What I forgot to mention in the video is that The Hexer has this old school vibe which reminds me of 80s fantasy and you can also feel the same atmosphere in The Witcher books and the first game. It's hard to explain. By the way I hope this video doesn't get any copyright claims since I've used a lot of shots from The Hexer and also soundtrack from it. I've heard that it's pretty strict when it comes to this show. I would have to completely re-edit the video. So wish me luck.

Still a better adaption than Netflix.

I watched this after Netflix season one and after reading the first book. I prefer this to Netflix because the passion put into the project was evident. The atmosphere was nailed and it felt like the series had a soul.

Smoku piękny jesteś..

It's worth mentioning that the Wiedźmin series featured some of the best Polish actors who carried the show with their exceptional performances, they were S-tier of 90s and 00s polish cinema. While the actors in Netflix's show are talented, they cannot be counted as a S-tier.

Soundtrack from Hexer is giving such a vibe... it is perfect, every track is sooo good.

100% its better than the Netflix version.

Love Wiedźmin, just wish we got more episodes. While not perfect, there's just something about it not being overproduced which creates this atmosphere which gives it book feels. (Also, the soundtrack is sooooo good)

Soundtrack of "The Hexer" was composed by Ciechowski, one of the best musician of polish 90`s. For a polish rock genre, he's kind of classic. So yeah, soundtrack is good.

I'm watching this series right after the premiere, and I immediately liked the atmosphere, and, maybe is not 100% consistent with the book, which I have read several times, but it is very close to the raw material. The only thing that limps is the special effects, but we know that the budget was poor, anyway I prefer this version to the Netflix version.

I'm a fan of your channel, from Poland. Thank you for this video!

Music in this show is fantastic! Also I really like how they depict Geralt's moral struggles and confusion when he searching Ciri. Similar how it was in a latest books.

I'm from Algeria, and I love the polish vibe in the book series that I didn't find in the netflix show. The atmosphere pf the witcher is definitely a key role in the reason why we love it so much, sometimes it doesn't matter wether the show is good or not, sometimes we only want to engage in the atmosphere and feel the experience rather than judging what we watch. I will definitely watch it, thank you.

Thank you. Finally someone who contributed something new and meaningful to this discussion.

The producers were two: Heritage Films and Telewizja Polska - Film Agency for TVP 2, and it is probably TVP that holds the production rights. For many Poles, this series is still iconic despite its flaws. Baginski gave hopes of preserving the character of the stories in the "NTFLX" production, but as he admitted, "they had to adapt the content to an American audience." And that, in the ears of the savvy, sounds like NTFLX's US customers are not the sharpest tool in the box.

I really love The Hexer for its down-to-earth vibe, that the netflix show just forgot. I also really enjoyed the realistic stunts and the amount of horses in the show. I just really appreciate the craftmanship. Thanks for pointing a spotlight on this beautiful show.

I watched the show with my family after 1st season of netflix witcher, we were surprised how much more coherent the story was and we actually really enjoyed it, the atmosphere really lures you in.

I've only ever seen clips of The Hexer, but it seems... fine? I watched Hercules: The Legendary Journeys and Xena: Warrior Princess back in the 90's and liked them. The Hexer seems about the same.

Zapachniało powiewem jesieni Z wiatrem zimnym uleciał słów sens Tak być musi Niczego nie mogą już zmienić Brylanty na końcach twych rzęs Tam gdzie mieszkasz już biało od śniegu Szklą się lodem jeziora i błota Tak być musi Już zmienić nie może niczego Zaczajona w twych oczach tęsknota Wróci wiosna deszcz spłynie na drogi Ciepłem słońca serca się ogrzeją Tak być musi Bo ciągle się tli w nas ogień Wieczny ogień który jest nadzieją

I loved Hexer from the start. Yes, it is cheap, but they captured the witcher's "magic". And chemistry betven Geralt end Dandelion is so good that i will never be able imanige Dandelion differently than Zbigniew Zamachowski.

the main 'combat' consultant was a known polish aikido master (Jacek Wysocki), hence the 'samurai' vibes

4:59 I always thought that Nilfgaard was inspired by Germany. Old Polish fears of militarized neighbour and such...

I agree, the dragon episode for instance was very faithful to the source material. And portrayal of Geralt's duel with Striga is also very faithful to the short story (in many ways similiar to The Witcher (1) trailer).

