Game: The Witcher

The Witcher is a role-playing game based on the book The Witcher by Polish fantasy writer Andrzej Sapkowski. By the time the game appeared, the novel was already well known in Eastern Europe. The game refines and expands its vast worldview, and the game’s potential for film and television adaptation is beyond doubt. Especially after the release of The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt, the game’s popularity reached its peak.
Based on its vast worldview, adapting its content through several films seemed too much, so in the planning of Netflix, it became a cinematic television show.

Film production of television programs

The Witcher’s first season used several strategies to try to make cinematic television. First, the impressive monster design and magic scenes show that the show has invested a lot of resources in visual effects. Second, the existence of multiple timelines in the series leads to a complex story structure. This kind of storytelling is more common in television than in traditional TV dramas. In addition, in order to provide the audience with a more cinematic magical experience, excellent production and photography techniques were used. This allows the audience to immerse themselves in a large magical atmosphere. Together, these factors contributed to the Witcher’s first season’s attempt to make it cinematic from television. Different from TV, film has a big feature that enlarges the budget of traditional TV shooting and compresses the lengthy plot prepared for traditional TV. Television is for continuous viewing.

Still a TV series?

Despite its multiple cinematic production strategies, The Witcher’s first season should still be called a TV series. Although the series has some film elements, it is still broadcast in the format of the series and is produced to accommodate the continuous viewing needs of the audience. Therefore, although the production level and presentation approach is close to the filmgrade production standards, but its broadcast medium is still television, which makes it still belongs to the category of TV series in terms of classification. And according to Netflix’s business model, revenues from on-demand viewers around the world support a TV series as much as a movie.

How does the Netflix model free up creative constraints and audience reach

The playback mode used in non-periodic TV playback mode. This mode provides creators with more freedom to create and can adjust the scope of creation according to the audience range. Of course, creators no longer face the constraints of traditional TV seasons and weekly releases. They can make their own choices and determine the narrative structure to meet the needs of the story. And viewers can choose their own suitable time to watch programs around the world, no longer subject to regional restrictions on broadcast signals, and are suitable for people with different lifestyles. Viewers don’t have to worry about missing traditional broadcast times.

References

Netflix. (2019）THE WITCHER | MAIN TRAILER | NETFLIX. [YouTube video].

IGN. (2015）The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt Rating. The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt – IGN.

Netflix Brasil. (2023）The Witcher: Temporada 3 | Trailer oficial | Netflix. [YouTube video].

Netflix: Behind the Streams. (2022）Making a Monster: Inside The Witcher Season 2’s Prosthetics Department. [YouTube video].

Elena Rodgers, Are TV Shows Still Being Made for Television? Are TV Shows Still Being Made for Television? – Concrete (concrete-online.co.uk)

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