General / Off-Topic The Witcher, Netflix version!

EDanaII

EDanaII
I finished it last night. Wasn't impressed. I think it was trying to be the "next Game of Thrones". What show these days isn't? ;) But whereas GoT was brutal, there was still some humanity in it. The Starks, Daenerys, even Tyrion, were trying to be decent human being despite the situations they were in. Yes, they got brutal sometimes but, in the end, except for Daenerys, many of their decisions made sense whithin the framework of human reasoning. In the Witcher, the choices seemed more plot driven. Except a few, none of the characters felt even slightly human. The Queen who wanted to kill her daughters "beau" just went straight to that decision for plot drama and not much else. The "Teacher" who taught her students the hard way by actually letting them get hurt was a similar thing: let's just do the worst to these people for drama's sake. There was, as far as I could tell, no "human" motivations behind these characters, just plot driven ones. I doubt I'll even bother with season two.
 

m0rl0ck

M
I really enjoyed it, thought it was far above average fantasy fiction, to those who cant enjoy it because of prejudice or bias, you deserve yourself.
I didnt play the game or read the books so i was starting with a blank slate and imo it stands fine on its own.
I would give it 7 of 10 stars easy.
 

jasonbarron

jasonbarron
So far I've only criticized it based on it's creative shortcomings which are bad enough. If you can wade through that garbage and get to dissecting the actual content of the story it just gets worse.
 

askavir

askavir
lysan said:
Oh boy that doesn’t sound good, I’m still holding back maybe it gets better?
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Halfway it gets a bit better, but never becomes "good". It's on par with the typical tv fantasy shows. It tries (but fails) to be something more. Still watchable, although I do have a large tolerance threshold for fantasy and scifi shows (because they're so rare and far-between) so maybe that's the reason.

So if The WItcher was a scifi show, it wouldn't be anywhere near The Expanse, Battlestar Galactica or Babylon 5, but it also wouldn't be as awful as Killjoys, Maybe somewhat in between, like Dark Matter.
 

askavir

askavir
EDanaII said:
There was, as far as I could tell, no "human" motivations behind these characters, just plot driven ones.
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I agree this is the biggest shortcoming. Especially when even the games were a lot better in that regard. What makes the Witcher's game world so special is precisely how the characters feel "human", how the usual tropes of good vs evil are thrown away and replaced with the real world shades of grey, how everyone had reasons and/or agendas to do what they do.
 

lysan

lysan
askavir said:
Halfway it gets a bit better, but never becomes "good". It's on par with the typical tv fantasy shows. It tries (but fails) to be something more. Still watchable, although I do have a large tolerance threshold for fantasy and scifi shows (because they're so rare and far-between) so maybe that's the reason.

So if The WItcher was a scifi show, it wouldn't be anywhere near The Expanse, Battlestar Galactica or Babylon 5, but it also wouldn't be as awful as Killjoys, Maybe somewhat in between, like Dark Matter.
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Killjoy was a pain to watch I simply couldn’t continue watching it.
 

CMDR Cosmic Spacehead

CMDR Cosmic Spacehead
I finished season 1 the other day, and I'm already itching for season 2.

And I don't normally enjoy any show enough to be wanting more.
I never finished GOT, or walking dead (did it even finish?), any many other shows just get to boring after a while.
But after some mild confusion with the time line, I began to enjoy it more, after episode 4 or 5.

Episode 1 was still my favourite, and I was kinda sad that those effects, and combat weren't continued for the entire season. The fights later on feel very "meh" in comparison. But I guess they have a right budget.
If you pay attention to Netflix shows, they'll usually have a high budget first, and last episode, and fairly average to low budget for everything else.

I started playing The Witcher 3 the other day, which is so far, less enjoyable. Lol
Possibly because I haven't played 1 or 2.
Got no clue what's going on, haven't figured out the combat (I just spam fast attack), and haven't worked out upgrading my character or inventory.
Although I was happy to find a sword that does 5x damage compared to the starting sword, after my first monster kill. 😁
 

Robin of Spiritwood

Robin of Spiritwood
It has some storytelling issues, but Henry Cavill really carries it.
He used to play the games he says, and he understands Geralt pretty well. 5/10 without him, 7/10 with him.
Every scene he's in is watchable, and that's about 2/3 of it.


