- Henry Cavill announced he was leaving Netflix’s adaptation of The Witcher after three seasons in 2022.
- Liam Hemsworth has since taken on Henry’s original role, Geralt of Rivia, in the show’s upcoming fourth season.
- The Witcher’s top executive producer, Lauren Hissrich, recently revealed the reason behind Henry’s departure during an interview with Entertainment Weekly.
Over the years, Henry Cavill has quite literally led Netflix’s The Witcher, playing Geralt of Rivia, a monster hunter with supernatural abilities. After reprising his role for three seasons, Henry announced that it would be his last back in October 2022.
“My journey as Geralt of Rivia has been filled with both monsters and adventures, and alas, I will be laying down my medallion and my swords for season 4,” he wrote in a statement posted on Instagram. At the time, the actor also gave some insight into who his replacement on The Witcher is moving forward.
Enter: Liam Hemsworth, who, according to Henry, “will be taking up the mantle of the White Wolf. As with the greatest of literary characters, I pass the torch with reverence for the time spent embodying Geralt and enthusiasm to see Liam’s take on this most fascinating and nuanced of men.”
We’re thankful that the head honchos over at Netflix are committed to continuing the franchise, which returns with eight new episodes on October 30. But…we’re also human (read: nosy) and still want to know the reason behind Henry’s decision to leave.
Luckily, the show’s top executive producer, Lauren Hissrich, spoke to Entertainment Weekly and gave a much-needed update on Henry’s departure.
She admitted that the conversation had gone on “for a while,” as Henry “personally wanted to end his time as Geralt.”
“He had plans for other roles that he really wanted to commit himself to,” Lauren told EW. “And for us, you don’t want to hold someone and force them to be doing something that they don’t want to do. I think that’s why it felt like a really symbiotic decision.”
At the time, rumors suggested that HC left because of creative differences when it came to his vision for the character. Being an avid gamer (like, he legit built his own gaming computer), Henry reportedly wanted to honor the original source material as much as possible. However, Beau DeMayo—a former producer and writer on The Witcher—has gone on the record and dished that some writers on the series “actively disliked” both Andrzej Sapkowski's books and CD Projekt Red's games.
In 2020, Lauren also admitted that she tried not to hire writers who are purists of the source material, saying, “We need writers who are close, but not too close. Who love the world, but aren’t afraid to question it. Who are fans, but are willing to step back and open their minds, in order to bring their beloved world to our real (big) one. I hope we did that.”
Fans saw these nuances come to light ahead of the release of season 2, when Lauren revealed Henry had sent her notes about Geralt’s dialogue. “A lot of the notes he was sending to me were about Geralt’s dialogue—could he, first of all, say more,” the showrunner told The Hollywood Reporter in 2021. “Everybody came out of season 1 laughing and loving Geralt’s fuming. But Henry was saying that when you read the books, you spend a lot of time in Geralt’s head. So how can we put that on the page?”
In a subsequent convo with Philstar, the actor elaborated on the sitch, revealing, “It’s important for me to have the character be three-dimensional. And it’s tricky to do, as I was saying earlier, because there’s a certain vision and there’s a certain set storyline and plot. And so, it was about me trying to find Geralt’s place within that. All of my asks and requests were along the lines of just being faithful to the source material.”
As for Liam stepping into the role? He knows he has big shoes to fill for the upcoming season. “It came out of nowhere,” he told EW of Netflix’s initial offer. “I was as surprised as anyone.”
He added, “I’m a massive fan of Henry’s, and I’m a fan of what he did in the show.”
“The other really great thing about Liam is he takes this really, really seriously,” Lauren said of the streamer’s recast. “I think he knew that he was stepping into big shoes. It was really important to him to have certain things [for] continuity — and also certain things that he could invent so that his Geralt could stand on his own two feet.”
