The Witcher on Netflix.

[mormont]

It's a 'pretty important point'? How so? Provided it's clear that the sorceresses can appear younger than they actually are, what in the books makes it 'pretty important' that their apparent age be about 20 instead of about 30?

[Pliskin]

4 hours ago, mormont said:

It's a 'pretty important point'? How so? Provided it's clear that the sorceresses can appear younger than they actually are, what in the books makes it 'pretty important' that their apparent age be about 20 instead of about 30?

It's an important part of the sorceresses attitude (free women preying and controlling men or other women) and superficiality. The books make the point that whoever is in power will abuse it in the way that suits them best. And the sorceresses are the only women (save royalty I guess) in that position in that kind of world.

The mages choose what they deem the most convenient (i.e. attractive) appearance for each gender. And that happens to be very young looking women for the sorceresses. The male mages on the other hand prefer to look much older and mature. This hypocrisy of the world when it comes to genders is important to keep and not tone down, I think. But you may not agree with me, and that's fine.

[mormont]

4 hours ago, Pliskin said:

It's an important part of the sorceresses attitude (free women preying and controlling men or other women) and superficiality. The books make the point that whoever is in power will abuse it in the way that suits them best. And the sorceresses are the only women (save royalty I guess) in that position in that kind of world.

The mages choose what they deem the most convenient (i.e. attractive) appearance for each gender. And that happens to be very young looking women for the sorceresses. The male mages on the other hand prefer to look much older and mature. This hypocrisy of the world when it comes to genders is important to keep and not tone down, I think. But you may not agree with me, and that's fine.

OK. What, in all of this, makes it so important that they appear like extremely attractive 20 year olds specifically and not like attractive 30 year olds? You've so far failed to explain that bit, and it is the bit I asked about.

[briantw]

22 minutes ago, mormont said:

OK. What, in all of this, makes it so important that they appear like extremely attractive 20 year olds specifically and not like attractive 30 year olds? You've so far failed to explain that bit, and it is the bit I asked about.

Is there really even a significant difference between an incredibly attractive thirty year old and an incredibly attractive twenty year old?  I'd imagine most super attractive women don't age much from twenty to thirty.

[Pliskin]

13 minutes ago, mormont said:

OK. What, in all of this, makes it so important that they appear like extremely attractive 20 year olds specifically and not like attractive 30 year olds? You've so far failed to explain that bit, and it is the bit I asked about.

Well, I thought I did, I'm sorry if I failed.

Not sure what I can add, other than realizing that Geralt is somehow of a pedo by modern standards, while reading Jaskier/Dandelion's sarcasm, deeply disturbed me. It's as important to keep as, let's say, girls marrying as soon as they're ready to bear children in medieval settings.

It may be a detail, and we're probably discussing more than it should, but important nonetheless for authenticity.

[Pliskin]

12 minutes ago, briantw said:

Is there really even a significant difference between an incredibly attractive thirty year old and an incredibly attractive twenty year old?  I'd imagine most super attractive women don't age much from twenty to thirty.

Yeah, I think I gave in my first posts the impression that the actual actor's age was important. I tried to correct that in my answer to Wert. Really, what I'm saying is important is just the look. And some actors believably portray teen or early twenty characters even in their near thirties.

[briantw]

27 minutes ago, Pliskin said:

It may be a detail, and we're probably discussing more than it should, but important nonetheless for authenticity.

I think it's a largely unimportant detail in the grand scheme of things.  The games aged up the sorceresses and there wasn't really a downside to it, and in fact I'd wager your average Witcher fan probably visualizes the game characters at this point anyway.

[mormont]

4 hours ago, Pliskin said:

Well, I thought I did, I'm sorry if I failed.

If you did, it may have been in the implicit assumption that looking 20 is inherently more attractive than looking 30, or at least that it would be regarded as such in the world of The Witcher. That's a highly problematic assumption either way, and as noted, is not even true for fans of the games.

4 hours ago, Pliskin said:

Not sure what I can add, other than realizing that Geralt is somehow of a pedo by modern standards, while reading Jaskier/Dandelion's sarcasm, deeply disturbed me. It's as important to keep as, let's say, girls marrying as soon as they're ready to bear children in medieval settings.

You know that's a myth, right? Many women in political marriages did marry young, but most others in medieval times married around 18-23 so far as we can tell from existing records. (Of course, customs did vary by geography and time: 'medieval' is a hopelessly broad cultural generalisation.) If we're talking 'authenticity' to the actual middle ages, we should be chucking that particular aspect in the bin. If we're talking 'authenticity' to a setting that is based on that myth, we should still be chucking it out, because the author's misapprehensions are not a thing we should perpetuate.

[Pliskin]

Maybe I should have said "marryable" instead of marrying, but I don't think that's correct English.

1 hour ago, mormont said:

If you did, it may have been in the implicit assumption that looking 20 is inherently more attractive than looking 30, or at least that it would be regarded as such in the world of The Witcher. That's a highly problematic assumption either way, and as noted, is not even true for fans of the games.