 

askavir

askavir
Robin of Spiritwood said:
It has some storytelling issues, but Henry Cavill really carries it.
He used to play the games he says, and he understands Geralt pretty well. 5/10 without him, 7/10 with him.
Every scene he's in is watchable, and that's about 2/3 of it.


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Yeah you can see that Henry Cavill is really trying hard, and he actually succeeds to portray a believable young Geralt.
 

Pyrotiger

Pyrotiger
I thought it was dreadful, personally. Henry Cavill does a great job. Beyond him, though, it's a shocking borefest. Couldn't bring myself to watch the last episode.
 

EDanaII

EDanaII
askavir said:
I agree this is the biggest shortcoming. Especially when even the games were a lot better in that regard. What makes the Witcher's game world so special is precisely how the characters feel "human", how the usual tropes of good vs evil are thrown away and replaced with the real world shades of grey, how everyone had reasons and/or agendas to do what they do.
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Yea, but there's a little more than just that. The split timeline did not help things, especially since there was nothing to indicate that you were watching multiple timelines. I certainly didn't figure it out until half-way through. But the other thing for me was something I call "bullet-pointing". The Star Wars prequels suffered from it. The last two seasons of Game of Thrones suffered from it. Bullet Pointing is basically where nothing but plot points happen. Nothing or little else. None of the normal human interaction that normally occurs between characters that gives you some idea of their humanity. I.e. Daenerys was alone - check; Daenerys felt betrayed - check; Daenerys turned to the Dark Side - check. In these kind of situation, you can't appreciate what they did and why they did it. The entire season of the Witcher felt like this. Queen wants dude dead - check. Witcher intervenes - check. Fight breaks out - check. Nothing in between that helped you understand why they were making the choices they did. Not a lot of that, anyway.
 

Chris Simon

Chris Simon
I re-watched the whole thing and I have to say I enjoyed it a bit more than the first time.
I kind of got used to the stupidly race-swapped characters and the non-linear storytelling that was so confusing the first time around started to make a little bit of sense. I mean, it's still rather bad - I don't think the writers had much experience with this kind of stuff, but it's not completely nonsensical and self-serving when looked at as a whole.

I actually really like H.C.'s Geralt. Surprisingly, I might say. He's nothing like game Geralt (obviously), and not really a book one either. But it's obvious he's a Witcher fan and has his own idea of who Geralt is to him and plays the role to his own strengths and it kind of fits.

The whole thing is one of those "cool idea that could have been executed a bit better" deals. If it was done as a fan project, it would be bloody awesome, but as a professional production... well, it has some moments worthy of an awkward chuckle. :)

Overall, after warming up to it a little, it would get 6.5/10 from me, with 8/10 for stories and the main character (and partly for Yennefer, whom I hated at the beginning but her story arc turned out to be rather good, albeit as far from the books as possible) and 5/10 for supporting cast and production value (some costumes and CGI are way off and although some of the fight scenes are really great, some feel like 10y/o kids fighting with sticks)
 

DaggerSnake

DaggerSnake
Speedcuffs said:
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I’d love to see him as Roland in a decent Dark Tower series too!
 

Jezzah

Jezzah
Watched the first episode.

Liked it. Seemed a decent setting introduction. Cavill plays Geralt well I think. The combat is sufficiently meaty and styled nicely.

I read the books and played the games so I made a strong effort right from the start to push back against any story comparisons. Taken in that light I felt it's got a lot of the setting right. It felt at least to me like it should.

I'll be able to judge better when I've finished the season, but if its like this throughout then it's a strong start to the series.

Like any new series the first season is often a blunt strike with the writers, actors and directors finding their feet with it and following seasons are much better.
 

Jezzah

Jezzah
Just finished episode 3.

I think this is great. That 3rd episode was a belter.

Its maybe one of those marmite things for folk. But speaking as someone that loved the games and the books I am very much enjoying it. Does it have a few minor niggles - sure, but they are minor and only so if you are looking for a purity in fidelity to the books.

It's very difficult if not impossible to wholely translate a large body of writing to the screen and not lose some of nuance or detail. But for my money Netflix have this far, done very well with here.

The only thing I'd criticise really and it doesn't apply to those that know the story, is that it's not terribly clear about the timelines. So that could easily confuse newcomers and put them off when the timelines eventually catch up without each other.
 
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