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The Witcher Producers Talk Plot Simplification for Western Audiences and Writers

mckmas8808

Mckmaster uses MasterCard to buy Slave drives
This guy just points the finger and blame everyone else but himself. Now it's a new low for him since he's blaming an entire nation. The fact is over the past 20 years, some of the best shows that ran for multiple seasons longer than his pathetic take on the Witcher series. Shows like The West Wing, The Good Wife, Criminal Minds and countless other law series and crime series were the top shows for decades. All are 1000% more complicated and infinitely better than The Witcher TV series.

I like how this guys acts like The Wire was some dumb down TV series by HBO lol.
 

nkarafo

Member
What an idiot.

Game of Thrones was a massive hit until the later seasons where they dumbed down the writing because they run out of source material.

I get how dumbing down media for mass consumption is something that happens. I say it all the time that once something becomes mainstream, it gets ruined everytime. But the market is already heavily saturated by dumbed down media, especially movies. You are not going to stand out if you just make another one. Again, Game of Thrones became such a huge hit because it was known as a smart show that isn't your average fantasy movie, which is exactly what it became in the last few seasons and got panned for it.

Also good job admitting you made the show for the average tik-tok user. Makes it much easier for me to not ever watch it.
 
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Darklor01

Might need to stop sniffing glue
So.. just so I can understand this.. as one of them dumb Americans..

From their perspective: A show needs to be dumbed down and simplified to reach a mass audience.

We’re going to choose a book and video game that many love, and actively read and play, which may or may not be niche to begin with, and put it on Netflix.

We love the Witcher and everything it is, so, we’re absolutely going to deliver something completely derivative and make sure the quality declines to keep people’s interest.

Next, we’ll get rid of the main star because he thinks people would actually want to see a reasonably faithful adaptation of the source material we, like you, love. Fuck that guy!

And just so we’re clear, all of this is because you’re all fucking idiots who can’t possibly understand the complexities and nuance of the stories are that sold millions of copies in book and game format to you same people.

Obviously it is your fault we can’t produce shows on that level. I mean, no one goes to Broadway style plays, museums, opera houses… etc. That would be patently ridiculous.
 
Literally
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Hahahah.

Though Lelouch was rather on point in his case.
 

JonSnowball

Member
So, the reasoning for the shows failures is that Americans are retarded? That's what happens when you produce a show for Netflix, a company that strives to produce exercises in revenue outcomes instead of entertainment. Mass appeal! Target the dumbest mother fucker in the entire mother fucker! Y'all know what I mean, bitches?
 
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Sure you can still be successful producing highly complex, multi facetted stories within the mainstream. My suspicion would be that the particular people working on this series might be afraid of certain decisions or artistic choices. To blame that on the audience is ridiculous.
Also, this "stupid Americans" trope needs to die already. You don't become a superpower by having only dumb people on the payrolls for government, military and science related positions. America has many brilliant heads leading in different domains globally. It's a lazy excuse for some Europeans, while Europe itself is going down the shitter - I'll stop here to not make this a political posting.
 

SHA

Member


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Keep in mind, we are in the same universe and on the same planet where Game of Thrones and House of the Dragon both reached record audience numbers.
Video games stories are just second tier, regardless of how much they make, that's how I view them unfortunately.
 
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First season was fun and sexy, but it was downhill from there. Also it wasn’t the fans fault that they butchered the source material.

Also like many shows season 1 is full of nudity and violence and then it gets toned way down every season after.
 

Hudo

Member
Stupidity is not exclusive to Americans. And I am a bit astonished that no one at the PR/marketing departments stepped in. Calling your audience stupid is ... stupid.
 
Whoever this moron is, doesn’t know what they’re talking about. Spewing words is all this is. Plenty of high profile, TV shows that don’t treat the viewer like an asshole and acknowledges that they can understand what’s going on.

Witcher is just shit show. They even had both the games and books as groundwork but chose to instead to focus on areas hardly anyone gives a shit about.
 

