The Witcher is Netflix’s next big foray into the hole left by Game of Thrones. Based on a series of books by Andrzej Sapkowski, it’s got everything you could want in a fantasy show: fearsome monsters, even more fearsome lord and ladies, a wayward princess, a powerful sorceress, and a swashbuckling silver-haired hero.
That hero is professional monster hunter Geralt of Rivia, played by Henry “I used to be Superman” Cavill. As the show gets closer to release, Netflix is giving us more sneak peaks, including at an action scene premiered on Jimmy Kimmel Live! Watch below:
The. Fight. Scenes. #TheWitcher pic.twitter.com/hY7QVzGRlN
— Netflix Geeked (@NetflixGeeked) December 4, 2019
Folks who have read the books will probably recognize this scene as lifted from the story “A Question of Price” from The Last Wish. For the rest, we won’t spoil it by explaining what the hell is going on here. Who fights at a banquet, really?
The action itself looks pretty fun, quick and kinetic with lots of bangs and bumps and grunts. And as Cavill revealed on the full interview, he didn’t use a stuntman for this particular fight at all. “It’s really important that the character exists within the action as well rather than just an acting scene and then you have an action scene, which is completely separate, and then you’re back to the acting again,” he said. “It’s really important that the story and the character travel through all of those things.”
By the way, if you watched that clip and you thought that Geralt resembled another fantasy icon from recent memory, Kimmel was way ahead of you. “I modeled myself off Khaleesi,” Cavill joked. “I made people call me Khaleesi or Emilia on set… no eye contact, I want to be Emilia or Khaleesi. Call me mother of dragons, I’m fine.”
Whoever he looks like, Cavill has definitely done his homework for this role. He was a big fan of the Witcher video games from CD Projekt Red to start, and just fell more in love with the world from there. “Played [The Witcher 3] to the death and then I heard was coming out,” he recalled. “I met the showrunner and that’s when I learned that there were books. Read the books and then realized that I was missing out on a whole world of this stuff because I’ve been into the fantasy genre since I was a kid. Since before I could read, my dad was reading me fantasy books.”
Cavill is also bringing his previous experiences into the role. Talking to Kevin McCarthy below, he compared Geralt to Superman…and Batman, for good measure.
“I have not seen any Snyder cut.”
— Kevin McCarthy (@KevinMcCarthyTV) December 3, 2019
Henry Cavill and I geek out about our shared love for @ZackSnyder’s masterful MAN OF STEEL, his idea for future of his Superman character & how is character in THE WITCHER is a combination of Batman & Superman!#ReleaseTheSnyderCut #TheWitcher pic.twitter.com/xg6WWKVRAB
“There are some strong similarities,” Cavill said. “Geralt of Rivia is almost like a blend of Superman and Batman. He is bigger, stronger, faster… but he’s also exceptionally good at detective work.”
Beyond interviews, Netflix has also released a bunch of character posters. We’ve got Geralt…
…his eventual protégé Ciri (Freya Allan)…
…and the love of his life, Yennefer (Anya Chalotra):
So there’s quite a bit of hype for this show! We’ll see if lives up to it when the first season (a second season has already been ordered) drops on Netflix on December 20.
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