Netflix’s first season of The Witcher left fans ravenous for a second season, and everyone will be delighted to learn that filming has now wrapped on the second season. While filming has ended we’re continuing to keep track of all the information you need to know on the second season of The Witcher including post-production updates, what to expect, casting news, and ultimately the Netflix release date.
Subscribers had to wait for what seemed like an eternity before the premiere of The Witcher. After binging the first season over the weekend, we can gladly say that it was more than worth the wait for the adaptation of Andrzej Sapkowski’s greatest work. Henry Cavill played Geralt of Rivia in fine form. He was a perfect portrayal, so it could be enjoyed by both video-game and book fans.
Redanian Intelligence is doing an amazing job of providing a monthly update on The Witcher 2 news.
Unfortunately, due to delays in filming caused by the pandemic worldwide, the release date for The Witcher Season 2 has been moved further back.
The series had been scheduled to arrive in early 2021, but now it’s looking more likely that we’ll see The Witcher return in early 2022.
Expected release date: early 2022
The Witcher's second season will see the return of these cast members:
Role | Cast Member | Where Have I Seen/Heard Them Before? |
---|---|---|
Geralt of Rivia | Henry Cavill | Man of Steel | Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice | Justice League |
Princess Ciri | Freya Allan | The War of the Worlds | Into the Badlands | Captain Fierce |
Yennefer of Vengerberg | Anya Chalotra | Wanderlust | The ABC Murders | Sherwood |
Tissaia de Vries | MyAnna Buring | Kill List | The Descent | Doomsday |
Fringilla Vigo | Mimi Ndiweni | The Legend of Tarzan | Cinderella | Mr Selfridge |
Jaskier | Joey Batey | The White Queen | Knightfall | Strike |
With the deaths of Queen Calanthe, King Eist Tuirseach, Mousesack, and Princess Renfri in the first season, we aren’t expecting to see the respective cast members return to portray their roles. Flashbacks that include the mentioned characters are their only chance of them returning.*SPOILER ALERT*
There’s been plenty of developments throughout February, and plenty of new cast members have been announced to star in the second season of The Witcher:
Role | Cast Member | Where Have I Seen/Heard Them Before? |
---|---|---|
Vereena | Agnes Bjorn | Monster |
Nivellen | Kristofer Hivju | Game of Thrones | Fast & Furious 8 | Beck |
Eskel | Thue Ersted Rasmussen | Fast & Furious 9 | Sunday | The Way to Mandalay |
Lydia | Aisha Fabienne Ross | The Danish Girl | Alleycats | Drama |
Francesca | Mecia Simson | He Who Has It All | Britain and Ireland’s Next Top Model |
Kaine Zajaz will play Francesa Findabair, the Elven sorceress' brother, in the second season.
The Witcher's next season will feature seven more cast members, with one casting that was revealed in 2020.
Role | Cast Member | Where Have I Seen/Heard Them Before? |
---|---|---|
Nenneke | Adjoa Andoh | Invictus | Fractured | Bridgerton |
Phillippa Eilhart | Cassie Clare | What Happened to Monday | Beauty and the Beast | Mamma Mia: Here We Go Again |
Fenn | Liz Carr | Silent Witness | Les Miserables | The OA |
Dijkstra | Graham McTavish | The Hobbit | Rambo | Outlander |
Ba’lian | Kevin Doyle | Downton Abbey | The Libertine | Blackpool |
Codringher | Simon Callow | Four Weddings and a Funeral | A Room with a View | Shakespeare in Love |
Rience | Chris Fulton | Outlaw King | Clique | Our Ladies |
The next season will feature Witchers that are not Geralt, according to both the videogames and the books.
Danish actor Kim Bodnia will be reprising his role as the veteran Witcher, and Geralt’s tutor Vesemir. Bodnia has already portrayed Vesemir in the series, as his voice was heard during one of Geralt’s flashback.
Pictured: Kim Bodnia (left) and Vesemir (right) – Copyright. CD Projekt Red
Lambert, a favorite of video-game enthusiasts, has been confirmed as appearing in The Witcher's second season.
Paul Bullion (who starred previously in Peaky Blinders) will play Lambert, a young Witcher who is more skilled in the killing of monsters than Geralt.
Pictured: Paul Bullion (left) and Vesemir (right) – Copyright. CD Projekt Red
A character held dearly in the hearts of book readers, the youngest of the Witchers at Kaer Mohen, Coën will make his debut in season two. Coën is being portrayed by Yasen Atour who previously starred in Ben-Hur and Robin Hood.
Pictured: Yasen Atour (left) and Coën (right) – Copyright. CD Projekt Red
The prettiest of the Witcher bunch and Geralt’s childhood friend, Eskel will also be making an appearance in season two.
Thue Ersted Rasmussen was previously cast, but has been replaced by Basil Eidenbenz.
