Did The Witcher Just Find the Perfect (and Bizarre) Way to Avoid Plot Conflict After Cavill’s Exit?
After recent revelations about the future of The Witcher, many fans were led to believe that S4 will start a multiverse — but admittedly, the reality is way more meta.
With Henry Cavill leaving the show after the third season, The Witcher S4 will feature a different Geralt of Rivia actor — Liam Hemsworth. Switching the lead actor is always a risky business, especially in this case, and many franchises resort to acting as if nothing happened and going on with the narrative. The Witcher does not.
For all the controversy around Cavill’s exit, we have to give credit where it’s due: the creators of The Witcher didn’t decide to pretend that nothing has changed. Instead, they went on to tackle Geralt’s new appearance from inside the narrative, and we can’t help but admire the boldness of their plan. It is truly daring, especially now.
Recently, executive producer Tomek Baginski gave an interview with the Polish newspaper Wyborcza, and his words about the in-universe approach were understood by many in the wrong way. Most fans assumed that S4 would introduce some sort of The Witcher Multiverse, but admittedly, that won’t be the case at all.
"Many book readers forget what Andrzej Sapkowski did in the fifth volume of the saga. <...> I'm not talking about specific events, but the narrative framework that was introduced in this book. Suddenly, at the beginning of the book, we learn that everything we've read so far might not have been true,” Baginski explained.
The Lady of the Lake, the novel Baginski was referring to, starts with a mind-bending revelation: everything prior to that point was a tale told by a person many years later. Apparently, the events we learned about before could have unfolded in a completely different way, for all we know, and this changes the perspective of them entirely.
This is the trick that The Witcher’s creators plan to use starting from S4, and it would easily explain why Geralt of Rivia will look different. If anything, it will explain any and all inconsistencies — and the best part is, it’s completely canon. There was no consistency in the books; there were stories told by many different people.
We hate Henry Cavill’s exit as much as you do, but this here revelation… It’s brilliant. The most elegant solution to such a huge problem, and we can’t help but admire it.