The Witcher Season 5: Ciri's Story Challenges and Book Changes

The Witcher's Netflix Future Looks Dark With More Ciri Book Changes By  Angel Shaw Published 17 minutes ago Angel Shaw is a Lead Writer and Peer Mentor on ScreenRant's New TV team, covering new-release TV shows across all major streaming platforms. She has been a writer with ScreenRant since 2022 and specializes in Harry Potter, The Lord of the Rings, and fantasy.  Angel holds a bachelor's degree in language interpreting and is passionate about all things culture and communication—especially in how it relates to popular media throughout history (from Shakespeare to Friends to Game of Thrones). Sign in to your ScreenRant account Summary Generate a summary of this story follow Follow followed Followed Like Like Thread Log in Here is a fact-based summary of the story contents: Try something different: Show me the facts Explain it like I’m 5 Give me a lighthearted recap

The Witcher's past is steeped in controversy thanks to its many changes from the books, and its future doesn't look much brighter. Though The Witcher season 1 had a decent start, the next two installments moved the bar lower and lower. In many ways, season 4 was an improvement, since the stories in these episodes were much closer to those in Andrzej Sapkowski's books. However, with only one season left, I'm not sure The Witcher can keep it up.

The biggest problem in The Witcher season 4 was the recasting of its central character. Liam Hemsworth gave it his best, but there's nothing worse to break the immersion of a TV show than to suddenly change the face of the lead. It meant that any efforts on Netflix's part to finally stick to the books came too little, too late. Though we might have gotten used to Hemsworth's Geralt ahead of season 5, these coming episodes will come with their own problems.

It Will Be Impossible To Fit The Rest Of Ciri's Story In The Witcher Season 5

Ciri as Falka looking angry in The Witcher season 4

Ciri's The Witcher season 4 story was quite faithful to canon. However, I had expected more of her adventures to happen in this batch of episodes. It took a full season just to see Ciri develop her bloodlust with the Rats, and Leo Bonhart only murdered her friends in the final episode. This means that The Witcher season 5 has a whole lot to cover in a very short amount of time.

Warning! The remainder of this article contains spoilers for the The Witcher books and potentially The Witcher season 5.After being captured by Leo Bonhart in Sapkowski's books, Ciri spends a few weeks as the bounty hunter's prisoner. This is easily the darkest part of her story, going even beyond the disturbing events of the Rats' story arc. Bonhart drugs, molests, and forces Ciri repeatedly to fight to the death in an arena for coin. She eventually manages to escape, but shortly after, Ciri ends up jumping through dimensions, landing in the Elve's homeworld of Aen Elle.

Ciri's time in this world takes up another large stint in her book's story. Once again, she is held captive, and yet another character hopes to impregnate her for her power (this is quite a trend in the books). When Ciri finally manages to escape this dimension, she finds herself completely lost in time and space. It takes the help of Nimue (introduced in The Witcher season 4) to finally make her way back to Stygga Castle.

Once all of this happens, Ciri attempts to save Yennefer from Vilgefortz, fights Leo Bonhart, and is taken by her father, Emhyr var Emreis, who promptly lets her go. Even this isn't the end of her story, since all these adventures are followed up by Geralt and Yennefer's (implied) deaths in Rivia. This leads to even more dimension jumping for Ciri.

Netflix Has No Choice But To Condense Certain Aspects Of Ciri's Book Story

Clearly, this is a whole lot for The Witcher to fit into its fifth and final season. So, even though The Witcher season 4 was more true to the source material, there's really no way season 5 can do the same. We can assume that Ciri will be the primary focus of the coming episodes. However, no matter how Netflix cuts it, something within her final adventures will have to be significantly condensed.

Given Ciri's showdown with Leo Bonhart, it's important that The Witcher season 5 spends enough time on his cruel treatment of Ciri, effectively building tension for that big moment. Then, since The Witcher season 4 introduces Nimue, we can assume that her part in the story will get some significant focus. This really only leaves the Aen Elle storyline to cut down to size. Of course, that's assuming that Netflix doesn't go in an entirely different direction with Ciri's final arc. Regardless, I wouldn't expect The Witcher season 5 to avoid any significant changes.

247 8.0/10 6/10

The Witcher

10 stars 9 stars 8 stars 7 stars 6 stars 5 stars 4 stars 3 stars 2 stars 1 star Like Follow Followed TV-MA Drama Action Fantasy Adventure Release Date December 20, 2019 Network Netflix Showrunner Lauren Schmidt Hissrich Directors Stephen Surjik, Charlotte Brändström, Edward Bazalgette, Loni Peristere, Louise Hooper, Bola Ogun, Alex Garcia Lopez, Gandja Monteiro, Sarah O'Gorman Writers Haily Hall, Clare Higgins, Javier Grillo-Marxuach, Jenny Klein, Tania Lotia 8 Images Liam Hemsworth as Gerlalt smiling slightly in The Witcher season 4Henry Cavill as Geralt looking serious and holding a sword in The Witcher season 2Dolph Lundgren as Brehen in an arena in The Rats A Witcher TaleYennefer and Phillippa doing magic together in the woods in The Witcher season 4Francesca and Yennefer fighting with swords in The Witcher season 4Liam Hemsworth as Geralt with Ciri and Yennefer in The Witcher season 4Regis & Geralt with their crew in The Witcher season 4Jaskier & Geralt tied up in The Witcher season 4Close

Cast

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• Henry Cavill Geralt of Rivia
• Anya Chalotra Yennefer of Vengerberg

Franchise(s) The Witcher Genres Drama, Action, Fantasy, Adventure Powered by Expand Collapse

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