Pictured: Basil Eidenbenz (left) Eskel (right) – Copyright. CD Projekt Red
*Spoilers Below*
After a dramatic and dramatic end to season one, Yennefer was able use fire magic to repel the Nilfgaard armies. However, he mysteriously vanished in the middle of the battle. Geralt and Ciri have found one another, greeting each other almost as if they were fathers to their daughters. Ciri, who had never met Yennefer, asked Geralt about her.
After finally finding each other, Geralt and Ciri can now continue destiny’s will. Geralt, thanks to the law of surprising and the deaths of Ciri's parents, is now her adoptive father. The Nilfgaard army remains a threat. With spies constantly hunting Ciri for information, Geralt will bring her to Kaer Morhen which is the stronghold of Witchers.
Ciri, a result of her Elven blood, is extremely gifted in magic and great for killing monsters. Geralt is likely to begin his training as a Witcher just like him. Ciri’s training would be a grueling and difficult process, but her talents with magic combined with Witcher training would make her an incredibly strong combatant, giving her the ability to protect herself and others.
Both Tissaia and Yennefer survived the massacre of many mages. Yennefer was told by Tissaia to let her “chaos explode”, taking her seriously, Yennefer unleashed hell upon the Nilfgaardians, using forbidden fire magic to annihilate anyone that came close. Tissaia was left confused by her disappearance after she defeated the Nilfgaard forces.
As an incredibly powerful and talented Mage, Yennefer isn’t dead. It’s unclear where she may have disappeared too, but Yennefer would likely have portalled herself away from the battlefield.
Thanks to Geralt’s wish, we can definitely expect to see the pair reunite some point in the second season. Not to mention the fact that with Ciri’s magical potential, who better to teach her how to use actual magic than one of the most talented mages alive.
It’s unclear how many Nilfgaardians were killed in the Battle of Sodden, but it’s clear a significant amount of men were slain by the mages of Aretuza. Nilfgaard will continue to seek the Northern Kingdoms' conquest, although they will be unable to carry on their campaign after suffering significant losses.
King Foltest from Temeria was the first to reach Northern Kingdoms. Foltest, despite not being present at the fight, could view the chaos that was erupting between Nilfgaard's mages from far away. Temeria could counterattack Nilfgaard's campaign by attacking the Nilfgaardian campaign at the right time, as Nilfgaard has suffered huge losses.
The Nilfgaard army was defeated by the Aretuza mages at great cost. Yennefer and the academy's loss of so many powerful mages meant that there were not enough to stop a possible Nilfgaard attack against Aretuza.
With some mages already defecting to Nilfgaard, there’s potential for a coup to happen that could result in the destruction of Aretuza or at the very least, susceptible mages joining Nilfgaard.
Jaskier, the beloved bard was always in trouble around Geralt. The pair often travel together over the years, but they always end up reuniting years later. Jaskier is likely to be found out there, wooing women of court and getting in trouble. As the only known friend of Geralt, if any Nilfgaard’s men come looking for Geralt, then Jaskier may know his whereabouts.
‘Gravemaster’ from Redanian Intelligence had the chance to interview with Lauren S Hissrich, the showrunner of The Witcher. She was able clarify the plot for Geralt, Ciri and Jaskier during the interview.
Discuss Geralt and Ciri
As expected from the saga, Ciri really takes center stage in season two. The whole world is after her, and she has to find safety and respite with Geralt (and eventually, Yennefer). Problem is, they’re complete strangers. She doesn’t know Geralt, doesn’t see why she should automatically trust him, and really doesn’t love when he starts making big decisions in her life especially when she’s still mourning the loss of her grandmother in Cintra. For his part, Geralt dutifully wants to protect Ciri, but also doesn’t know anything about being a dad, and certainly doesn’t know how to balance that with the need to continue doing his job. There’s some comedy in how these two come together and eventually bond, but that belies a deeper reflection on what it means to become a family.
Jaskier also gets his moment on The Witcher's second season.
Yes! One of my favorite moments with Jaskier is from Episode 106, when he and Geralt are sitting on the cliff’s edge, and he says “I’m just thinking about what pleases me.” You have this character who has quite literally attached himself to the coattails of our Witcher, in order to rustle up material for songs. But what happens instead is… he finds a friend. Jaskier starts to think about what he needs and wants in the world, and in season two, we’ll see him begin to discover it.
Those who have seen The Witcher will know that the original season featured multiple timelines. This allowed for the characters of Geralt and Yennefer to be told in different time periods. The episodes had a lot of events that were covered in the books The Last Wish (or Sword of Destiny) as chronologically ordered. Both books are a fantastic read and precursors to the ‘official’ start of The Witcher Saga.
Having said all that, The Witcher's first season was a prologue to its end.
