Game of Thrones may be over, but Netflix’s The Witcher has stolen the hearts of fantasy fans — and proven just how in demand stories within this genre really are. In fact, during the week of December 22 to December 28, The Witcher officially became the most in-demand streaming series in the world, replacing The Mandalorian, which previously held the place of top show worldwide. This data comes from Parrot Analytics, which releases regular reports on this topic.
According to Parrot Analytics, The Witcher was also the biggest streaming series in the United States, with 127 million demand expressions (a demand expression is basically someone saying something online about wanting to watch a show, whether it’s a tweet or an Instagram caption or whatever). That’s 12 million more than The Mandalorian had during the same period of time. (Keep in mind that however popular The Mandalorian is, Disney+ still has far fewer subscribers than Netflix, which could account for it losing this battle.) That the two series are so close to one another at the top of the list suggests big things for genre television. It seems the market for science fiction and fantasy is growing, at least if the popularity of these shows is anything to go by.
With such high demand, it’s probably no surprise that The Witcher is also one of Netflix’s most popular shows of the year. The streaming platform revealed its top 10 series for 2019, and the only show that surpassed The Witcher in terms of popularity was Stranger Things. Given that the latter just saw its third season, while The Witcher is only on its first, this is a fairly impressive accomplishment.
Based on these reports, it seems like The Witcher could become one of Netflix’s biggest money makers, meaning fans might be in for several more seasons of Geralt, Yennefer and Ciri. A second season is already in production. The deeper into Andrzej Sapkowski’s novels this story dives, the more the show will have to offer its fans. And we know from Game of Thrones that high fantasy doesn’t have to be for a select few.
As a representative from Parrot Analytics pointed out to Business Insider, popular series like Stranger Things and The Witcher could also help Netflix take on the increasing competition that accompanies the rise of new streaming services like Apple TV+ and Disney+. Whatever happens with the streaming wars, these numbers are good news for Netflix and for fans hoping to see more of this fantasy world.
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