Netflix's The Witcher dethroned The Mandalorian as the biggest TV series in the world

[Shark_Blade]

https://www.digitaltrends.com/movies...n-mandalorian/

The popularity of the character Baby Yoda from The Mandalorian certainly helped make the case for subscribing to Disney+ for may people, but Netflix shouldn’t be worrying about losing subscribers just yet. New data suggests its new series The Witcher is currently the biggest television series in the world.

Television data firm Parrot Analytics has revealed that based on viewer demand, The Witcher is the biggest show worldwide at the moment. Most impressively, it has beaten out The Mandalorian, which has been hugely popular not only because of its Star Wars connection, but also due to the meme-ready character known as “The Child,” who the internet has collectively dubbed Baby Yoda. Due to his popularity, many pieces of official merchandise, including plush toys, were released shortly after the show premiered.

But even that adorable green creature didn’t make The Mandalorian as in-demand as The Witcher. According to Parrot Analytics, it logged almost 127 million “demand expressions” for The Witcher from December 22 to December 28. The show was also the second-most-streamed series on Netflix for 2019, with only the long-running Stranger Things coming out ahead.

The Netflix series was released all at once in December — as is the model for most Netflix shows — meaning those who chose to binge it will have to wait quite a bit before the second season is available. They could also watch the original Polish series The Hexer, but it was met with fairly scathing reviews from critics and fans alike when it released nearly two decades ago.

In the meantime, many fans appear to be playing the 2015 game The Witcher 3. Set after the events of the books that the Netflix series is based on, the game is widely considered to be among the best role-playing games of all time, and it’s available on everything from Xbox One to Nintendo Switch. Star Henry Cavill is among those playing the game — he’s already on his third playthrough.

On Steam, the game has hit its highest concurrent player count ever, which even tops the total for the game when it first launched. Rather than develop a sequel right away, studio CD Projekt Red moved forward with Cyberpunk 2077, which is set to release in 2020.

Congrats Henry Cavill and team. Wow didn’t know Cavill is a gamer, I’m excited to play the game on Switch too.

[CyberCubed]

This is meaningless though, whatever show is "brand new" is of course going to get the most attention and most viewers when it comes out. Mandalorian is already 2 months old.

[Shark_Blade]

Not necessarily true, many new shows flopped and got cancelled after first or second season. The Witcher is a good solid show that attracts traffic and it shows. Netflix is all over the world while Disney Plus is limited to certain places (that’s Disney’s own fault and incompetence)

Also Witcher has a legendary acclaimed “best RPG ever” game helps boost it while Star Wars have nothing but average games.

[Andrew NDB]

Disney+ and Netflix don't release their ratings (well, super rarely they will) so this is all just guesswork.

[Shark_Blade]

Apparently there’s The Witcher books before the author sold off the rights to the game publisher. Wonder if it’s worth checking out. Bet the author regrets that the series is going great.

Oh wow he regrets big time. https://www.polygon.com/2018/10/2/17...cd-projekt-red

[newfan]

Watching the Witcher right now, I was told it started as books first but didn't know the full history.

[IMJ]

I watched a few of them. In some ways it much fills the void left by the weirdness of the first few years of Game of Thrones. The could have done a better job with the creating a pattern for the viewer to follow the time jumping though....

[Andrew NDB]

I'm on episode 5 right now. So much of it I'm enjoying but I feel like I'm constantly missing information or f***ing up the names. In other words, yeah, a lot like the first season of Game of Thrones.

[Andrew NDB]

Anyone watching season 2? A few into it now. Overall it's pretty good but it's a little... "uncompressed." A little padded. A ton of this could be tightened way up.

[Andrew NDB]

I was coming here to ask if anyone's bothered with season 3 yet, but it looks like no one here even bothered with season 2.

[CyberCubed]

Isn't that how all these shows go? When the first season comes out people act like it's going to be a hit new show, then nobody comes back for the following seasons.

[IndigoErth]

I've watched the season 3 eps that are Netflix so far, just didn't realize a thread exists. I was rather late in checking the series out.

I've enjoyed it. Though I'm not familiar with the books or game, so I don't have any basis on which to be picky about anything, as I've heard some people supposedly are. I've liked how Geralt and Ciri's relationship has evolved and how the circumstances have kind of slowly made him a whole person again, going from a gruff and hesitant accidental protector of this kid to now basally accepting a role of more or less being like an adoptive father.

Too sad that Henry Cavill is going to step down from playing Geralt.

Really hoping the next episodes they add are a nice number of them and not like just three...

[IndigoErth]

Of course I was right... they left only 3 for the second "half." Why even split it up.

Liked the eps for the most part, but didn't really feel like they got that much accomplished in this season. Henry Cavill's Geralt is done and these last few needed more of him.

[Andrew NDB]

Originally Posted by IndigoErth

Of course I was right... they left only 3 for the second "half."

Isn't that what they did with Stranger Things season 4?

Liked the eps for the most part, but didn't really feel like they got that much accomplished in this season. Henry Cavill's Geralt is done and these last few needed more of him.

I'm curious, is there some in-story explanation for the change in his appearance at the end?

[IndigoErth]

Originally Posted by Andrew NDB

Isn't that what they did with Stranger Things season 4?

I think they did (or something I watched did), wasn't crazy about that either.

They weren't bad episodes, but I feel like they weren't impressive enough on their own to bother saving them until now.

I'm curious, is there some in-story explanation for the change in his appearance at the end?

Nope. Not at all. He gave some people a final successful ass kicking then the ep moves on to where other characters are presently at before it ends on a cliff hanger.

Hoping they'll provide some explanation in the next, or at the very least some snarky quip out of Jaskier to acknowledge it would be nice.


edit: At best, I suppose "healing waters" or whatever it was used on him at some point could be excused as doing that, even if lore doesn't support it? Since the actor, supposedly a huge Witcher fan before even getting the role, appears to be leaving due to disagreements with writing not staying true enough to the source material (why can't we have someone like him for TMNT??), I suppose they're just free to do whatever now.

[Andrew NDB]

I'm not really convinced Season 4 is even going to happen at all now.

[IndigoErth]

Yeah, with it being on hold because of the strike and all, who knows. But it really makes me wish they would have made season 3 a complete season instead of leaving it off on the kind of cliffhanger they did. Even if it's just one more season, or heck, just a movie, they need something to wrap it up.

[IMJ]

I don't think I got through season 1 ever....

[The Deadman]

Let's be honest here, people only watched this show because of Cavill and once the 4th season actually starts and people actually realize hes no longer attached to it, it's gonna die off.

[IMJ]

Originally Posted by The Deadman

Let's be honest here, people only watched this show because of Cavill and once the 4th season actually starts and people actually realize hes no longer attached to it, it's gonna die off.

I absolutely agree with this. Hemsworth has zero chance of keeping this show alive.