The Witcher Season 4's Recap Highlights The Problem With Liam Hemsworth Replacing Henry Cavill

Contains spoilers for "The Witcher" Season 4

Like it or not, Henry Cavill has exited "The Witcher" and is no longer Geralt of Rivia. Liam Hemsworth took over the role ahead of Season 4, and many fans wondered how the show would address the transition from Cavill to Hemsworth. Perhaps a joke from Jaskier (Joey Batey) about Geralt looking a little different, or maybe a soap opera voiceover saying, "The role of Geralt is now played by Liam Hemsworth." Turns out that the series chose the worst option possible and scored an own goal.

In the opening scene of "The Witcher" Season 4's first episode, an older man reads a story to a group of young children about the legend of the Butcher of Blaviken. Essentially, it's a remixed version of the scene from the premiere episode of the series where Cavill's Geralt kills the kikimora monster. After the man finishes the story, a young girl insists the story is wrong, adding that Geralt slayed more monsters during the kikimora scuffle and giving more weight to Hemsworth's fight scene.

From there, the girl recaps the pivotal events of "The Witcher" up until this point, including Geralt's romance with Yennefer of Vengerberg (Anya Chalotra) and his relationship with Ciri (Freya Allan) — with Geralt played by Hemsworth in the flashbacks. It's all rather awkward and jarring, as it feels like a rewrite of history. Plus, it's unlikely to silence the fiery debate about Cavill and Hemsworth's portrayals. In fact, this only adds fuel to the fire when it comes to drawing comparisons.

There's no doubt that Liam Hemsworth knew what he was walking into with "The Witcher." He did the right thing by getting jacked to replace Henry Cavill as Geralt, but he was taking over from a fan-favorite actor as a beloved character, so backlash from sections of the fanbase was inevitable. What's bizarre is how the people involved in the show thought the remixed recap to introduce his version of Geralt was a good idea. As it turns out, Hemsworth had his doubts about it, too.

"I didn't want to directly try to redo anything that [Henry Cavill had] done," Hemsworth told IGN. "I initially had a little bit of hesitation towards that. And then after some talks with [showrunner] Lauren [Schmidt Hissrich] and the writers, we felt like it was a way of throwing back to some earlier things that we've seen The Witcher do already, and saying, 'Here's my version of it, and we're going to move forward with it.'"

This remixed version of the story doesn't help the situation. All it does is rile up viewers loyal to Cavill and make it appear as though the showrunner and writers are trying to one-up his iteration of Geralt, especially through the kikimora scene. Walking that tightrope was always going to be a problem for the creators, who should have known better than to recreate some of Cavill's scenes with his replacement. Yes, they needed to get behind Hemsworth's version and showcase him as a legitimate Geralt, but was this recap the best way to do it? Probably not. Maybe "The Witcher" should have ended after Season 3, after all.