Pelao

Member
I'm neither from the US nor would I say I'm that young (In my mid 30's).
Maybe try to make an adaptation that doesn't suck next time.
The changes made to the original material were ridiculous.
 

SushiReese

Member

Tomasz Bagiński

I am surprised to find that this guy is actually Polish and he is the directors for:
he (used to?) work at CDPR and directly worked with the games devs too.
This make me appreciate HBO TLOU series more even it also has some "PC" issues.
We could blame/dislike Neil Druckmann on his writing/characterizations issues for TLOU 2, but we could admit that TLOU series live-action adaption is far better than any other video games live-action actions or fantasy books adaption we have in this decade.(The Rings of Power,Halo,The Witcher and Resident Evil) .

When you condensed 20~80 hours of novels/video games into 1 hour program x 12 episode TV series, it would be always a issue that you have to balance content between your core fanbase and general public. Like if we let Hideo Kojima to direct a Metal Gear Solid live-adaption series the reception may be similar or worst than the Witcher show.
 
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mdkirby

Member
The lead star, who is also representative of their core audience was so pissed off by the shit writing and lack of respect for the source material that they quit…then the show runners try to blame it on “dumb tiktokers” for making them make the plot dumb

The core audience and people with actual attention spans was larger enough to make it a success without chasing additional demographics and ruining it for everyone else.

I can’t imagine Oppenheimer, which made 400mil in its opening week, as a high brow, 3 hour period drama biopic about a scientist would have been as successful as it is if they had tried to also appeal to teenagers with 3 minute attention spans.

This is all 100% on incompetent show runners and low quality writers.
 
If someone showed me this show with no title you could pass this off as generic medieval HBO show. I saw the plot points for this show and it's almost on par or worst then the halo show 🤮. Maybe instead of insulting the audience I would be more concerned about making a quality show and let the fans build from that.
 

Mr Reasonable

Completely Unreasonable
I assume the nuance of the producer's words were slightly lost in translation there and that they seem harsher than he intended. I also assume that he was essentially CDPR's representation on the production and feels that he's likely to work with them again and not at all likely to work with Netflix in the future. The alternative is that he's trashing his product to save face with video game nerds, which seems like a bit of a mistake.
 
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Melfice7

Member
When there's a medium change for something, it stands to reason that some things need to be adapted to the new medium's limitations or characteristics, but it also stands to reason that the new product is being made primarily for the fans of the original product and not something fundamentally different just because thats what they think a new audience wants.

It alienates the original fanbase, it doesn't capture a new one, it's made for no one and its simply trash, so yeah keep doing this over and over, soon they will run out of popular franchises to ruin.
 

Dodo123

Member
Netflix is a cancer for the film industry, which generally, as a whole, becomes worse and worse every decade . And it's not only about being woke (we probably should be thankful that Geralt is not played by a black guy), the quality itself is decreasing. They focus on quantity and kill creativity, because they don't want to take risks. It's easier to make 78th reboot or remake or come back to a franchise that was good 20 years ago, just to destroy its legacy.
Baginski is a clown, as he unnecessarily steps out of line and now takes all the hate and criticism on himself. But there is a whole corporation behind him, which makes these decisions and the whole broken industry.
 

RaduN

Member
It's funny because this was obviously Netflix wanting to have their own Game of Thrones.
Really? Whith those production values and talent?
This show is more in the league with the likes of Xena: Warrior Princess or that Hercules series from around the same time, at least the first season, which is the only one i saw.
Maybe the other seasons are dramatically improved, but i don't think i'll give ot another shot. It's jus B-tier, or worse.
 
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kubricks

Member
I am not an American, and I am not young at all.
The show is a fucking disgrace to the sources material (both the games and the books from Andrzey Sapkowski), the only reason for me to watch the first 2 season is Henry Cavill and now they got rid of him. How do retards like these producers got paid to run the show is beyond me.
 
