The Witcher on Netflix.

[red snow]

4 hours ago, The Anti-Targ said:

Maybe I should watch again. My first impression was that he's very keen but seemingly an outside chance to get the role. Though if he pops up in a few interviews talking about how much he knows and loves all things Witcher and playing Geralt would be great, I would be inclined to think that this is a tactic to get the fanbase warmed up for the inevitable announcement of him playing the part of Geralt. 

 

Oh, he's definitely being really canny in drumming up some support and it probably does come from a genuine enjoyment of the games but I think replaying the game and reading the books is as much training for the role/casting as hitting the gym for playing superman.

 

[Martini Sigil]

interesting article

https://screenrant.com/witcher-netflix-geralt-actor-richard-armitage/

 

[Werthead]

2 hours ago, Martini Sigil said:

interesting article

https://screenrant.com/witcher-netflix-geralt-actor-richard-armitage/

Armitage would be interesting. I always thought he was a good actor since the terrible BBC Robin Hood reboot (Armitage was, by light-years, the best thing in it) and he was probably the best thing about the Hobbit trilogy (at least when he was allowed to act properly by Jackson). He's certainly a better actor than Cavill.

[Centrist Simon Steele]

I guess I'd prefer Armitage over Cavill, but my only experience with Armitage is from the first Hobbit (hated that movie), and his voice work on Castlevania--bringing a whole wealth of nothingness to my childhood heroes--the Belmonts. I mean, at least he's Trevor Belmont, the most forgettable Belmont. Had he brought such uninspiration to Simon Belmont? I'd never forgive him.

I worry he'd be about as enthusiastic if playing Geralt. 

[Centrist Simon Steele]

On 8/7/2018 at 9:23 AM, red snow said:

That's cool he's a fan through and through. If not the lead they should definitely find a role for him in the show somewhere. I think an actor can bring something extra to the table when they are genuinely enthusiastic about it. Look at Ryan Reynolds with Deadpool.

Now that you mention it, Cavill should play Cahir Mawr Dyffryn. Handsome. Dull. On a quest for redemption. It just adds up.

[The Anti-Targ]

I guess one thing that might help stop non-gamer actors from phoning it in for The Witcher is the fact that it is actually literature, and not a video game. Even though the video game is what's globally popular and there would be no chance of any US adaptation of the material if not for the games.

But it's still an adaptation of books, first and foremost, so actors don't have to cringe about being in a video game adaptation.

I still prefer Cavill because he is a gamer and a fan of the Witcher games, and that counts a lot for me.

I haven't seen enough of Armitage outside the Hobbit movies, and as the Hobbit movies were a real let down he has been tainted by association in my mind. So I'm pretty lukewarm about the suggestion, even though he ticks the right boxes from a physical and vocal perspective.

[Centrist Simon Steele]

I think that's true--that this is literature as opposed to a game, so that might make actors more invested.

Man, my post about Cavill playing the character of Cahir...I'm going to throw in some Lady of the Lake book spoilers:

Spoiler

I just finished Lady of the Lake last night, and from the assault on the keep to the end, I was spellbound, but Cahir's sacrifice was really something else. He spent all this time looking for Ciri, then he just gets owned by Bonhart. The thing is though, the more I think about it, what a great arc for this character. That little flashback right before he is killed, that he loved Ciri and she hated him and never trusted him. He has such a tragic turn. Give this role to Cavill if he wants to be part of this so badly. 

Anyway, the books are great. I just finished Lady of the Lake, but I realize, I started the series back in...2006? I've slowly been reading it for so long that I think rereading back to back would really be great.

I'd missed some really interesting things (I think due to the time gap): spoilers about Emhyr:

Spoiler

Like he just kept referring to himself as Ciri's father, and I was always like--nah, that creepy knight Duny was her father. What kind of sham is this? I didn't realize until Lady of the Lake that...oh yeah, Duny is Emhyr. I must have forgotten that, and I wonder how that will change my perceptions of him upon reread.

 

[Theda Baratheon]

21 hours ago, Martini Sigil said:

interesting article

https://screenrant.com/witcher-netflix-geralt-actor-richard-armitage/

 

Ooooh you know I forgot how much I really like him he’s lovely 

very good in period drama North and South 

[Theda Baratheon]

15 hours ago, Simon Steele said:

Now that you mention it, Cavill should play Cahir Mawr Dyffryn. Handsome. Dull. On a quest for redemption. It just adds up.

