Random Film Critique: The Witcher

[eller]

So yesterday I was reminded of the existence of these classical fantasy books... And that they've been made into a series, and that I (although I rarely watch series or films) wanted to at least give it a chance... So today I did just that. I didn't watch it in the right order, just random episodes and scenes here and there, but that's enough to form a first impression.
They changed a lot when comparing the whole thing to the books, but, I mean, that's normal...

Best thing about the series? Clearly, the guy playing Geralt. Awesome actor (pretty famous too, apparently, but I didn't know him because I don't watch American media much), and... Yeah, basically, he is Geralt. Perfect choice for the role, really outstanding acting job.

Also, I really liked that they gave the female characters some depth. I mean, the original Witcher books are nice enough, but they suffer from the same problem as most nineties fantasy: the female characters, even the supposedly "strong women", tend to be male wanking material stereotypes. The series manages to actually make Yennefer an interesting character. Thanks for that!

Also, I've figured out why so many people in fandom ship Jaskier and Geralt: from the books only, that would be a pretty unlikely ship (with Jaskier a fairly minor character, and both Jaskier and Geralt being very much dick-driven into ladies), but in the show
- the actor playing Jaskier is extremely charismatic (which would make the character popular in fandom), and
- he clearly interprets his role as having a massive crush on Geralt, which, I mean, why not? As a narrative choice, that's actually an improvement. Their relationship really makes more sense this way! Amusing if you've read the very very much aggressively heterosexual books, but if you're introduced to the story with the series, the ship, at least in a one-sided version (though if you're looking for it, sometimes Geralt almost flirts back, which, cool), is actually canon?!? XD

Ciri is still boring, but, I mean, she's the worst Mary Sue in anything I've seen that's actually been professionally published, so I suppose making her an interesting character would have taken a miracle.
(Let's face it: she
- is the literal "magical child" trope played straight and without any detectable irony
- has ridiculous mystical heritage, complete with ridiculous "elvish" name
- also, needless to say, tragic backstory
- is ridiculously superpowered even in comparison to other superpowered characters
- is loved by everyone
- ....
...basically, she's a huge storytelling f*-up by the book author, and unfortunately she's a major character too, so she couldn't be changed too much without drawing fandom ire.)

I liked less that... how to explain this? The books are Polish, and the fantasy world and fantasy elements are very much inspired by Polish folklore. The series removed most of that and Americanized the whole thing. That's... actually pretty major. Cultural appropriation at its worst. Basically, the fantasy in the series is now your standard Western European and US American collection of tropes, because almost everything distinctly Slavic was carefully eliminated. Yikes! The original books lean pretty heavily on (and sometimes even parody: one of the things that made me keep reading the books because that's really well done!) Slavic mythology and folk tales. Oh, and even if the world is fictional and the countries have fantasy names, the characters are culturally distinctly Polish. I suppose they thought they could market the story to an American audience better if they minimize that (and just keep some Slavic mythical monsters, but have the characters behave culturally US-American, or, more precisely, the fantasy standard of How-US-Americans-Imagine-Medieval-Western-Europeans) - and, unfortunately, they're probably right about that, too - but really, this is not the way to treat literature from another culture. Not even when it's, let's face it, pretty straightforward unapologetic power-and-wank-fantasy stuff from another culture.

Basically? If this were my first introduction to The Witcher, I would have loved the show. The actors are all excellent, and in many ways the quality of the storytelling surpasses the entertaining but ultimately trashy original. It was just a bit disappointing to see a very American retelling of a very Polish story. Will probably not watch the whole thing, although I now have "Toss a Coin to your Witcher" stuck in my head. (Awfully catchy song! XD)

Comments

[yhlee]

My sister adores the books and the video games, although I'm not sure if she's seen the TV show. (I haven't read/seen/played any iterations of the Witcher.) I'm sorry that they Americanized the TV show, because I thought it would be really neat to see a Polish take on fantasy on the screen!

[eller]

It's probably better you didn't watch it: the main character does struggle with depression. (It's not named as such, but it's clearly there, and yep, the clinical thing.) They even resisted the temptation to cut that from the TV show. I mean, I don't mind - it actually makes Geralt a pretty interesting main character, especially for genre standards - but, eh, his main problem is himself, and that might be triggering.

(They didn't just Americanize the thing, they removed some other things from the stories as well - like the... episodic (?), intentionally-disjointed and quite unique storytelling style that actually influenced me a lot - but I'll admit it would have been impossible to translate that to the screen.)