Just a side remark: can we stop bringing the games as arguments at every occasion? I know, the games are what the large majority knows. I know, the games are what introduced almost everyone worldwide to The Witcher. But they're still completely irrelevant: it's an independent adaption of the books. The games do not matter.

Back to the real topic, yes, it is problematic. But let's not obsess over the actual age (20 vs 30), doesn't really matter as I said countless times. It's just looks. And the problematic thing is that's a very young look. Somehow, the archetype of seduction for men and women, in the Witcher world at least, is how I presented it. Now, if you're saying it is/was not true in ours, that's an other debate, and I frankly have no opinion on it and do not wish to discuss it.

Also, Happy New Year.

[Bennis of the Brown Shield]

21 hours ago, Pliskin said:

Maybe I should have said "marryable" instead of marrying, but I don't think that's correct English.

Just a side remark: can we stop bringing the games as arguments at every occasion? I know, the games are what the large majority knows. I know, the games are what introduced almost everyone worldwide to The Witcher. But they're still completely irrelevant: it's an independent adaption of the books. The games do not matter.

Back to the real topic, yes, it is problematic. But let's not obsess over the actual age (20 vs 30), doesn't really matter as I said countless times. It's just looks. And the problematic thing is that's a very young look. Somehow, the archetype of seduction for men and women, in the Witcher world at least, is how I presented it. Now, if you're saying it is/was not true in ours, that's an other debate, and I frankly have no opinion on it and do not wish to discuss it.

Also, Happy New Year.

 

In theory maybe, not in practice. The reason for why Netflix even produces this show is to get lots of viewers and lots of money, not to do as faithful an adaption of the source material as possible. 

Given that the games were enormous successes and are where almost all the fans of the franchise from outside Eastern Europe come from, you can count on them having a big impact on how the show ends up looking. 

As for the books I've only read the first one, but I thought it was pretty mediocre to be honest. I hope they get better as the series goes on, because the writing in that one hardly measured up to the games. At least not the third one. 

 

 

 

[mormont]

On 12/31/2017 at 11:29 PM, Pliskin said:

Just a side remark: can we stop bringing the games as arguments at every occasion? I know, the games are what the large majority knows. I know, the games are what introduced almost everyone worldwide to The Witcher. But they're still completely irrelevant: it's an independent adaption of the books. The games do not matter.

To some extent this is true for the plot but visually? The games surely do matter a great deal. They're the principal source of visual information about the world. If the cast don't look like the video game version, most viewers will find that odd.

[Werthead]

Quote

 

Just a side remark: can we stop bringing the games as arguments at every occasion? I know, the games are what the large majority knows. I know, the games are what introduced almost everyone worldwide to The Witcher. But they're still completely irrelevant: it's an independent adaption of the books. The games do not matter.

 

I've said this before, but I think we're in the StarGate situation here: the original source material was created and was popular, but it was an adaptation by other producers that took the franchise to being a worldwide, famous success. The original creators got annoyed by that and have threatened to continue the story in a way that contradicts the other material, but that's gone down like a lead balloon because they are no longer perceived as being responsible for the success of the series. Sapkowski was offered the chance to get involved more closely in the adaptations and he chose not to, then starting whinging when they became an enormous success without him. Well, that's on him.

Also, people who worked on the video games are working on the TV show, one of them as a senior executive producer and director. I don't think they have a contract with CDPR so they can't adapt storylines (and they wouldn't need to until many seasons down the road) and there may be some limitations on the visual stylings they can use, but they're not going to have employed people who worked on the games if the games were not a key influence.

[Jussi]

I'm a big fan of Witcher, but I have never played the video games or even watched Youtube videos. I've read all the books in Finnish translations (including Season of Storms), they are popular in my country.

I don't know anything about the Witcher video games except that they are non-canon according to Sapkowski. I really hope that the Netflix series will be a direct adaption of the books and will have nothing to do with the games.

 

http://deadline.com/2017/05/netflix-to-produce-the-witcher-tv-series-1202095582/

“I’m thrilled that Netflix will be doing an adaptation of my stories, staying true to the source material and the themes that I have spent over thirty years writing,” said Sapkowski. “I’m excited about our efforts together as well as the team assembled to shepherd these characters to life.”

[Pliskin]

5 hours ago, Werthead said:

Also, people who worked on the video games are working on the TV show, one of them as a senior executive producer and director. I don't think they have a contract with CDPR so they can't adapt storylines (and they wouldn't need to until many seasons down the road) and there may be some limitations on the visual stylings they can use, but they're not going to have employed people who worked on the games if the games were not a key influence.

Can you say more about who's involved from the games? I thought it was just the guy(s) who did some cutscenes and cinematic trailers, not people who worked on or wrote for the actual games.

7 hours ago, mormont said:

To some extent this is true for the plot but visually? The games surely do matter a great deal. They're the principal source of visual information about the world. If the cast don't look like the video game version, most viewers will find that odd.

