The Witcher Scene That Went Too Far In Season 1
When Andrzej Sapkowski originally first started writing "The Witcher" short stories and novels back in 1986 (via Eurogamer), he probably had no idea that his inventive world would become one of the biggest fantasy franchises on the planet. It's been adapted into a critically acclaimed video game series from CD Projekt Red, and there's even a Polish TV show based on the books called "The Hexer." Back in 2019, Netflix revealed its own live-action "The Witcher" series, with "Man of Steel" star Henry Cavill leading the show as Geralt of Rivia. It received middling reviews with a 68% critic rating on Rotten Tomatoes, but fans loved it — and Season 1 still holds a 91% audience score on the aggregator site.
Much of the complaints around the series came from the plot, as BBC's Scott Bryan says, "It relies so much on the gameplay of it and what people love about the game, it's like they forgot how to make a TV show." But "The Witcher" excels with the grim creature designs, as Geralt faces a number of monsters during his adventures across the Continent, and they strike a faithful balance between the beasts in the books and video games. The series opens with Geralt's fight with the haunting Kikimora in the middle of a swamp, and it only gets more bloody from there.
But out of all the violence and bloodshed, fans think a surprising scene went too far in "The Witcher" Season 1.
Fans dislike Yennefer's magic love fest
In Season 1, Episode 5, "Bottled Appetites," Geralt and Jaskier (Joey Batey) head to Rinde in search of a mage who can heal the bard from a Djinn-inflicted illness. They're pointed towards the Mayor's house, where Yennefer (Anya Chalotra) has taken over using her abilities, enchanting everyone in the house into being part of a wild orgy in the basement. The mage claims she's only pushing them to engage in their deepest desires, but using magic to force them into it gets into some ethically dodgy territory — and fans on Reddit think it went too far.
In a thread titled "Was anyone else disturbed by the orgy scene in the show?" users debated whether the scene went too far, or if it was just an excuse to include pointless nudity. U/fantasywind summed it up perfectly in stating that "the entire 'orgy scene' was completely unnecessary and it's unfortunate implications make it all the more controversial." They went on to say, "all they needed is to only make this a fully natural extravagant costume party that Yennefer organized, there was no need to shove magic into it."
U/Winter-Fir echoed the sentiment, writing, "That scene was awful and just wrong. It's the reason why I dislike Netflix Yennefer," further adding that "the whole episode made me think that Netflix Yennefer and Geralt do not work together at all, that is a terrible relationship right there," while u/Pyrometrics had a very simple response to the thread, saying "You're not missing anything. It was very wrong." Thankfully, "The Witcher" Season 2 corrected many of the complaints leveled at the first season, such as the confusing timeline, so here's to no more magic orgies going forward.