What a pleasure to watch. This show is special even though there are issues. We can still love something even when flawed. The brotherhood in the show between Geralt and Jaskier was the best, truly great actors. Thank you for making this.

Apart from Żebrowski and Zamachowski, I liked Anna Dymna. This actress is perfect for the role. In his private life, he runs his own charitable foundation. And that's how nice, warm and sensitive Neneke is. I like the relationship between Jaskier and Geralt the most. You can see that the men, even though they are completely different, understand each other very well. And they love each other like friends or maybe brothers? they can count on each other in any situation. My favorite part is the scene when Jaskier explains that if you love, you love, no one can stop you from doing so. A beautiful soundtrack that you can listen to even without the series. The rest was written by Grzegorz Ciechowski and most of the songs are performed by Zamachowski himself. In his private life, Mr. Zamachowski teaches singing at an academy that trains actors. One song is performed by Robert Gawliński.

I couldn’t agree more. The one thing that I always remember about this show is how great was the chemistry between Dandelion and Geralt.

I've never watched the movie version, but I have good memories watching the series on Polish TV in early 2000s

Great points, thank you for the link with English translation. I have been curious about the Hexer show for a while and have seen clips that make it look interesting But your point about Dandelion and Gerald’s relationship Hexer vs the Netflix show is spot on. I am reading Book 2 again, and in „A little Sacrifice”, their relationship was so close that Dandelion was trying to stitch up Geralt with fishing line and Geralt let him, because he trusted him and Dandelion wanted to. And then Dandelion borrows Geralt coat for the evening. No questions or problems and certainly no punching him in the gut because he was angry at someone else.

Wiedźmin was my intodutction to The Witcher. I watched it in the Czech dub with my dad it was enjoyable.

I like the old Witcher, it sticks loosely to the books and twists a few things, but it has a unique atmosphere and definitely the best Geralt 🙂

I love the show because of the two main actors. Witcher is always at its best with great characters. And these two are just perfect. They may not look exactly like their book counterparts but they act exactly like them

Feel like the difference between netflixs version and this is money vs passion. Like old polish tv show so no were near as much that they could do but they tried their best with what they had.

for me The Hexer has this 'tv theatre play' vibe we had in PL back in the day. After Netflix bastardation it indeed feels not that bad anymore (except 1st, 2nd and last episodes, which were completely invented by the show writers), and anytime I see it on tv by random, I watch it.

It was really good, still is. Atmosphere, actors, faithfulness to the story are so good, I always come back to it

I saw a couple episodes on tv when I lived in Poland, but my Polish is terrible, so I couldn't really keep up with the dialog. But the production value kinda reminded me of some US shows I watched as a kid in the 90's, like Highlander and Hercules: The Legendary Journeys

For many years I was thinking that Hexer is just bad but after the netflix abomination I completely changed my mind.

For some reason Jaskier/Dandelion/Marigold looks exactly how I imagined him in the books. (At least in the beginning) I imagined him being older because some character mentioned that Geralt and him have known each other for a long time. There was also a mention of him liking food or something like that, which made him wider in my head.

The Samurai aesthetics and witcher council came from polish comicbook adaptations of The Witcher from the 90’. They where 6 parts, 5 of them are adaptations of Sapkowski’s, but the last one, called „Zdrada”/„The Betrayal” is the original story about pogrom of witchers.

If it funny to hear dragon-argument, because In Netflix movie golden dragon wasn't better. It was like a chicken. While according to a book it was beautiful, had a swan neck and cat movements. About Lutik I think Polish version is better because it really gives an impression of real medival bard and not Hollywood pretty boy. Especially I like how they fooling around with Doo doo in the end of the episode. It was a really really a thing. The author of this video found a very good word "Chemistry". There was no "Shrek and Donkey" story like in Netflix version. Geralt always loved Lutik.

This show is unironically one of my favourite TV shows ever. I was 5 when it was first aired on polish TV, so I didn't watch it then, but I've seen it many times now and it's just fun and wholesome. I periodically watch it with my brother so we can joke about and laugh at the bad parts together, but the stories and the characters still make me emotionally involved, which is a unique mix. And I like how human Geralt is, not a hollywood superman like in the netflix show (and games tbh), but a vulnerable person with feelings and insecurities. I've watched an interview with Michał Żebrowski and he said he was badly heartbroken at the time the show was made, so maybe it had influenced his Geralt's character. Even though Zamachowski didn't look like Jaskier, he was perfect for the role. Also, I think the first few episodes are quite weak (other than my favourite scene of all time in episode 2 which sometimes pops up in my head and makes me laugh out of nowhere), and the further you go, the better it gets.

