It’s safe to say that The Witcher has been a massive success for Netflix, introducing a whole new audience to the books and game series. Season 1 is out and it seems like Season 2 won’t be hitting Netflix until sometime in 2021, but it seems like Netflix has some additional surprises for Witcher fans between seasons. A page on the Writers Guild of America website may have provided evidence that Netflix is working on an animated The Witcher movie, reportedly titled The Witcher: Nightmare of the Wolf.
At the current time, there are few details about the rumored film. The listing notes that Beau DeMayo is writing it. DeMayo was the writer for episode 3 of the Netflix show’s first season and is credited with at least one of Season 2’s episodes. Rumors have been circulating for a while that the film will be an animated feature. There’s no information about any of the actors reprising their roles for the movie, though it seems like a longshot that Netflix would spend so much time establishing Henry Cavill as Geralt and then replace him, especially considering how much work he did for the role. Redanian Intelligence notes that Henry Cavill was “notably absent” from much of The Witcher’s Season 1 promotional tour and events, positing that he could have been busy recording his voicework for the upcoming film.
The only other potential news about The Witcher: Nightmare of the Wolf comes from a note in the credits page for voice actress Harriet Kershaw, who lists having worked on “The Witcher” in 2020. Since she doesn’t appear to be in the TV show, and that wasn’t filmed or released in 2020, there’s a good chance that listing means this movie project. Kershaw mostly does voice acting for the children’s cartoon series Fireman Sam, though she has also lent her talents to video games, including 2018 action RPG Shadows: Awakening.
The Witcher executive producer Tomek Baginsk has teased “interesting surprises between seasons,” and it looks like the animated The Witcher: Nightmare of the Wolf could be this year’s surprise to hold us over until Season 2 in 2021.
An animated film adaption of a video game (that itself adapted a book series) coming to Netflix isn’t a stretch, especially considering this is the same platform that the live-action show has been such a success on. This year both Ni No Kuni and Dragon Quest have animated film adaptions hitting the service (though Netflix did not produce the adaptations itself). In addition, Netflix has a rather fantastic animated TV series based on Castlevania which they did produce. They’re also currently working on an animated Dragon’s Dogma series, and starting the Ubisoft animated TV series multiverse.
[Source: Writers Guild of America, Harriet Kersaw’s Credit Page, via Redanian Intelligence]