Blood Origin Prequel Already Avoids The Witcher’s Biggest Criticism
The Witcher: Blood Origin, Netflix’s second The Witcher spinoff, already avoids The Witcher’s biggest criticism. Described as a four-part event, The Witcher: Blood Origin will take place 1,200 years before the events of The Witcher and is set to explore a world before the Conjunction of the Spheres. Blood Origin is also set to feature the creation of the very first Witcher, and it is expected to follow mostly original characters. Compared to The Witcher: Nightmare of the Wolf, which focused mainly on Vesemir, Blood Origin seems to be a much more ambitious prequel.
After a strong first season, which had already made changes to the source material, The Witcher season 2 was met with a lot of criticism over lore changes and original storylines. Unlike The Witcher season 1, which followed both The Last Wish and Sword of Destiny relatively closely, The Witcher season 2 reworked a lot of different storylines from the books and created original arcs for Geralt and other many supporting characters. Essentially, The Witcher season 2 struggled with balancing original stories with the source material. That is a problem Blood Origin might not have as it is not adapting a specific book but rather creating something new based on The Witcher’s lore.
Blood Origin Can Have The Creative Freedom The Witcher Doesn’t
Whether The Witcher: Blood Origin will work both as a show and as The Witcher prequel is difficult to say, but it can at least have the creative freedom The Witcher does not. Adapting such a well-known series of books, which has also led to successful video game series, is not an easy task. The Witcher universe has plenty of lore for the show to adapt, and that is why having original stories in The Witcher season 2 was so divisive. The Witcher: Blood Origin, on the other hand, will not be compared to a specific The Witcher book or game, thus allowing the show to be judged by its own merits.
Henry Cavill’s Witcher Exit Makes Blood Origin Even More Important
Henry Cavill’s Geralt was the face of Netflix’s The Witcher franchise. Though Cavill still plays Geralt in The Witcher season 3 and the character will be recast with Liam Hemsworth for The Witcher season 4, losing its main star obviously plays against the show. The Witcher will have to prove that it can continue without Henry Cavill as Geralt, and releasing a solid prequel series can be the first step to it. If Blood Origin is successful following mostly original characters, then the Witcher universe on Netflix can continue expanding despite Henry Cavill no longer being involved with the franchise after The Witcher season 3.
All of that considered, Blood Origin will still be compared with the source material on some level. Even if it is an original tale, Blood Origin is taking elements from The Witcher’s lore to tell a story set in a time period the novels often refer to. As such, Blood Origin will likely make changes to The Witcher’s book timeline. For example, in the books, the first Witcher is said to have appeared 300 years before Geralt while Blood Origin is set to feature a “prototype Witcher” 1,200 years before Geralt. It remains to be seen if The Witcher: Blood Origin will find the balance between adapting the books and creating something new.
