Witcher — Season 1
Witcher is a fantasy TV show produced by Lauren Schmidt Hissrich and it is based on a book series. The book series has been written by a Polish writer Andrzej Sapkowski. Before the TV show, video games based on these books were released as well.
The story is set in a fictional land which is called the Continent, in medieval times. Geralt of Rivia is a monster hunter who is magically enhanced and possesses superhuman strength. He sets out in search of the princess of Cintra named Cirilla (Ciri) who became his destiny by the law of surprise, long before she was even born. Ciri is brought up by her grandmother, the queen of Cintra, after losing her parents in childhood.
The viewers are not aware at first but the show follows three different timelines. First, we see that the land of Cintra is attacked and the injured queen tells Ciri to run and find the Geralt of Rivia who is her destiny. Then she falls herself from the window and dies. In the second timeline, we see the younger version of the queen holding an engagement party for her daughter. Her daughter wants to marry her lover instead of her fiancé and Geralt the Witcher saves her lover from being killed at the queen’s orders. As a repayment, Geralt casually says that he will take the law of surprise without knowing that the princess is going to have a child (Ciri) which then becomes his destiny. In the third timeline, we see a young girl, Yennefer of Vengerberg, who was a hunchback but her appearance is magically changed later. She is taken up by a sorceress who teaches magic to Yennefer and several other girls. Yennefer is also shown to be Geralt’s love interest.
At the end of the first season, we see the timelines converging and the viewers are just blown away. Or at least I was, being a big fan of different timelines shown in a single show. The anticipation of the convergence of the timelines where dramatic irony ends and the viewers are no longer the only people who know what is actually happening and the characters find their destinies. In the present case, the season finale ended with Ciri and Geralt finally meeting each other and Ciri, whose mind is also connected to Geralt’s, asks him a single question, “who is Yennefer.” Safe to say, I have been waiting ever since for the new season.
Characters
Geralt of Rivia is a very nonchalant and seemingly emotionless character played by Henry Cavill. The lack of emotions reminded me of Henry Cavill’s role as Sherlock Holmes in the recent movie, “Enola Holmes.” Geralt is a brave fighter who barely takes anyone’s crap. He is given the name “White Wolf.” One of the things that I like most about his character is that he doesn’t hurt the innocent, nor does he just stand by if an innocent is being hurt. One of the most anticipated things for me is Geralt’s back story because we only got a little glimpse of his life as a child.
Princess Cirilla of Cintra did not have as much screen time in the first season as I would have liked. She possesses some magical powers and she can cross time and space. Despite having less screen time, she was one of my favorite characters and I couldn’t wait for her to unite with Geralt.
Yennefer of Vengerberg is kind of a bitter character in my opinion. Her life before becoming a sorceress was extremely unpleasant. She is even sold by her father and later betrayed by a man she likes. We can see what series of events led her to become so bitter and full of hatred. This leads her to work only for herself, without throwing a care for anyone at all. She thought that beauty and power could give her a better life but that turned out to be false as she was still miserable. I do not like her character very much because although she is selfish as no one has truly cared for her before and she gives herself a priority, but she wants unlimited power and is prepared to get rid of anyone who stands in her way. Despite her flaws, I don’t think I can state that she is evil, rather just extremely stubborn and selfish.
What I thought about the show
The medieval timeline of this show and the costumes of the people according to the setting were on point! I absolutely adored the setting. Not being a fan of violence, I tend to skip or ignore the fight scene in any TV show, but the fight scenes of Geralt in this show were riveting, especially the tension between the enemies on both sides.
Jaskier’s song, “toss a coin to your witcher” is a very catchy song. I say this because it has been almost a year since I watched the show and the song is still stuck in my head, in a good way.
I did have a problem with the unnecessary nudity. There was really no need to add such scenes, they did nothing except make me extremely uncomfortable which led to them being skipped.
This show is quite compelling. Despite my love for different timelines, they do create a lot of confusion when there’s no proper indication whether the following scene is far into the past or future but the viewers still can’t wait for the next season. Definitely hoping to see more of Witcher and Ciri!