He's right.
I am Polish and I've been to America multiple times. They're one of the dumbest nations on Earth.
All the greatness in America has been achieved by those who moved there as adults and haven't been shaped up by non existent education system or "culture".
It didn’t used to be that way. Americans have been deliberately dumbed down by our neo-Nazi deep state government over the past few decades. We will return soon.
 
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Skifi28

Member
Why don't you give us smart Europeans the full version and just dumb it down for the Americans later?

 

yanhash

Member
What an idiot.

Game of Thrones was a massive hit until the later seasons where they dumbed down the writing because they run out of source material.

I get how dumbing down media for mass consumption is something that happens. I say it all the time that once something becomes mainstream, it gets ruined everytime. But the market is already heavily saturated by dumbed down media, especially movies. You are not going to stand out if you just make another one. Again, Game of Thrones became such a huge hit because it was known as a smart show that isn't your average fantasy movie, which is exactly what it became in the last few seasons and got panned for it.

Also good job admitting you made the show for the average tik-tok user. Makes it much easier for me to not ever watch it.
Exactly, even the worst seasons of GOT has AAA production design and it shows. The Witcher was only made to milk the IPs name recognition, Cavill signed on cause he was a fan, not cause he won the role in audition or believed in the show runners vision, and he ended up getting used.

If every character in the show was a teen, Netflix would have given them a decent budget as share holders seemed to be obsessed with the tic toc demographic
 

mxbison

Member
I'm all for blaming stupid people for most of the problems in the world, but the writing in season 3 was simply dog shit. It was actually hard to watch, dialogues written by chat gpt would've probably been better.
 

mitchman

Gold Member
Nah, it’s just a bad adaptation that got worse with every season. The games are a much better adaptation of those books and its not even close
Season 2 is nowhere near the first book, but Season 3 is much closer to the 2nd book. Simplified for sure, but the 2nd book has a lot of dialog which won't work so well in a TV series. Season 1 and 3 is good, season 2 was bullshit imho.
 

Dodo123

Member
It didn’t used to be that way. Americans have been deliberately dumbed down by our neo-Nazi deep state government over the past few decades. We will return soon.
As long as you believe that the country was and is run by "neo-Nazis", they will continue to succeed and further destroy the nation from the inside. The US and rest of the western world are under influence of COMMUNISTS, not nazis. And they, decade by decade, change the state of these nations for worse. It's subversion, a long term process that is ongoing since the end of the WWII.
So guys, stop thinking that Hitler is the only bad guy, because Lenin and Stalin were even worse. Would love to see the US education system talk about this a bit.
 

Topher

Gold Member
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Speaking with Polish news site Wyborcza (as translated by fan-site Redanian Intelligence) Baginski gave many reasons for changes to The Witcher show from the books and short stories, including production chaos and unforeseen issues like actors falling ill—understandable reasons—before saying this:





Baginski continued, saying simplifications of plot points are just as painful for writers as it is for viewers but oversimplifications to an otherwise nuanced and complex topic are often “necessary” so that a show can reach a larger audience.

I think it needs to be pointed out that no where does he say "stupid Americans" or "emotional young people". Why are those words in quotes in the title? I mean that is sort of the sentiment he is giving here, but he is not that explicitly insulting about it.
 

Ozzie666

Member
What's with Hollywood blaming fans for failures these days and actors and actresses yelling at fans?
Seriously, know your audience and stop making bullshit and destroying things like Indiana Jones.
Part of me hopes the strikes just make them all implode for their greed.

Witcher season 3 seemed better than 2, although I felt they went cheap with the final 3 episodes to save money. Reminded me of those cheap Doctor episodes where they didn't need to spend much. It's really sad to hear the behind-the-scenes stories for this project.
 

BootsLoader

Banned
I blame producers that don’t respect characters and stories. You can’t change history, you can’t change premade characters.
Also, what I don’t understand is, they made the changes so the series become successful, why it didn’t become successful? Why those big, hard decisions did not bring success?

Also, look at Christopher Nolan movies. End of story.
 
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