Dónal Finn will play Mat Cauthon starting in the second season of The Wheel of Time. He has some experience with fantasy; watch his scene in The Witcher!
Amazon’s TV adaptation of Robert Jordan’s 14-book strong The Wheel of Time series won’t premiere for a couple months yet, but there are already big shakeups behind the scenes. The other day, we learned that Barney Harris — the actor who plays fan favorite character Mat Cauthon in season 1 — won’t be returning for season 2. Instead, actor Dónal Finn will play Mat going forward.
It’s not unheard of for shows to recast characters, but rarely are they this important to the plot, and rarely do we hear about it before the show even begins, and rarely is the show as hotly anticipated as The Wheel of Time; fans have been waiting for a good screen version of this story for literally decades, so the stakes are a little than usual.
Usually when a character gets recast, fans get to debating about which actor played the part better, but that’s not possible here because we haven’t seen either actor in the role. However, if you want to see how Dónal Finn fares on a fantasy show, he had a bit part as a bar patron named “Nettly” in the second episode of The Witcher, where he enlists Geralt of Rivia to help with a “devil” harassing the locals. Take a look:
"With news of Mat being recast, I went back to watch Dónal Finn’s scene in The Witcher, and though I thought Barney Harris had the perfect look for Mat, Dónal may not be a bad fit either. Clip is too short to critique his acting, but his physical looks still gives me that Mat vibe. Agree or disagree? from WoT"
Finn looks good in a fantasy smock, and he does kind of look like Harris — they both have long faces and tousled heads of brown hair. Finn has a pretty pronounced Irish accent whereas Harris, so far as I know, does not, but that’s where acting comes in.
The first season of The Wheel of Time will premiere on Amazon Prime Video on November 19. The second season is already in production.
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