Netflix’s The Witcher released a Christmas-themed trailer today. The streaming giant released a short one-minute clip featuring notable moments from the first season of the series, placed in a new context.
In it, buildings are decorated with digitally-added Christmas lights and decorations, and menacing characters such as the magic-wielding killers were turned into gift-givers guarding piles of presents, all while the classic Christmas jingle, “Sleigh Ride” plays.
The Witcher stars Henry Cavill as Geralt of Rivia, Anya Chalotra as Yennefer of Vengerberg, Freya Allan as Ciri and Joey Batey as Jaskier.
The Witcher Season One follows Geralt of Rivia, a witcher, as he travels the continent looking for monsters to slay for coin while a war between Nilfgaard and the Northern Realms starts brewing. Over the course of his adventures, he is thrown into the lives of Yennefer of Vengerberg and the Cintran princess, Cirilla. Despite his efforts to resist, he ultimately comes to accept the pull of destiny. Upon release, the series received widespread praise from audiences and went on to become one of Netflix’s best-performing series.
Filming resumed in August but was forced to shut down for a second time recently after four members from the production team tested positive for COVID-19. Netflix provided assurances that principal photography would continue when doing so would be safe. It has since given The Witcher the permission to continue. It is not clear how this will impact the schedule, if at all. The most recently announced filming schedule placed completion in February 2021.
The Witcher Season Two is set to predominately adapt the events of Sword of Destiny and Blood of Elves, which sees Geralt and Ciri spend the winter at the witcher fortress of Kaer Morhen, where Ciri begins training under the tutelage of Geralt and his fellow monster hunters: Lambert, Eskel, Coën and their mentor, Vesemir.
The Witcher Season One VFX is made by:
Cinesite (VFX Supervisor: Alexander Pejic)
Cheapshots (In-house), Framestore (VFX Supervisor: Pedro Sabrosa), NVIZ (VFX Supervisor: James Fleming), One of Us (VFX Supervisor: Oliver Cubbage), Platige Image (VFX Supervisor: Matt Tokarz)
The production VFX supervisor is Julian Parry and the production VFX producer is Gavin Round.