‘The Witcher’ report offers why Liam Hemsworth was announced as the new Geralt of Rivia so quickly

It’s been a week since Liam Hemsworth was shockingly announced to be replacing Henry Cavill as Geralt of Rivia beginning with the fourth season of Netflix smash hit The Witcher, but it would be an understatement to say that the fans aren’t ready to move on.

Almost as soon as the news broke, longtime supporters of the source material, the live-action series, and its leading man voiced their opposition in the strongest terms possible, with many urging the streaming service to cancel the show altogether instead of carrying on with a brand new star they didn’t ask for, and certainly don’t want.

Now, petitions demanding the entire core creative team get fired so that Cavill can return have racked up tens of thousands of backers after reports emerged of behind the scenes discontent, and it’s all just a big mess that Netflix should have seen coming from a mile away.

However, one curious thing to note is that production on season 3 of The Witcher only wrapped towards the end of September, but mere weeks later there’d been a season 4 renewal and a change of leading man. According to a new report from Redanian Intelligence, there’s a straightforward and kind of lazy-sounding reason as to why Hemsworth was drafted in so rapidly.

As per the site, the actor was one of the front-runners to land the role of Geralt back when the initial audition process was underway. So, as opposed to mounting an extensive and exhaustive search for Cavill’s replacement, The Witcher simply went back to the first round of prospective monster hunters to find the most suitable candidate, one who’d also be receptive to the idea of stepping in.

It’s fairly sensible methodology when you think about it, and would help explain how the news erupted out of absolutely nowhere, even if a lot of folks would rather bid a complete farewell to the Continent.