The Witcher Season 3’s Final Two Episodes Are Its Lowest Rated Ever

Now that The Witcher season 3’s final three episodes have aired, the dust can settle and we can see if Henry Cavill’s farewell was something that satisfied fans.

It may not surprise you to learn that it did not.

In what remains one of the biggest nosedives in fan support I’ve ever seen, The Witcher has gone from a hugely praised season 1, which mostly delighted both book and show fans, due mainly to Cavill’s performance as Geralt, to something of a disaster with Cavill about to be replaced and the overall quality of the series spiraling.

Fans did not give Henry Cavill some sort of high-note boost as he left, and have rated his final two episodes the lowest of the entire series, though obviously it’s through no fault of his own.

Season 3 episode 7, Out of the Fire, Into the Frying Pan (who names these?) and the season 3 finale, episode 8, The Cost of Chaos, are the two lowest rated episodes on IMDB overall with a 4.2/10 and a 5.3/10 respectively.

In fact, season 3 has uh, eight out of eight of the lowest rated episodes of the entire series. As in, every episode season 3 is rated lower than every episode of seasons 1 or 2. And that’s even with a good amount of controversy about season 2 diverging from the book’s source material in a few different ways. The highest rated episode of season 3 is actually one of the final three, episode 6, the aftermath of the betrayal at the ball, but even with a 7.0, that is rated lower than all the season 1 and 2 episodes by 0.6 points (season 2 episode 2, Kaer Morhen, is the lowest rated episode besides season 3’s, with a 7.6/10).

Overall scores for the series, all episodes considered with over 500,000 votes cast, are still a solid 8.1/10 on IMDB, with the first two seasons carrying the weight of season 3 with total scores. But what happens from here is likely to be brutal, as if these are the “fan protest” scores before Henry Cavill leaves the series, I would be afraid to see how they react to the Liam Hemsworth seasons when he shows up to replace Cavill, and same writing team is present which seems responsible for both Cavill’s departure and the show’s overall decline. It remains incredibly unclear what happened here, but subsequent quotes from producers, saying that getting a new Geralt is like getting a new Doctor Who or Peter Parker, and that this is really “Ciri’s story,” not Geralt’s as a way to downplay his role, are very irritating sentiments for fans.

I am sure Hemsworth will try his best to finish the series and fill Cavill’s shoes. But this is likely to be a disaster, and I’m not sure Netflix should have even tried to keep going here after season 3.

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Pick up my sci-fi novels the Herokiller series and The Earthborn Trilogy.