I never really watched the Hexer beyond a few scenes (I was sad about the lack of budget which resulted in it looking somewhat cheap), but you're absolutely right: Żebrowski as the Witcher, Zamachowski as Dandelion, Wolszczak as Yennefer and Dymna as Nenneke did sell me on the characters. Even when (especially with Dandelion) they didn't look the part, they still felt like it. I might actually give it a go these days.

The Hexer's soundtrack was written and performed by Grzegorz Ciechowski, who was the founder and vocalist of two New Wave bands in Poland in the 80s'90s. "Republika" and "Obywatel GC". Check out those bands, they are pretty cool.

I mean, The Witcher 1 was not so far from The Hexer when it comes to the atmosphere. The show was quite groundbreaking for its time (for Polish cinematography), and it both game and series had some shortcomings, but became classics with time ;) I need to rewatch it. Thanks for your work 🙏

Můj oblíbený geralt ❤❤❤

I really like the Hexer series, it had atmosphere, music, showed the relationship between Geralt and Ciri, Żebrowski was great Geralt (so great that he was first choose to voice Geralt in games, but he denied, and later he dubbed a Henry Cavill version) and was one of my favorite productions about The Witcher. And I say this as a person who also likes season 1 and elements of season 3 (the duel with Vilgeforz, despite the changes, was well shown), The Witcher on Netflix (season 2 was so bad that it's better not to mention it), and the animated film about Vesemir was also good.

doteraz si pamatam ked som bol maly a nasiel som ten serial :D, boze jak ja som ho miloval nadherny pribeh Yenefer som miloval /je to kočka/ :D ten pribeh na zaciatku ako ta stara babka rozprava vsetko z pamäti, ta hadka z elfama o moc lepsia co Nflix urobil, aj to co urobili z jezkom celkom ok, a som stebou za jedno Gerald aj Marigol boli paradne obsadeny, ja som chapal ze to je stary serial a ze grafika je jaka je a este je to z polska takze v tom nebolo tolko penazi ale hudba priroda a atd adt sa mi velmi pacilo za mna velmi pekna vec ktora mi ostala v pamäti aj vdaka nej som sa tak strasne rad spominam na svet Zaklinača, a dakujem za zdroj na serial niekedy bol na YT cely v cz ale nejak sa vytratil a na konec len POWODZENIA NA DROGE !!!! :D

I'd say that the soundtrack should get more praise. It was composed by really talented Polish artist, Grzegorz Ciechowski, known very well from his earlier projects, eg bands like Republika or Obywatel G.C. He was also a producer for many Polish musicians. What he did for Hexer's OST is just amazing piece of art, and it fits Hexer's world, characters perfectly. From main movie theme performed by Robert Gawliński (Nie pokonasz miłości/You can't defeat love) to track used as a main theme of TV show (I stało się co miało się stać/And what was supposed to happen happened) or songs sang by Jaskier throughout series like "Jak gwiazdy na traktem/Like the stars above the road" or "Zapachniało powiewem Jesieni/It smelled of the breeze of autumn" - soundtrack was made with passion and love.

Will give it a try!

The look has that 1980-homemade-Christmas-series quality, like Fantaghiro , that is so comforting to a certain extent. 😍

The series had been produced by Heritage Films (a Polish company specialising in TV productions) for the Polish State Television (TVP). Most probably, TVP holds the rights. It is now in the state of liquidation (with no intention to actually liquidate it - it is a drastic restructuration), so it might be hard to find anyone willing to talk about remastering the series now. There is a chance that Heritage Films holds still at least some rights.

Oh yeah, that is what I was looking for.

There is two separate matter here: this was made into just over 2 hour movie and year later they release 13 episode series. Movie was rubbish, but series surprisingly was quite good. Each episode focus on one short story (with some exceptions) and mostly important - Gerald was main character here. I liked it.

