While fans wait patiently for the second season of Netflix’s The Witcher to debut in 2021, the streaming service is set to release a Witcher anime film titled The Witcher: Nightmare of the Wolf.
In a recent interview with ComicBook, the writer of The Witcher series, Beau DeMayo, explained why the crew decided to go down the anime route rather than keeping the entire project live-action after the success of the first season.
“I think from just… In terms of what the Witcher world is capable of, It is a massive canvas, and I actually started out my career working as an assistant and executive at Disney in animation, and it was there where I first got my job in the industry,” DeMayo said. “So I was aware when Lauren came and asked me to write it, what we could do in animation that you cannot do in live-action. There is not necessarily always parity between those two mediums. There are things that you can animate in an animated form that will look so amazing, so badass, that if you did it in action, in live-action, it’s just going to look goofy or it’s just going to register as a little false to the human eye.”
“There’s a grace and an art form to animation, and especially anime, that allows a different flavour,” DeMayo said. “So I think from Lauren and I’s perspective when we came at it, was what is the type of story we can tell? Which, I can’t tell you the story, but what is the type of story that we could tell that we could never tell in our live-action scope?”
DeMayo continued to explain how the script for Nightmare of the Wolf takes advantage of using an animation style as certain aspects such as magic and monsters may not have turned out as they intended if taking a live-action approach.
“Something with magic and monsters and adventure and romance that you couldn’t necessarily use a live-action medium to tell, and I think when people see the anime and when it releases, there are very particular choices we made,” DeMayo said. “And the script itself, there are certain things it takes advantage of in terms of animation that only animation can do. I think that’s what’s the most exciting thing that I’m waiting for fans to see. Is that, when you see the anime, it’s not just the events, it’s what Studio Mir has been capable of pulling off. It’s what our partners in the anime division at Netflix have been able to pull off. It is something… it is a story we could not have told in live-action in any way, shape or form. At least not with an incredible burden on production, I will say that.”
Nightmare of the Wolf is coming from the same team as the series with showrunner Lauren Schmidt Hissrich and writer Beau DeMayo producing. The anime is being developed by Studio Mir, the animation studio behind such fan-favourite series like Voltron: Legendary Defender and The Legend of Korra.
There is no word on when the anime will be released, but it is likely to fill the gap between The Witcher‘s second season, which won’t be released until 2021. It is also unknown if Henry Cavill or any of the other cast will reprise their roles for the anime, but it seems safe to assume that may be the case.
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