One of the most common criticisms of The Witcher on Netflix is that it strays too far from Andrzej Sapkowski's novels. It may have been a source of some tension behind the scenes, too: Former series star Henry Cavill made a point of saying he "pushed really, really hard" to stay true to the books, while also claiming that some of the writers on the show "actively disliked" them. There's no question that some aspects of the novel have been simplified for the TV show, and in an interview with Polish site Wyborcza (translated by Witcher fan site Redanian Intelligence), executive producer Tomek Baginski explained why some of those changes were made: "[A] higher level of nuance and complexity will have a smaller range."
Sometimes changes are made out of economic necessity: Production can't stop because an actor gets sick, for instance. But the needs of an international audience, particularly a Western audience—and even more specifically the lucrative US market—also have to be kept in mind, according to Baginski. He said he encountered a "perceptual block" with American audiences some years ago, when he was promoting an unfinished film project called Hardkor 44, a sci-fi retelling of the Warsaw Uprising.