Scene with doppler is amazing. It goes from jovial, to sad,, to profound in a span of one minute

From memory I remember the show being bad, but with some good scenes mixed in. The music is good and I generaly like the costumes. Probably my favourite is Zamachowski as Jaskier, something about his portrayel that had me going, "yeah I can see women swooning for him". Zebrowski was good though a bit of a pretty boy, but that seems to be a constant problem (with the 1st witcher game the exception)

It wasn't the best adaptation of the book, but I liked it. The music, fight scenes and landscapes did their job. :)) The nostalgia of my childhood. :)

Have loved the series for years. Re-watch it once a year. Luckily, as a speaker of another Slavic language, I can watch it in the original Polish.

Filavandrel actor, Olbryski (most known as Kmicic from Deluge epic movie) was one of most expansive actors in cast, his apperance cost 300k pln, to comparision Żebrowski payment was 120k pln.

Another awesome video. I am so happy you make stuff like this. World needs more videos about folklore and hidden gems like Hexer. ❤ Keep up the good stuff like you do, my man!

This is THE video I've been striving and longing to find on youtube. Thank you for delivering yet again! And know, that I'd very much support you with the petition effort! EDIT: I wonder, whether the samurai inspiration in Hexer wasn't partially just a technical issue where drawing a curved sword from the back is somewhat more doable then a european longsword...

I whink when it comes to current owner of The Hexer series that would be Telewizja Polska S.A./TVP which is also responsible fro making it in a first place. They have all episodes on their streaming platform called TVP VOD.

I say The Hexer is truer to the books than Flixer. Anyone who has a problem with that can get a Skellige welcome.

Ukrainian subscriber here:) I remember watching the series on Ukrainian TV back in 2004, and being raised on Xena and Hercules this show was very similar in atmosphere. Wasn't really exposed to high budget things or quality back in the days, so it was quite okay for me - some of my classmates were outright fans of the show. Will sound like an old person, but the current tendency to be 4k picture above anything else makes me appreciate bad visual quality shows even more now - because they knew they lacked in one department and had to be stellar in story telling to be picked by any TV network. And that they did because despite everything, Wiedzmin is definitely interesting to watch.

The soundtrack is definitely one of my favorite things about The Hexer! Also, although the costume choices are pretty orientalist in hindsight, it left really strong impression on me, I believe it enhanced the _otherness_ of Geralt even in the fantasy environment...

Thank you for the Video. Because of your Channel I´ve heard the first Story of the witcherbooks and want to read the rest in future. Also, thank you for the comment on the prequel-triology.

I'm sure I'll get annoyed at the inaccuracies to the books, but I will take your suggestion and watch it (thanks for the link!). If there was passion for the source material, I'm sure it'll shine through and make it a fun experience. And besides, special effect and amazing action (while nice) aren't the point of a story like this, the Witcher isn't meant to be popcorn entertainment. Frankly, the clips you've shown kinda have a cozy vibe to them, which I appreciate.

Żebrowski and Zamachowski are such good duo. I think that the biggest strenghts are it's overall slavic dark fantasy atmoshere and how it adapts Sapkowski's books. Because let's be honest, the original stuff added by writers is questionable at least. Netflix does well neither of those. But I recomment it to any Witcher fan especially if they like witcher 1. I hope one day it gets remastered kindla like Potop (Delugde) movie was.

The Hexer introduced me to this amazing world of Andrezej Sapkowski. I found the books and games only after I watched it. And I have always loved it. Is the show perfect? No. Are they 100% faithfull to the source material? Also no. But the most important thing is, that they captured the feeling of the books and wrote the story well. So that you grew to love the characters. When I think of the characters in the books, the first thing that comes to my mind are the actors in this show. And the music was amazing as well. That carried the whole show. To this day I love to listen to Dandelions Song that he plays after the whole spectacle with the Dragon Hunt.

I've been watching The Hexer as 7yo kid with my father. Nothing until Mandalorian never felt anyhow similarly great in terms of atmosphere.

It was a pleasure to watch ur video and listen to your commentary. Agree with you 100%. This show is definitely a guilty pleasure to every Witcher fan.

It is a guilty pleasure of mine as well. It has its own share of issues, but man, you just gotta appreciate the little things it does well.

As a Pole that went for a movie premiere i can attest to how sh it was and how angry, disappointed my fantasy fanclub ppl were and than after Anger subsided, we went into just constant grilling and finally laughing. BUT! We f LOVED TV series! There is WONDERFUL fan movie on YT called Alzur's Legacy that has the same vibe and you HAVE to watch it

I used to laugh at this, and then I was forced to endure the Netflix poo poo platter for 1.4 seasons. Compared to that abortion on Netflix, this old cheap piece of Polish TV looks better and better. At least they cared. At least it has a mortal soul.

