The Witcher is back for Season Three and this time, it’s in two parts! It also sees the last season of Henry Cavill as Geralt and this sees monarchs, mages, and beasts of the Continent compete to capture young Ciri. While Geralt takes Ciri into hiding, Yennefer is entrusted with Ciri’s magical training and leads them to the protected fortress of Aretuza, where they hope to uncover more about the girl’s untapped powers; instead, they discover they’ve landed in a battlefield of political corruption, dark magic, and treachery…
We had to find out more, so we spoke to The Witcher Executive Producer Steve Gaub in London where he’s busy shooting Season Four…
The Witcher has been such a huge success, what do you think it is about this world that keeps audiences wanting to come back for more?
It starts with the characters. It’s such a great story structure of three disparate people on a continent that have no real reason to have any familiarity with each other. But fate has had different ideas.
So you get three people from three completely different backgrounds and there’s no escaping them becoming a family. And just that, ‘well how is that going to happen?’ is I think what’s kept people through the first couple of seasons.
Now in season three, we see them together. Well is this actually going to work? How can they stay together? It’s the continent that’s trying desperately to pull them apart…
What trajectory do our main characters go through this season?
We pick up not too long after we last saw them at the end of Season Two. They have left Cameron and now they’re just looking for a normal life. They’re looking for somewhere where Yennifer can figure out a little bit more about Ciri’s powers, what she’s all about, and what the Elven background actually means. If there’s some good that can be harnessed in her powers.
Then of course, we know that there’s Nilfgaard and other entities across the continent that are searching for Ciri for different reasons. Ciri is also wanting to find her ultimate destiny, whether it be a Witcher or whether it be a mage or whether it’s just to be living a peaceful life with a family out in the country!
Why is Season Three of The Witcher in two parts?
We recognised that there were a couple of spots within the narrative that made for a great cliffhanger, but it was in the middle of the season. In the streaming world, you just don’t get those classic cliffhangers, and they tried it out with Stranger Things and Netflix was happy with how that worked out, and for the most part, I think fans are happy because it keeps an excitement level. It gives them something to look forward to without having to wait a year and a half for the next season to come about.
So it’s good for us as it keeps the energy going and we had two natural points, so it really just became ‘where do we break up the episodes?’ it was a big decision.
What are you most looking forward to audiences seeing in Season Three?
It’s Henry’s last season and he does just a tremendous job bringing his interpretation of Geralt almost full circle. Then Ciri’s journey is just really special. She’s trying her best to just grow into adulthood amidst all these other larger world concerns that Geralt and Yennefer have, and for her to be able to try her best to put blinders on to all the pressures around her and just say ‘what’s best for me? What do I want?’.
Freya [Allan who plays Ciri] really stretched as an actress this season, which was so lovely as a producer to watch and to cheer for her and to revel in. I’m excited for audiences to see the whole journey that that Ciri takes through the season.
Season 3 Volume 1 launches globally on Netflix on 29 June, 2023. Season 3 Volume 2 on 27 July, 2023