The Witcher Executive Producer Tomek Bagiński recently teased how the Netflix series will handle Liam Hemsworth replacing Henry Cavill as Geralt of Rivia.
Cavill announced he was leaving the show after the third season finished filming and he would not return for the fourth season.
He posted on Instagram, “My journey as Geralt of Rivia has been filled with both monsters and adventures, and alas, I will be laying down my medallion and my swords for Season 4.”
Cavill went on to reveal that Hemsworth would replace him, “In my stead, the fantastic Mr Liam Hemsworth will be taking up the mantle of the White Wolf. As with the greatest of literary characters, I pass the torch with reverence for the time spent embodying Geralt and enthusiasm to see Liam’s take on this most fascinating and nuanced of men.”
“Liam, good sir, this character has such a wonderful depth to him, enjoy diving in and seeing what you can find,” Cavill concluded.
Speaking with Radio Times, Bagiński said, “Lauren [Schmidt Hissrich, showrunner] and her team – and there are a few really good writers returning to the writers’ room for season 4 – I think they cobbled together a really nice opening which is really true to the books.”
He continued, “This is a very little thing that I will tease – people who know the books really deeply also know that this is not a typical fantasy book. It’s not just one world. It’s not just one story happening in those books, in those stories. It’s a huge, huge world which is very, very complex… I will stop here!”
Bagiński would provide more details to Daily Express US, “We have to be quite careful because how Liam will get incorporated into season four, that’s a huge spoiler and we really don’t want to spoil it.”
“We don’t really want to destroy the surprise,” he added. “I think it’s done really nicely and very, very close to some deeper ideas in the books which were introduced in book five, at the very very end of the saga.”
“Again, we probably don’t have time to go, into philosophically the core ideas behind behind the saga and define the Witcher world, but one of the like big topics in The Witcher world is that every story can be told from many, many POVs – and sometimes those POVs and those versions of the stories are very, very different from what we thought was truth,” he explained.
“I don’t want to tell anything else anymore, but that I think we found [..] a really smart idea on how to incorporate Liam into this role and I think he will be a great Geralt,” Bagiński concluded.
Bagiński’s fellow producer Steve Gaub also shared, “I think big-picture wise, you know, it’s a franchise and we trust that the IP and the franchise is the strength.”
“The characters are the strength, the stories are the strength, and that’s what draws fans back,” he relayed. “We could list five or six different franchises that have had, you know, title characters that changed face every few movies or seasons or years, and we’re another one.”
“But you know, we’re going to continue to build on what [Henry Cavill] established very strongly for Geralt, but continuing to deliver The Witcher franchise you know, as strong as ever,” he concluded.
That strength appears to have completely evaporated with audiences. The entire show’s Audience Score on Rotten Tomatoes sits at a rotten 56%.
When you look at Season 3, the Audience Score is an atrocious 24%.
What do you make of this tease on how they will replace Henry Cavill with Liam Hemsworth as Geralt of Rivia?