The Continent is filled with dangerous monsters and powerful mages, so Netflix’s “The Witcher” will need special effects as realistic as they are eye-catching. Though, with tons of praise already coming in the early “The Witcher” reviews, fans may not have to worry too much.

Given the fact that “The Witcher” special effects team is Cinesite, which Deadline reports just received a $112 million investment, fan anticipation for “The Witcher” release is warranted, to say the least. Cinesite has worked on a variety of other massive-scale projects, including “Game of Thrones” and “Avengers: Endgame.”

Cinesite isn’t the only one bringing “The Witcher” to life, though. “The Witcher” VFX team will feature work from several other production houses, including Framestone, NVIZ, One of Us, and Platige Image. Julian Parry is acting VFX supervisor and Gavin Round is VFX producer on the Netflix dark fantasy series.

Parry, who has worked on “Vikings,” “The Terror,” and “The King,” spoke with SFX Magazine (via Redanian Intelligence) about enlivening “The Witcher” and bridging the Continent to the real world. The real world’s most sickly and gnarly entities offered him the best inspiration.

“As I’ve gone through life I’ve seen really weird, strange, sick things, and I thought, ‘How can I get that into this creature?’”

Given its more horror-centric tone, the show's monsters should be some of the most gruesome and terrifying, more so even than the "The Witcher" books or video games. However, the monsters aren’t all that make “The Witcher” so fantastical.

Parry added, “We’ve got the Nilfgaard armies, which can’t exist because they are 10,000-plus of them. Same with the Temerians and the Cintrans. The armies physically can’t exist here on set.”

“The Witcher” boasts epic monster fights, war-ravaged battlefields with Cintra and Nilfgaard going head-to-head, as well as unbelievable magic made all-the-more believable through the VFX work of Cinesite and other companies. Evidenced by all the promotional material thus far revealed, Netflix’s “The Witcher” will seemingly attempt to topple its rival, “Game of Thrones,” with practical special effects over CGI.

Showrunner Lauren Schmidt Hissrich told Premiere magazine (via CBR), “It was important for the show to have an authentic style.”

She added, “A superb video game already exists, and I really didn't want our show to look like it.”

“The Witcher” makes its monstrous debut Friday.

The Witcher Yennefer
Anya Calotra's Yennefer enters the Brotherhood of Sorcerers in "The Witcher." Netflix/Katalina Vermes
RELATED STORIES