The Witcher: Sirens of the Deep gets release date and new clip with game actor Doug Cockle returning as Geralt
By Daniel Roman
Get ready to go back to the Continent...in 2025! Netflix has just unveiled a bunch of new information for its next spinoff of The Witcher, including its release date: February 11, 2025. The Witcher: Sirens of the Deep is an animated film which takes place in the earlier days of Geralt of Rivia's monster-hunting career. This time around, he'll be facing off with something brand new for the television franchise: merpeople.
Originally, Sirens of the Deep was announced with a release date of 2024. The move to early 2025 isn't wholly surprising, since Netflix has remained relatively quiet about the movie throughout the year. But not anymore!
The Witcher: Sirens of the Deep is exciting for a few reasons. The first is that it features the return of Doug Cockle, who voiced Geralt in the beloved video Witcher game series from CD Projekt Red. Henry Cavill may have become synonymous with The Witcher for many television viewers thanks to the Netflix show, but long before he was Geralt, Cockle was capturing hearts and minds as the gruff mutant swordsman. Cavill has even talked about how much attention he paid to Cockle's performance when figuring out his own take on Geralt.
We got our first official clip from Sirens of the Deep as part of Netflix's Geeked Week, with an introduction from Cockle himself! Check it out:
The clip features Geralt and Jaskier talking around a campfire, and their conversation contains some interesting hints about what to expect in the movie. First off, we're going to learn more about Jaskier's past in this film, since they're returning to his hometown. It hasn't been confirmed yet whether Joey Batey is voicing Jaskier in this movie or if it's someone else, but presumably we'll find that out soon. Second, Geralt is going to be tending not just to monsters, but to matters of the heart.
The Witcher: Sirens of the Deep is based on Andrzej Sapkowski's short story "A Little Sacrifice," which appears in Sword of Destiny. Many of the short stories in that book were covered in The Witcher season 1, but there wasn't room for all of them. "A Little Sacrifice" is a standalone tale for Geralt and Jaskier, so it made sense for the show to leave it out at the time. But it's also a great early Geralt story, and I can't wait to see how Netflix brings it to life in animation.
In terms of the timeline, it takes place during one of the tumultuous "breaks" in Geralt and Yennefer's relationship, before he crosses paths with Ciri. For the television show timeline, I'd guess that it's set after Episode 105, "Bottled Appetites," but before Episode 106, "Rare Species," since Geralt and Jaskier are still on good terms in the clip above. The short story deals with Geralt working through his feelings after being rejected by Yen, and finding new romance in an unexpected place. We'll probably be seeing quite a bit of Essi Daven, the character Jaskier mentioned, in the film.
The Witcher: Sirens of the Deep is produced by Studio Mir, the same studio that worked on the last Witcher animated film The Nightmare of the Wolf. It was written by Mike Ostrowski and Rae Benjamin, with The Witcher showrunner Lauren Schmidt Hissrich serving as a producer and author Andrzej Sapkowski as a creative consultant. Here's the official logline for the movie:
Geralt of Rivia, a mutated monster hunter, is hired to investigate a series of attacks in a seaside village and finds himself drawn into a centuries-old conflict between humans and merpeople. He must count on friends -- old and new -- to solve the mystery before the hostilities between the two kingdoms escalate into all-out war.
The Witcher: Sirens of the Deep drops on Netflix on February 11, 2025! Considering we're also expecting to see season 4 of The Witcher with Liam Hemsworth sometime next year too, it could be a big year for the Continent.
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