How can you have the cast look like the videogame anyway if it's live action? If you mean just vaguely similar to the look of the games, then if they follow the books, it will be similar to the games anyway. Since the games are based on it...
I find your remark quite odd.

[Fez]

18 minutes ago, Pliskin said:

How can you have the cast look like the videogame anyway if it's live action?

Pretty easily actually. I don't know if this is a photoshop or what, but Mads Milkkelsen looks an awful lot like video game Geralt here. And a lot of other actors could do this too.

[Pliskin]

1 hour ago, Fez said:

Pretty easily actually. I don't know if this is a photoshop or what, but Mads Milkkelsen looks an awful lot like video game Geralt here. And a lot of other actors could do this too.

You can do that easily with any actor. Not seeing your point here. That white hair/beard/bad ass look is from the books, you know. The games are pretty faithful to the books.

[Werthead]

7 hours ago, Jussi said:

I'm a big fan of Witcher, but I have never played the video games or even watched Youtube videos. I've read all the books in Finnish translations (including Season of Storms), they are popular in my country.

I don't know anything about the Witcher video games except that they are non-canon according to Sapkowski. I really hope that the Netflix series will be a direct adaption of the books and will have nothing to do with the games.

http://deadline.com/2017/05/netflix-to-produce-the-witcher-tv-series-1202095582/

The games have outsold the books by at least 5-1 and are the reason the books were translated into English and several other languages in the first place (Gollancz had been looking at them for a while but it was the news of the first game coming out in 2007 that spurred them to action).

This TV show and half the translations wouldn't exist without the games and Sapkowski's being ridiculous when he tries to deny that is the case. I get his fear that the books are being left behind by the fame of the games but that's really his fault, especially his reluctance to allow references to the games in the marketing for the books.

 

Quote

Can you say more about who's involved from the games? I thought it was just the guy(s) who did some cutscenes and cinematic trailers, not people who worked on or wrote for the actual games.

Jarek Sawko and Tomek Baginski designed and created the CG cut scenes and trailers for all three games, starting with this pretty direct adaptation of the original "The Witcher" short story from The Last Wish (that cinematic is pretty old now, eleven years). Their company Platige Imaging looks like it's going to be providing some or all of the CG and creature effects for the TV series.

[Fez]

1 hour ago, Pliskin said:

You can do that easily with any actor. Not seeing your point here. That white hair/beard/bad ass look is from the books, you know. The games are pretty faithful to the books.

My point is, you said:

Quote

How can you have the cast look like the videogame anyway if it's live action?

And the answer is: Easily.

[Pliskin]

3 hours ago, Werthead said:

Jarek Sawko and Tomek Baginski designed and created the CG cut scenes and trailers for all three games, starting with this pretty direct adaptation of the original "The Witcher" short story from The Last Wish (that cinematic is pretty old now, eleven years). Their company Platige Imaging looks like it's going to be providing some or all of the CG and creature effects for the TV series.

Yeah, well, they're the guys I was mentioning. They just delivered the cinematics they were ordered. They didn't really work on the games. I don't think Sapkowski would even accept to work with those (protective as he is of his writing).

2 hours ago, Fez said:

My point is, you said:

And the answer is: Easily.

And maybe you should have read the whole post...
No need for pointless remarks in a thread already bloated with superfluous discussions and repetitions I think.

3 hours ago, Werthead said:

The games have outsold the books by at least 5-1 and are the reason the books were translated into English and several other languages in the first place (Gollancz had been looking at them for a while but it was the news of the first game coming out in 2007 that spurred them to action).

This TV show and half the translations wouldn't exist without the games and Sapkowski's being ridiculous when he tries to deny that is the case. I get his fear that the books are being left behind by the fame of the games but that's really his fault, especially his reluctance to allow references to the games in the marketing for the books.

I must be honest: it's frankly getting tiresome. I don't understand the need to always repeat these facts and belittle the books reach. We all know the status of the games. They're still irrelevant when adapting the books. And I'd rather not have the books marketing based on the games success. We all hate the GoT covers of ASoIaF books. Should we start liking them now too, just because the show is successful? Should it be forbidden to say that the show is not canon?
That is pretty much all the author said about the games that was even remotely negative (he even praised the games actually, while saying that they do their own thing). And the butt-hurt fans of the games started hating him for it. And then suddenly, everyone started taking the fans recollections of what the author said as the truth. Amazing process.
Even his ridiculous stance about sales is not that ridiculous when you put it in the Polish (and neighboring) context.

Shitting on Sapkowski is becoming the new "GRRM is not writing anything". Can't we just discuss what we would like for the adaptation without going meta?
And frankly, I think the books are nowhere near as good as ASoIaF for the drama to be worth it.

[Derfel Cadarn]

We all hate the GOT covers?? Do we?  The UK GOT covers are my favourites (not that I own copies of them) since the original three covers.  I've found many of the in-between covera rather bland.

Whether the game plots are followed in any way at all will largely depend on the show's popularity.  If it's doing really well by the time they're adapting the last book, they may well draw on them.  If the show's struggling, we'll be lucky to see all the books adapted.