept of the multiverse, where out of nowhere there are many different realities.”
Tomek further described the events ofThe Lady of the Lake, the final book inThe Witchersaga. Centuries after Geralt, Ciri, and Yennefer have become living legends, people start retelling the stories of their adventures. Because so many years have passed and the nature of how these stories evolve, not all of these legends are the same. Details change with different interpretations, which could be replicated inThe Witcherseason 4. The producer also stressed that inThe Witcherworld,The Conjunction of the Spheresmay indicate different worlds, but there is just one timeline. There are no Geralt variants like Marvel has demonstrated. In the Netflix version of the story, events could be retold with the titular character looking quite different from how he did for the first three seasons.
While this is certainly one way to fix the recasting issue, it doesn’t bode well for the show’s future. Tomek even recalled that whenThe Lady of the Lakecame out, “people were very frustrated.” Changing the nature of the story so late in the game feels like a betrayal to fans who have invested years of their lives into these characters. This could be the fate for future seasons ofThe Witcher. Tomek arguedThe Witcheraudiences were misguidedand shouldn’t interpret the material so closely, but that will be cold comfort to die-hard fans. There is not one way to interpret art, and the previous seasons have not endeared themselves to book lovers.The Witcherhas been subject to harsh criticism for years, and it doesn’t look like that will stop soon.
To be sure, there wasn’t much the Netflix series could do other thanrecasting Geralt forThe Witcherseason 4. Cavill was resigned to leaving the series, and focusing on a different character wouldn’t be in line with the source material either. There were only so many choices that the writers could select or a new Geralt to make sense. Steering away from a multiverse that has been prevalent in big franchises is the way to go, soThe Witcherfeels fresh. But at this point, there is no winning for a show that was rocky, at best.