Is that a Welsh name??? No fuckin way do I want him playing a Welsh charact- oh gosh I’m sorry I’m genuinely so weirdly bias against this actor who has done nothing to wrong me  I have no reason to dislike him I just don’t like him and I’d love for someone with a bloooody name like that to have a welsh actor!!! Rhys Ifans!!!

[Gronzag]

Are Witcher books genuinely good? How they stack against ASOIAF, TSA, Kingkiller, First Law? Are they grimdark?

[Maltaran]

2 hours ago, Theda Baratheon said:

Is that a Welsh name??? No fuckin way do I want him playing a Welsh charact- oh gosh I’m sorry I’m genuinely so weirdly bias against this actor who has done nothing to wrong me  I have no reason to dislike him I just don’t like him and I’d love for someone with a bloooody name like that to have a welsh actor!!! Rhys Ifans!!!

A lot of the Nilfgaardians seem to have Welsh sounding names. 

[Theda Baratheon]

9 minutes ago, Maltaran said:

A lot of the Nilfgaardians seem to have Welsh sounding names. 

You know partly why I'm so obsessed with the video game and why I should def read the novels soon is there is so much welsh and cornish folklore and I am SO HERE FOR IT.

 

Also SO MANY CHARACTERS in Witcher 3 have Welsh accents!!!! The Welsh crones....oh be still ym beating heart. I LOVE those disgusting, twisted ladies.

[Werthead]

6 hours ago, Simon Steele said:

I think that's true--that this is literature as opposed to a game, so that might make actors more invested.

The suggestion that "literature" (not sure I'd put literature in italics as it suggests pitting Sapkowski against the likes of Wolfe, Priest or Aldiss and, well, that's not a competition he's going to win) is always innately superior to the writing in games is amusing. Don't get me wrong, the writing in the first two Witcher games (in particular) isn't going to be troubling any novel writers anywhere, but the third game? Whole another level, and I'd be impressed if the writing in any of the later Witcher books rises to the level of, say, the Bloody Baron storyline.

The Witcher 3 represents a substantial step forwards in video games - particularly AAA, high-end ones - as an art form and in the level of writing that they can achieve, probably the biggest such step this century.

Quote

 

Are Witcher books genuinely good? How they stack against ASOIAF, TSA, Kingkiller, First Law? Are they grimdark?

 

Not on the level of ASoIaF, Malazan or TSA, probably around the level of First Law, better than Kingkiller. I haven't read all the Witcher books yet, so there may be substantial improvements later on (although looking online the consensus seems to be that the two short story collections and Blood of Elves are the best and the quality drops off fairly substantially afterwards).

Grimdark in tone more than content (I don't recall any graphic sex scenes in the books, or any really horrific violence), I'd say, maybe on the level of Glen Cook.

[The Anti-Targ]

It's not about literature being better in any objective sense than writing for video games. But the fact that there is, and will be for a long time yet, a lot of snobbery when it comes to adapting books vs games.

It's probably not overstating things to say that there is almost no respect for video games as art or narrative entertainment in Hollywood. Even among Hollywood people who game there are probably a lot who still don't respect them as comparable to movies or books for telling a good story. And video game film adaptations have such a horrible reputation in Hollywood there is little reason for Hollywood to change that view.

This is also part of the reason I would like to see Cavill in the production in a leading role. We need writers, actors and directors with a passion for the story-telling potential of video games and a vision for how that can be translated to movie or TV.

I envy people who don't give a shit about whether video games will ever get respect from other entertainment mediums, or ever receive excellence with adaptations for movies or TV. It's funny that movies about video games have historically done better than movies adapted from video games.

[The Bard of Banefort]

I know virtually nothing about The Witcher. All the internet has been able to tell me is that it's about a magical James Bond who spends most of his time having sex with random women. I'm going to go out on a limb and assume that it's more than that though. . . right? I'm not really into love triangles, either.  

[red snow]

Based on the success of video games I'm sure there aren't many within the industry losing sleep over other media thinking their storytelling is inferior. It's a very different type of storytelling as it has to appear as if the player/reader has a choice in destination while remaining on tracks that ensure you get from A to B. Then there are games that genuinely don't need storylines but Hollywood shouldn't be trying to adapt these (yet they do).