We've been also shitting on that TV Series... for the digital effects i guess. I remember re-watching it some time later in the early mornings and then i changed my mind. The best about it is that it's showing that slavic root within the witcher, which obviously is just one of many themes. I actually had a chance to choose "Myths and Legends in modern fantasy" on my "matura exam" which I got so addicted to, even though I'm more into the "science" stuff... Going back to the topic, it has that feel that I'd categorise as a base, upon which you can start building up. Being a heartful fantasy and especially Witcher fan, it turned out I had no time to finish the Netflix series, because it's so much a caricature of an original story that I prefer to spend my time on work or other hobbies. So, this is how I started to like "The Hexer". Maybe if they could cut the CGI it could've been a nice adaptation, but I have no idea if that would be even possible. I have no idea who has rights to that show, my brain reminds me "Gutek Film", but I'm pretty sure it's just a false connection. If you're thinking about talking about uploading that to youtube I would be pessimistic about it as we can still watch that on TVP VOD, which means there's still money being taken out of that. Thanks for an interesting view and have a nice day!

Dandelion's song in this is just perfect. I liked the show on first watch, though I was put off by the weird changes to the lore at first.

I watched the first 2 episodes and despite how it strays from the books I liked it because it nailed the atmosphere, and the way that this version of Geralt carries himself is closer to the Geralt in the books as well (Henry Cavill did a fantastic job but the showrunners forced him to stray, this version was more hm... "Stoic").

Jó, starej seriál bylo pro mě první setkání se Zaklínačem, pak přišly tak nějak zaráz knížky a filmy. Ze seriálu jsem měl vždycky trochu smíšený pocity, atmosférou určitě lepší než Netflix, kostýmy a lokace jsou občas dobrý občas špatný (o vizuálních efektech se bavit nemusíme :D ). Ale tím, že to bylo to první co jsem znal a viděl jsem to jako děcko, tak k tomu mám celkově docela dobrej vztah, zpětně hrozně cením jak jsou tam ty postavy napsaný, jaký jsou ty vztahy a jak se to drží (v některých věcech) předlohy. Na druhou stranu některý věci a pár si jich zmínil mi tam samozřejmě taky vadí a je škoda, že je na tom sice na jednu stranu znát, že to dělají poláci a mají k tomu vztah, ale na druhou stranu to kazí tím, že se podle mě trochu snažili o nějakou světovost a úplně to nefungovalo. Osobně si myslím, že velká (resp. žádná) americká produkce nebude nikdy schopná vytvořit Zaklínače, tak aby to působilo dobře a mělo tu správnou Sapkowskiho atmosféru. P.S.: Mám radši draka z originálu než toho od Netflixu, částečně i proto, že mi připomíná draka Mraka :D

FYI Geralt is fighting using Aikido, because Jacek Wysocki was choreographer in this show. He was hugely popular back than in Poland as Aikido sensei with high dan, we needed poles recognized outside of Poland That's probably the reason for Japanese styled Witchers, it was synonymous then in Poland with elite warrior

It's interesting to me that Christmas is a time for fairy tales in the Czech Republic. In the Anglosphere, prior to the overcommercialization of Christmas, sharing ghost stories was a common tradition on cold winter nights. Obviously Dickens' A Christmas Carol is the most famous of these, but the English author and antiquarian M.R. James was famous for these stories as well. I'd definitely be interested in watching the whole series of The Hexer. A low budget "bad" adaptation that gave a solid effort is a lot more impressive than a big budget adaptation that lazily wastes the property.

using the star wars comparison made this a lot more understandable. I have not seen the hexer, but if comparing the hexer to the netflix witcher is like comparing the prequel trilogy to the disney trilogy wearing star wars skin, I might have to watch the hexer. also, I can understand your dislike for cavil as geralt, though I will say cavil, unfortunately, was the only one in the show who actually wanted to give a good adaptation, even if his attempts struggled

lol while watching the first episode I was like "interesting, they wear long khaftans with leather and mail protection and use some kind of two handed shaska? interesting design" but then I saw that random helmet and the bootleg samurai image clicked to me XD I actually assumed the reason Kar Morhen looked like a quarry is because we only get a glimse of the training erea and the caves are where Witchers are made, I was expecting I will see a full shot of the actual castle at some point.

So I stopped a wild rabid dog from biting a woman and after I saved her she spit in my face.- basically the witchers premise. Makes total sense.

The greatest thing I enjoy on this show is it came before GOT so no one had tendencies to copy it Really enjoyed Hexer, beginning was bit weird but rest was just nice enjoyment, nothing big but worth it

Old Polish Wiedźmin is awesome! Many Poles love it - there were some shitty things like dragon, but perfect cast🎉

My first exposition to Witcher world was through this series. And as a kid I thought it was super cool. Now I like it out of sentiment along with fact that, while aesthetics of some things as you mentioned don't make sense and special effects are awful even by back-then standards, it kept itself to the source material. I remember and love the scene when Geralt asks names of two Zerikkanian warriors that travel with Borch, how they make "sounds" and he's drunkenly looks at them and says "preettyyyy" (you've seen it so you know what I mean). Also it must been funny to Czech to hear Geralt saying "Szukam Ciri" (assuming you watched it with original dub).

It kinda reminds me of Ted Raimi's "Hercules" and "xena", or stuff made by Hallmark, I used to love this kind of series as a kid. It's low-budget, but really charming

【Shades Finnish Pirates】i watched the series before Netflix one came, i loved The Hexer and i will endorse the series to anyone as it's million times better than Netflix one. When show is made by slavs, it shows and that sums up all the complaints about the show. Jaskier's singing is beautiful in the series, he truly is selected for his acting & singing voice and it really made an impact on me. You can truly enjoy The Hexer, i do not understand why anyone would ridicule the Hexer as it is entertaining in the end and the actors nail their roles mostly Geralt & Jaskier. 1+ Give it a shot

5:27 Filavandrel is basically very well-known polish actor, so having him in any role in polish historical/fantasy movie was "mandatory", but yeah not the good cast for an elf.

I think TVP (polish state-owned TV) have rights to Hexer, or at least you can watch this on their site, but from what I know this series was created by company that its existing was ended by corruption scandal I think ( I can be wrong) for the TVP, so they should have rights to this day. It is a shame that after W3 global succes they didn't remastered it with official english subtitles.

Broooo your larp kit is insane, it looks so good

Fun fact: King Foltest actor Edward Żentara is the father of Mikołaj Żentara also known as M. one of the founders of Mgla, one of the greatest if not the best Black Metal band in Poland

Dobrze prawisz, polać mu! ❤❤

Great video, couldn’t agree more!

Very good take ! Dismissing the overall quality of the netflix show, I've always felt like the "vibe" was off... especially whilst adapting the first few short story's. They seem to miss the atmosphere of the universe

I watched the show many years ago for the first time (i think the second game only came out), and didn't think much of it. It was pretty bad, but it wasn't terrible. Then i rewatched it with a friend some time before the netflix adaptation came out and found new appreciacion for it. People who say it has a soul nail the sentiment. And after the netflix disaster i understood that i'd much rather rewatch this old show with bad effects instead of the new one, that had the potential to be great but ended up being terrible. I don't know how to explain it, but i feel like this show has something that even the games couldn't capture.

This show had a heart, passion, understanding and love for the story, which are all the things I missed in the Netflix adaptation. Sure you have monsters that look like plush toys because of next to zero budget but I’ll watch it again to hear the great dialogues and bathe in the atmosphere straight from the books. I couldn’t even finish the Netflix series. What use is the fancy budget when you butcher all the important aspects of why people loved the books in the first place and the dialogues were a sad joke sometimes.

The movie Wiedzmin has introduced me to the Witcher books. I like the film, really. I think it has great atmosphere and gives you that need to know more, to find the books and to start reading immediately. And Michal Zebrowski is great as Geralt in this movie. I'm sorry, Mr. Cavill, but no, you were just ok.

