Doug Cockle, the voice actor of Geralt, expressed sympathy for Henry Cavill’s spirit of respect for The Witcher.
In late October 2022, Henry Cavill unexpectedly announced he would be pulling out of Netflix’s The Witcher project after the 3rd season, which is scheduled to air in mid-2023.
Although the cause of this unfortunate breakup is not clearly revealed, some sources said that the actor could not compromise on creations that were too different from the original that the writing team included in the script of The Witcher.
Previously, Henry Cavill left a deep impression on the audience when he transformed into the monster hunter Geralt with all his enthusiasm and passion for The Witcher.
One of the factors that helped him play the role super successfully was remembering his deep voice, which was inspired by Doug Cockle, the actor who voiced Geralt in CD Projekt RED’s game series. This helped him score points not only with the mass audience, but also with die-hard fans of The Witcher game series.
Doug Cockle, the “Geralt” of The Witcher series, supports Henry Cavill’s view of respecting the original.
At MCM Comic-Con 2022, Doug Cockle also shared his views on Henry Cavill’s decision to pull out of The Witcher project. Doug didn’t hesitate to praise Henry’s respect for the original, while also being puzzled by Netflix’s controversial creative decisions.
“I can totally understand that decision,” Doug said, “Henry is an avid fan of the novel and game series (The Witcher), and Netflix’s writers, for unknown reasons, decided to deviate completely from both the original and the game. So are these changes good or not? It is entirely up to each individual person. Personally, I can’t understand why they would do this. I think that’s what led to Henry’s decision.”
Although still critically positive on major sites such as Rotten Tomatoes, The Witcher has faced a lot of criticism from the audience, especially after the 2nd season with so many big changes.
Without discussing the creations for the TV version, such as the evil Voleth Meir or the story line of the elves, this season has built the personalities of many of the main characters in a completely different direction from the original.
For example, Yennefer’s willingness to sell out Curi, or Geralt’s use of Ciri as monster bait – all of which contradict the original character in Andrzej Sapkowski’s series of novels.
The unresolvable conflicts between Henry and Netflix’s writing team are considered the main reason why the actor decided to turn away from The Witcher series – Image: Netflix.
Things got even more serious when Beau DeMayo, the former writer of The Witcher, suddenly revealed that some Netflix writers disrespected, and even mocked the original. Although producer Lauren Hissrich has denied this information, it still cannot appease fans after Henry Cavill’s decision to leave the shirt.
To avoid falling into the footsteps of The Witcher season 2, the production team has promised that the next season will be closer to the original novel series. Speaking to Entertainment Weekly, Lauren said: “For me, season 3 is the closest season we’ve ever made.
Of course, we can’t adapt every single page of the story. However, Time of Contempt has brought a lot of big events, many epic action scenes, along with the revelations of the biggest evil (of The Witcher). There was so much to do that we tried our best to stick to the novel.”
Season 3 of The Witcher is currently in post-production and is expected to air on Netlfix in the middle of this year. Henry Cavill will continue to play Geralt this season, before handing over the helm to Liam Hemsworth for season 4.