I think that's why movies about video games fare much better as that allows them to stick to the screenplay formula rather than the game one.

[Werthead]

Hollywood's been developing a bugbear for video games for a while. They see games making vastly more money than their industry (as has been the case since 1998), individual games like Skyrim or GTA5 still generating hundreds of millions of dollars per year more than six years after they came out, and don't really get it. Their attempts to adapt video games to movies are poor, usually because the writer and director refuse to actually play the games and are not invested in them so they change everything so it's unrecognisable, or they try to fit a 30-hour game (or even a 5-or-6-hour one) into 2 hours.

Even where they do a reasonably good job, sometimes the source material is too confusing or silly for them to adapt faithfully. Probably the most genuine attempt to adapt a game to a film was WarCraft and it was okay, but when you stick real actors in those over-the-top costumes, it just looks silly. The orcs though were pretty well-handled though. I think we're slowly getting there. The Tomb Raider reboot also seems to have been moderately well-received, at least as a mid-tier action movie.

[Fez]

11 hours ago, The Anti-Targ said:

It's not about literature being better in any objective sense than writing for video games. But the fact that there is, and will be for a long time yet, a lot of snobbery when it comes to adapting books vs games.

It's probably not overstating things to say that there is almost no respect for video games as art or narrative entertainment in Hollywood. Even among Hollywood people who game there are probably a lot who still don't respect them as comparable to movies or books for telling a good story. And video game film adaptations have such a horrible reputation in Hollywood there is little reason for Hollywood to change that view.

I don't think this is entirely true. There is still a relatively small total number of movie adaptations of video games, and they almost all have had terrible scripts. And I think there is very little respect in Hollywood for the bad quality writing anywhere, which does lead to a lot of phoning it in (though not always, the actors were all fine in the latest Tomb Raider). However, actors will generally phone it in for any kind of movie with bad writing; except for British actors over age 50, who have the uncanny ability to always be able to ham it up and just have fun.

On the other hand, there is a much larger sample of Hollywood actors providing VA in video games. And while there are certainly plenty of examples of phoning it in (Hello, Destiny's Peter Dinklage), usually there is still the issue of a bad script. When there's a good script, or even just an okay one, the actors usually do quite good work.

[Centrist Simon Steele]

19 hours ago, Maltaran said:

A lot of the Nilfgaardians seem to have Welsh sounding names. 

But Cahir "is no Nilfgaardian," as he relentlessly reminds everyone throughout his story. I always thought that was a nice touch to his character.

[Centrist Simon Steele]

16 hours ago, Werthead said:

The suggestion that "literature" (not sure I'd put literature in italics as it suggests pitting Sapkowski against the likes of Wolfe, Priest or Aldiss and, well, that's not a competition he's going to win) is always innately superior to the writing in games is amusing. Don't get me wrong, the writing in the first two Witcher games (in particular) isn't going to be troubling any novel writers anywhere, but the third game? Whole another level, and I'd be impressed if the writing in any of the later Witcher books rises to the level of, say, the Bloody Baron storyline.

The Witcher 3 represents a substantial step forwards in video games - particularly AAA, high-end ones - as an art form and in the level of writing that they can achieve, probably the biggest such step this century.

Not on the level of ASoIaF, Malazan or TSA, probably around the level of First Law, better than Kingkiller. I haven't read all the Witcher books yet, so there may be substantial improvements later on (although looking online the consensus seems to be that the two short story collections and Blood of Elves are the best and the quality drops off fairly substantially afterwards).

Grimdark in tone more than content (I don't recall any graphic sex scenes in the books, or any really horrific violence), I'd say, maybe on the level of Glen Cook.

Yeah...I loved all the Witcher books, and I'd put them well above everything on the list except ASOIAF. But I get that mileage varies. Witcher 3 had excellent writing, and it seems to have upset Sapkowski to some degree. But I will say, the stories in Sword of Destiny really hit about the same level of quality and pathos as the stories in the Witcher 3--even the Bloody Baron. I think you have to come back to them a time or two, I don't know, but the story A Shard of Ice really hits me hard every time I read it.