Netflix has secured the rights to produce a new show based on The Witcher series of books written by Polish author Andrzej Sapkowski. The writer will act as a creative consultant on the series, with the director of the intro videos for The Witcher games, Tomas Baginski, set to direct at least one episode each season.
On Saturday, one of the show’s writers, Lauren S. Hissrich tweeted that the script for the show’s pilot was finished. However, there’s still no news regarding a premiere date.
It’s been a big week, #TheWitcher fans… pic.twitter.com/TvcL3PqZal
— Lauren S. Hissrich (@LHissrich) January 20, 2018
Although The Witcher games are better known internationally than the source material, they’re based on a series of eight books and draw from various parts of the works for the deep and lengthy story of Geralt of Rivea’s life. They focus on the eponymous Witcher, who from a young age was trained and chemically modified to hunt monsters in a grim, medieval world.
With a cult following in Eastern Europe and Russia, Sapkowski has been surprised by the success of The Witcher games and didn’t profit much from them, having sold the rights to CD Projekt Red wholesale when originally approached. However, he seems much more excited by the prospect of the Netflix series, saying in a statement that he was “thrilled that Netflix will be doing an adaption of [his] stories,” and that it would be “staying true to the source material and themes [he had] spent over thirty years writing.”
Netflix hasn’t revealed which of the stories the series will focus on, though it has pegged Sean Daniel and Jason Brown (The Expanse) to executive produce. They claim that the show will follow an “unconventional family,” of characters. Players of the games will have some insight there, as Geralt does have a ragtag group of friends who help him on his adventures.
We’re told that the show will have original characters, as well as some funny dialogue and will be “constantly surprising.” However, Platige Image, the Polish production company which will co-produce the show, made a statement that suggested there would be more subtext from the books in the show. It claims that will add “moral and intellectual depth,” that goes beyond what the fantasy genre typically offers viewers.
“It is a story about us, about the monster and the hero inside all of our hearts,” the company said, according to IGN.
Update: Updated to include information regarding the show’s pilot.
