Netflix is making a six-part prequel to The Witcher titled Blood Origin

The world of The Witcher is expanding. 

Netflix has just announced a new live-action spin-off of The Witcher, titled The Witcher: Blood Origin. This six-part series won’t feature Henry Cavill’s Geralt of Rivia, however. Instead, it will take place 1200 years prior to his adventures in The Witcher. 

Blood Origin is a prequel set in an elven world that predates The Witcher by 1200 years. According to Netflix, the limited series, “will tell a story lost to time,” which includes the origin of the very first Witcher in existence. It will also explore the events that led to the conjunction of the spheres, which caused the worlds of monsters, men and elves to merge and become one. 

1200 years before Geralt of Rivia, the worlds of monsters, men and elves merged into one, and the first Witcher came to be.

Announcing The Witcher: Blood Origin, a 6 part live-action The Witcher spin-off series from Declan de Barra and Lauren Schmidt Hissrich.

— NX (@NXOnNetflix) July 27, 2020

Declan de Barra will run the show, with The Witcher showrunner Lauren Schmidt Hissrich acting as Executive Producer. The author of the original Witcher books Andrzej Sapkowski has also joined the show as series consultant. De Barra spoke on Blood Origin’s story, saying:

A question has been burning in my mind ever since I first read The Witcher books - What was the Elven world really like before the cataclysmic arrival of the humans? [...] The Witcher: Blood Origin will tell the tale of the Elven civilization before its fall, and most importantly reveal the forgotten history of the very first Witcher.

Netflix has announced that The Witcher: Blood Origin will film in the United Kingdom. They have not specified a release date, but this is only the third Witcher project being worked on right now. The Witcher Season 2 is well into production, as well as an anime movie that has Geralt face a new threat to the Continent.