The success of Netflix’s The Witcher is making room for yet another prequel. It won’t be a second anime, however. Instead, The Witcher: Blood Origin will serve as a six-part, live-action limited series. The Witcher showrunner Lauren Schmidt Hissrich and Declan de Barra are helming the project, which takes place 1,200 years before Geralt’s adventures begin.
Franchise creator Andrzej Sapkowski has been tapped to assume the role of creative consultant and producer. A quick rundown about the series suggests it will primarily center on the first mutated Witcher, during the period revolving around the Conjunction of Spheres–an event that saw the worlds of man and monster collide.
Netflix announced the news on its various social media accounts:
1200 years before Geralt of Rivia, the worlds of monsters, men and elves merged into one, and the first Witcher came to be.
Announcing The Witcher: Blood Origin, a 6 part live-action The Witcher spin-off series from Declan de Barra and Lauren Schmidt Hissrich.
— NX (@NXOnNetflix) July 27, 2020
In a statement to Forbes, de Barra teased the following: “The Witcher: Blood Origin will tell the tale of the Elven civilization before its fall, and most importantly reveal the forgotten history of the very first Witcher.”
For now, there exists no official word on character details and the like. A potential production start date and release information remains under wraps for the time being, too. These things could take time, though, given Netflix’s other Witcher-related projects. Filming for The Witcher Season 2 should restart in August. Netflix has yet to detail when work will begin in earnest on The Witcher: Nightmare of the Wolf, a prequel anime film that will star a young Vesemir.
[Source: NX on Twitter, Forbes]
