Every streaming service needs at least one killer fantasy series to drive viewership and subscriptions. Netflix has found theirs in the massive response to The Witcher, which I’m sure is driven by the show quality and not because it stars a frequently bare-chested Henry Cavill. The streaming giant has gone all-in on The Witcher, previously announcing an animated spinoff series, and now the franchise expands with prequel The Witcher: Blood Origin.
A live-action expansion of author Andrzej Sapkowski’s books (and best-selling video games), The Witcher: Blood Origin takes place in an elven world 1200 years before events in the core series. It will set out to tell the origin of the very first Witcher, and the events that lead to the pivotal “conjunction of the spheres,” when the worlds of monsters, men, and elves merged to become one.
Serving as exec-producer and showrunner is Declan de Barra, a writer on The Witcher season one. He’ll be joined by exec-producer Lauren Schmidt Hissrich, with Sapkowski as a creative consultant.
“As a lifelong fan of fantasy, I am beyond excited to tell the story The Witcher: Blood Origin,” said de Barra. “A question has been burning in my mind ever since I first read The Witcher books – What was the Elven world really like before the cataclysmic arrival of the humans? I’ve always been fascinated by the rise and fall of civilizations, how science, discovery, and culture flourish right before that fall. How vast swathes of knowledge are lost forever in such a short time, often compounded by colonization and a rewriting of history. Leaving only fragments of a civilization’s true story behind. The Witcher: Blood Origin will tell the tale of the Elven civilization before its fall, and most importantly reveal the forgotten history of the very first Witcher.”
Filming on Blood Origin will take place in the U.K., which is also where The Witcher‘s second season is shooting. Because of you-know-what, it’s unclear when to expect anything right now, but fans of the series have reason to be happy right now.
