A rumor claims that Netflix is trashing two planned spinoffs for its The Witcher series soon after it announced its main live-action series will end following the release of Season 5.
Henry Cavill as Geralt of Rivia in The Witcher (2023), Netflix
On April 18th, Netflix announced it was ending its live-action The Witcher series following the conclusion of Season 5. The company posted to X, “We’re heading back to The Continent. The Witcher Season 4 is officially in production. And Season 5 is coming to bring this epic series to a fitting conclusion.”
We’re heading back to The Continent. The Witcher Season 4 is officially in production. And Season 5 is coming to bring this epic series to a fitting conclusion. pic.twitter.com/mejYbhfhxZ
— Netflix (@netflix) April 18, 2024
In a blog post, the company shared, “Netflix has also greenlit Season 5 of The Witcher, which will film back-to-back with Season 4, and will be the final chapter in Geralt’s story. Seasons 4 and 5 will adapt the remaining of Sapkowski’s books, Baptism of Fire, The Tower of the Swallow and Lady of the Lake, promising to offer an epic and satisfying conclusion to Netflix’s hit fantasy drama.”
The show’s showrunner Lauren Schmidt Hissrich added, “It is with huge pride that we begin shooting our penultimate Season of The Witcher with a stellar cast, including some exciting new additions, led by Liam Hemsworth as Geralt of Rivia. We’re thrilled to be able to bring Andrzej Sapkowski’s books to an epic and satisfying conclusion. It wouldn’t be our show if we didn’t push our family of characters to their absolute limit — stay tuned to see how the story ends.”
Anya Chalotra as Yennefer in The Witcher: Season 3 (2023), Netflix
Following this announcement that The Witcher was ending after Season 5, What’s On Netflix reports that Netflix trashed two planned series. First, it trashed a spinoff called The Rats, which the outlet claims was a “a prequel series about its eponymous characters, the Rats. They are a group of teenagers who turned to crime because of the war.” The group was introduced in the third season of Netflix’s live-action series and the series was expected to “explore how they met and what they did before meeting Ciri.”
The cast for the show was expected to include Ben Radcliffe, Christelle Elwin, Fabian McCallum, Aggy K. Adams, Juliette Alexandra, Connor Crawford, Dolph Lundgren, Deoudone van der Merwe, Morgan Santo, and Stevel Marc.
Freya Allen as Ciri in The Witcher: Season 3 (2023), Netflix
Redanian Intelligence detailed that not only was the show scrapped, but it had already filmed for two months with director Mairzee Adams in South African. However, it was supposed to film for six months. Given the production was cut short, Redanian Intelligence reports that the limited series only filmed one or two episodes instead of the planned six or eight. After cutting the production short, Netflix executives allegedly looked at the footage and chose “not to pick it up.”
The outlet also notes that actor Juliette Alexandra’s CV previously noted she would star in a spin-off about The Rats, but that has since been removed and only details she will return for Season 4.
Anya Chalotra as Yennefer in The Witcher (2023), Netflix
Furthermore, Redanian Intelligence also claimed that the upcoming animated film The Witcher: Sirens of the Deep “is most likely the final Witcher spinoff at Netflix, meaning that children-oriented animated series is dead as well.”
Back in 2021, Netflix announced that it was creating “a new Kids and Family series set in the world of The Witcher.”
The Witcher on X
The ending of the live-action series and the cancellation of these spin-offs comes in the wake of massive viewership fall off for The Witcher Season 3 after Henry Cavill announced his departure from the series.
As reported by Netflix, the week the second season premiered garnered 142.4 million hours and it was the most watched show on Netflix. In fact, The Witcher Season 1 was the second most watched show with 49.1 million hours viewed.
Those numbers halved with the release of The Witcher Season 3. In the show’s first week on the streamer The Witcher: Season 3 only brought in 73 million hours viewed and 15.2 million views. It got even worse when it released the second part of the third season at the end of July. The series only brought in 59 million hours viewed and saw its total views decline to 7.8 million.
Freya Allan as Ciri, Henry Cavill as Geralt, and Eamon Farren as Cahir in The Witcher: Season 3 (2023), Netflix
What do you make of this rumor that Netflix has scrapped two planned The Witcher spinoff series?
NEXT: Netflix’s ‘The Witcher’ Casts Laurence Fishburne To Play A Race-Replaced Regis
The quality of the series declined after they sidelined the Witcher for Ciri and Yennifer. Another buffoonery decision. They keep making Woke that no one wants to see. Women can’t fight, but they put up a good shrill yapping.