In a world where Star Trek‘s cinematic comeback was stunted by the return of Star Wars, and Jurassic Park‘s revival knocked the new Godzilla franchise back into the Atomic age, The Witcher feels doomed to become an also-ran sandwiched between Game of Thrones, Disney+’s The Mandalorian and Amazon’s upcoming Lord of the Rings. But will those among Netflix’s 160 million subscribers who are unfamiliar with the fantasy source material be enticed? Have audiences had their fill of dark fables that juggle several story lines, an abundance of characters, and imaginary realms? The goal is to deliver television’s next great saga.
Enter Netflix, which tapped creator and showrunner Lauren Schmidt Hissrich ( Marvel’s The Defenders) to adapt Andrzej Sapkowski’s sprawling book series The Witcher, which also inspired a collection of globally popular video games. Martin’s Game of Thrones into a worldwide phenomenon, every major small screen combatant has been on the hunt for an epic science-fiction/fantasy tale it can alchemize into a similarly addictive TV series. Katalin Vermes/NetflixĮver since HBO turned George R.R. Henry Cavill stars in Netflix’s new blockbuster fantasy series The Witcher.
