The Witcher is officially a TV phenomenon. Netflix has released the viewing stats for its shows, and according to Variety, 76 million households tuned into the Andrzej Sapkowski adaptation within the first month of its release. That means 46% of subscribers have tossed a coin to their witcher.
This doesn’t necessarily mean all those people followed Geralt and co.’s adventures to the very end. As Variety notes, the company has changed its definition of viewer from those who completed 70% of an episode or movie to those who’ve watched something for at least 2 minutes.
According to Variety, the company also put a Google Trends chart in their investor letter that showed searches for “Witcher” far outpaced those for “Mandalorian,” “Jack Ryan,” and “Morning Show.” (It’s important to note that “Baby Yoda” was not one of those competing Google terms.)
As for whether this means the time-hopping fantasy saga is truly more popular than those other shows, that remains up for debate. One thing we do know is that the success of Lauren Schmidt Hissrich’s Netflix adaptation has done wonders for Sapkowski’s original series. Last week, Orbit Books announced that it will be reprinting over half a million more copies of the Witcher books to keep up with “exceptional demand.”
Will just as many fans tune in for season 2? We’ll find out when The Witcher returns to Netflix in 2021.
