Look at this clown! First, they came out saying they weren’t even fans of the material. You have Henry Cavil in the lead role who is a super fan of the source materials arguing with you and the writers about the show. And then you finish it off by blaming the audience for your decisions. Mind you, the audience you have ultimately attracted is largely influenced by the decisions you have made throughout the production of YOUR show. The audience didn’t make this show, YOU did
If you're the executive producer, it's your fault that your team members fucked it up. If you cannot find a competent writer to properly express nuance on the screen, it's still your fault. You hired the wrong person to adapt the books. You are the boss, the final say, the one-ass-to-kick when things go wrong. The Witcher is not some nuanced story about regional distinctions in low-visibility communities told in short form, which seems to be his only acclaimed experience, followed by several production failures.
This entire interview comes down to "those lazy zoomers don't know how to appreciate good film." From the description of his past, massive failures it appears to be a problem with his process and ability, not an audience problem.
If you’re the executive producer, it’s your fault that your team members fucked it up.
Again though, that’s not true.
The Television producer hierarchy has Showrunner at the top, that would be Lauren Schmidt Hissrich. Tomasz Baginski was just an EP on 16 of the episodes, so would not have been in charge of determining the overall series plot.
This entire interview comes down to “those lazy zoomers don’t know how to appreciate good film.”
Yeah, his complaints are that Young Adult material is simplified to be able to hold their attention, that’s not controversial, that’s not new, that’s been the case for literally ever. It’s why book stores have Young Adult fiction separate from more complex and heady adult fiction.
The Witcher found success on TV as a YA show and that has forced them to simplify the plot, something one of the producers didn’t appreciate.
It's worse, he's smashing his face with it and yet refuses to acknowledge the parking sign while complaining about some other imaginary obstacle instead.
If it were true that Americans & social media wanted such simplified plot, it would have been more successful than it was.
The Witcher 3 is one of the best selling games ever, and is considered by critics and fans alike to be one of the best games of its genre ever. This guy is a fucking clown.
Yes, came here to say this. Thank you for your services. American executive never own any failures. Claw back their bonuses, fucking brain piece of shits can't even do their jobs anymore.
Yea but that’s only because the game has lots of pretty, moving pictures. And the books have pretty covers.
I’m American, so I can’t even read. I noticed some symbols in the show that could be conceived as trying to impart words or ideas, and it just turned me right off.
You might be asking yourself: “If I can’t read, then how did I understand and respond to this topic?”, and I would then respond: “SHUT UP VOICES IN MY HEAD!”
Great comment, but could have used a more realistic scenario of using a screen reader/dictation software to comment. It’s okay though, I get that you needed to simplify it for the American audiences.
American test audiences literally said that for I Am Legend which combined with studios unopinionated cowardice caused them to ruin the ending, amongst many, many, many other times that test audiences have given bad artistic feedback.
His anger should probably be focused at the showrunner / studio, but I’m guessing he’s not risking burning those bridges so is instead blaming the only other party in the decision making process, the test audiences.
You do have a 20% illiteracy rate, and the response is that American test audiences have ruined very obviously good plots with their stupidity many times before.
“we want to make more money so we dumbed down the plot to idiot level and blame it on americans being dumb. Also we changed everything to be more emotional because that’s what tiktoks kids want, more emotion and less plot or something” [paraphrased of course]
I’ll be brutally honest: I think the books kinda suck. I love the Witcher lore, character, world, story and I especially love The Witcher 3 and I’ve played the entire game, plus the two DLC expansions, so I was very surprised to see the books were mid at best.
So if you want to know how to IMPROVE on the source material without DISRESPECTING the source material, look no further than the Witcher games. CDPR knew how to write the story in a way that can compliment the source material instead of competing against it.
The Netflix show was clearly competing against it in many ways that it might as well have been an original story. And mocking the source material isn’t the same as disagreeing with it, which is what one of the writer of the show failed to understand. It doesn’t look good when the show is already a mess and then the writer is mocking it, almost making everyone wonder why they even signed up to do the story in the first fucking place.
I think I remember when the show wanted Geralt to make a joke about Roach’s death and Cavill stepped in and said Geralt would never do that, which is true. Then the show staff apparently got butthurt about Cavill doing that a lot and that’s why he left.
This guy shouldn’t be making shows. Sounds like he makes the drivel that other shows, when they respect their audience enough to include the complexity he’s deliberately avoiding, are lauded for rising above.
Right… It’s the audience’s fault and not the show runners who outright refused to follow the books and games leading to the star of the show leaving. 🙄
I mean, im not the smartest crayon in the shed, and I have limited time playing the game. But the plot on that show jumped around like crazy it was hard to follow. And the dialogue made it feel weird. It was a medieval timeline with mid 2000’s slang tossed and soft core scenes tossed in. I didnt make much past season 1 (which wasnt bad). But Season 2 felt like writers were on an acid trip.
It still was way more complex than most shows on TV. Plenty of characters with wildly differing goals and motivations, at least. It’s not like other Netflix shows which have at best 5 or so characters with the exact same motivation and goals, only difference is some characters are a bit sassy.
It's still not an "easy" or "simple" show. While mass market US shows can be dumb, I think even Americans overstate the "dumb" Americans bit. There's definitely plenty of room for intelligent, thoughtful shows.
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