The first and third respective books of The Witcher Saga; The Last Wish and Blood of Elves – Copyright. Gollancz, Orbit Books
In total there are eight books in The Witcher, but only six of them take place in ‘The Witcher Saga’. The Last Wish (2006) and Sword of Destiny (2015) were novels that served as prequels and accompanied the main storyline with several short stories. Season of Storms has short stories that are interspersed with flashbacks and short stories from the original book.
The first season of The Witcher Saga's official series will be covered by the second, which will focus on Blood of Elves. The third will follow with Time of Contempt, the final book of the series.
The third book of The Witcher Saga; Time of Contempt – Copyright. Gollancz, Orbit Books
Official Production Status: Filming complete (Last Updated 01/14/2021).
Filming for the second season has been delayed numerous times since February 17, 2020. Filming has now officially ended for season 2 as of the date of this update
The filming of the series is complete. Now, it will undergo extensive post-production.
Budapest will be used as the location of filming for this series, alongside London, for large sets.
Filming location used in Gran Canaria, the Canary Islands for the first season of The Witcher
Most recently we’ve learned that the scouting team for locations for The Witcher has recently been to Scotland. The team was particularly on the stunning island of Skye off the coast from mainland Scotland.
You can clearly see that some of these locations are breathtaking, as you will see in the photos above. We’ll be curious to learn which region in the continent of The Witcher will use any of the locations above.
According to Redenian Intelligence, an entire city is currently being constructed at Arborfield Studios in the UK.
Now, we know that eight more episodes of the second season are coming.
We’re a long way off learning the episode titles but we do know which directors are lined up for the upcoming season:
Episode | Director | Previously Worked On |
---|---|---|
2×1 | Stephen Surjik | The Umbrella Academy | The Punisher | Lost in Space |
2×2 | Stephen Surjik | ——————————————————— |
2×3 | Sarah O’Gorman | Cursed | Jamestown | No Offence |
2×4 | Sarah O’Gorman | ——————————————————— |
2×5 | Ed Bazalgette | Doctor Who | Poldark | The Last Kingdom |
2×6 | Geeta Patel | Meet the Patels | Dead to Me | Santa Clarita Diet |
2×7 | Geeta Patel | ——————————————————— |
2×8 | Ed Bazalgette | ——————————————————— |
Each episode lasted at least 60 minutes, with only eight episodes in the original. The second season will follow the first.
We can expect to see a teaser trailer far earlier than most Originals, but we’re still a long way off from receiving a trailer for season two.
If we’re lucky, we could potentially see a trailer drop in Fall 2020.
As a placeholder, here is the delectable Henry ‘Geralt of Rivia’ Cavill reading from The Witcher books by author Andrez Sapkowski.
The Witcher, if Lauren S. Hissrich (showrunner) has any comments, will remain on Netflix for quite some time.
In an interview with inverse.com’s Just Lunning, Lauren S. Hissrich discussed the possibility of future seasons of The Witcher;
I love that the quote about “seven seasons” got picked up so quickly by the press. I swear in another interview, I said, “I could write this series for 20 years.” It’s not that I just don’t understand how numbers work, there is so much material, I believe that we could write forever.
Hissrich responded to a question about how many seasons could go beyond what the books can hold:
It’s not my intention to go past the books. We’re doing plenty of sort of fun exploration of things that are in the books already. We’re trying to add to the lore. You know, in general, authors end things when they feel like they should be ended. We would honor that as well.
The interview was incredibly insightful and from the showrunner’s answers, you can tell that The Witcher is in the best hands.
From across all the cast and crew, there appears to be a great deal of respect for the world created by Andrez Sapkowski, and we can’t wait to see more magic and monsters The Witcher has in store for us.
Subscribers have responded to criticisms more positively than subscribers.
The Witcher currently has an 8.9/10 score on IMDb. Over 55,000 people have submitted scores. Rotten Tomatoes also shows that the Original series has an audience score of only 92%. This clearly shows how subscribers loved the original season.
Unfortunately, now we have to talk about the critics. We are completely behind everyone's right to express their opinions, but some critics of The Witcher were outlandish. Some critics have sadly not even bothered to watch the entire season, formulating an opinion on the first episode alone, which has resulted in one of the worst reviews we’ve ever read. Lauren S. Hissrich, series creator and showrunner of the show responded to this review:
Other critics have taken to comparing The Witcher to that of Game of Thrones, but after watching the series ourselves we would argue that The Witcher is not the next Game of Thrones and instead should be looked as the very first The Witcher.
There will be a lot of pressure for Netflix to deliver on the second season of The Witcher, but if it’s anything like the first then we can’t wait.
Do you look forward to the new season of The Witcher Season 2? Comment below to let us know your excitement for the second season of The Witcher!
Comments
Leave Your Comments
Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *