The Witcher season 3 part 2 review: The good stuff is at the very end

After spending more time on it, and doing a lot of research (like Christopher Nolan’s protagonist), I regret to announce that the first part of this article is not very good. The WitcherSeason 3 of Pretty Lousy was as it turns out, pretty lousy. This isn’t all that different from what I thought at the time. I’m just even more sure of it now, as the final three episodes arrive on Netflix — which are actually a lot of fun! They don’t magically make season 3 any better, and in fact, might even highlight its shortcomings even further. But it’s got a ton of wizards shooting lasers at each other and some cool sword fights, and that’s not nothing.

Part 2 will do little to change any minds about season 3, mainly because there isn’t much left for the show to do. The gunpowder has been (messily) cast about all over the show’s characters and subplots; the final three episodes merely ignite it.

Fireworks are a great way to have fun and create the largest fantasy battle. The WitcherThe show’s attempts to explain magic have been a failure, even though the characters motivations are illogical. WorkIn its fiction. And given the thinness in characterization in part 1, the devastation that’s wrought in part 2 doesn’t really land on anything more than a superficial level.

This is a little more troublesome, because after its explosive start, most of part 2’s run time is denouement. The characters are dispersed, they lick their injuries, walkabouts and only readers can understand who these people are. Ultimately, this results in a downbeat ending that seems like it’s The word “youth” is a synonym for “orthodox”.Feel like Empire Strikes backBut instead, it serves more like Fast XLeave viewers with little interest in the status quo.

Susan Allnutt/Netflix

Decision to Divide The WitcherThe division of Season 3 into two unbalanced parts, in retrospect is puzzling. This highlights a flaw that has existed since the start of the season. The Witcher season 3 is constructed to obscure the identity of the master manipulator at the heart of the conflict that explodes in Part 2, and the narrative contorts to accommodate the writers’ desire to deliver a surprise. As a result, the characters suffer — never feeling like they have agency as they are pushed along the Continent to be where they need to be for the fireworks.

The season could have benefited from a touch of Hitchcockian intrigue, showing its viewers (who were book readers) the impending threat and watching them fall for a trap. We end up watching a show where motivations, conflicts, and locations are jumbled together for a surprise that will make a second watch worse, not better.

As the credits roll on season 3, it’s difficult to articulate what kind of show The WitcherThere is no longer any. It’s a show trapped in narrative inertia, still capable of delivering fantasy fun — Ciri (Freya Allan) finally gets the spotlight after spending most of the season in hiding, and part 2’s better moments focus on what she’s up to — but there seems to be an unwillingness from the show’s creative team to change its approach, as one episode after another continues to cram tangles of knotty plotting into too few episodes. The Witcher is suffocating itself, and it doesn’t have to.

Henry Cavill is stepping down and Liam Hemsworth will replace him in Season 4. It’s a good opportunity for The Witcher To reset. It needs to — because it’s also a good opportunity for viewers to leave.