I've mentioned it briefly under your different video, but the deal with all the changes in the Hexer was about massive copyright bullshit. It effectively amounts to the fact that the series was green-lighted before they finished all the legal stuff with Sapkowski, and then he walked out of negotiations about his (absolutely unreasonable) fee for the copyrights. But since he was doing a very weird bidding on bits and pieces of the copyright, he sold bits and pieces of the first two books to be used. Hence why certain episodes are so close to the text, while others are abridged version and others yet a complete fabrication - it would be simply illegal to make them any other way. And because the producers had experience with this sort of stuff earlier, way back in the 80s, they decided to just move along and work with the material they have and fill the gaps on the fly As for katanas, oriental stuff and all that: this was done because the combat choreography was initially to be done by a fencing trainers, except they run out of money to hire them. BUT they already hired a Polish aikido master, Jacek Wysocki, as a consultant on hand-to-hand combat and stunts, so they asked him if he can help with sword fighting, too. In case you don't know - aikido doesn't have any sort of fencing included to it, it's about redirecting the attacks of the opponent to throw them off-balance. So the end result was a budgetary restrain changing things around with how stuff was portrayed and they also got a surplus of training costumes for free. I mean come on, it's a 13 episode fantasy series from 2000 under a budget of 6.5 million dollars. That was a shoestring budget even back then.The oriental-but-not aesthetics also do tie with the general aesthetics of fantasy designs in Poland in the 90s, so it does make much more sense in the context that everyone was interested to include some of it. Even the katanas aren't from Hexer, it was already done in a mid-90s Polish comic book adopting Witcher. The rule of the time was "if it looks exotic and we can source it cheap, it's better than the stuff that's simply cheap". As for the endless critique: it's a 22 yo series. Average person who shits on it, never, ever actually saw it, and there is a solid chance they were a toddler back then, if that at all. But they know the memes, and the memes always are about the same things, obviously. You know what people rarely mention? The series was aired a year after the "movie" premiered and tarnished any sort of reputation the show could get... right? And it opens with two made-up episodes, so people are going to hate it... right? Wrong. The original ratings were consistently above 3.5 million viewers, and few episodes above 4 million. Poland had about 38.5 million citizens around that time. Which means every tenth Pole was watching it. In other words: it was a big rating success. It won't be a stretch to say that that series was what really made Witcher books popular in Poland, because a whole lot of just regular normies learned that this thing exists in the first place, rather than simply circulating fantasy fandom. Which over the next 20+ years of endless shitting on it is just tiresome. And it's extra tiresome, because I always liked the series. When it came out, the "shitty" effects were just the standard fare of the day, and stuff like LotR was the exception, the brand new and shiny (and also super-expensive). Same with costumes. What mattered were the performances of the leads. Żebrowski (Geralt) and Zamachowski (Jaskier) already paired earlier when doing "With Fire and Sword" few years earlier, so I knew beforehand that this is going to work out just great with them paired together. Their chemistry is what carries the whole series. I also never managed to "unseen" Borch or the Zerrikanian duo with him, because for all the cheese, it was still so iconic in Chyra's performance. And of course Kinga Ilgner with her Renfri. I am still getting chills when she asks Geralt to embrace her So in the end, it's not even "you can do it, when you want to". They always wanted to do it 1:1, but couldn't. Netflix had no copyright restrictions... and actively decided NOT to do it. PS Kaer Morhen WAS shot in a quarry. It was freshly closed, so the bottom was still dry, but the machinery was already removed. Why? Nobody knows. They had very, very weird choices when it comes to location shots, and I even accidentally recreated their "Sudety and Karkonosze" filming path last spring, realising only half-way through that I'm at the various filming locations PPS It's also important to note the original reception of the two products - the film and the series. The film was obviously trashed, and you can probably guess why. The series, meanwhile, got a really warm reviews from professionals, and as mentioned, the viewership ratings were exceptionally high. The whole memetic shitting over Hexer is something that started few years later, mid-00s mostly. So it's really complicated how the reception of the series went over time and what sort of reputation it has. Another aspect to it is that there is a great deal of people who didn't saw the series, but did saw the movie (2 hours vs 12.5, do the math) and are probably the most staunch hatedom, because they "saw" it and they "know" it's awful.

I feel really nostalgic about Hexer. I saw it probably 2002 on TV and loved it since then. I haven't had idea how infamous it is until now. It doesn't bother me at all. And I will still probably watch it at least one more time one day. I cant say that about the Netflix version.

Witcher translated to Dutch is 'Hekser'. Always fun to see how closely related our languages are.

Nápad s vánoční tradicí sledování Zaklínače se mi líbí, taky to zkusím! Trochu jsem brouzdal po internetu a práva bude nejspíš vlastnit Telewizja Polska, ale původní produkce seriálu byla Heritage Films. Nevím, jestli jsou ještě aktivní. Nicméně serilál nikdy na dvd nevyšel, ale za filmovou verzí, která na dvd vyšla stojí Victory Multimedia.