Endiness made a beautiful long post with all his quotes on that topic that I think is very informative and worth looking at, so hereās a link to that. And with that already discussed, I thought Iād make a thread of all his changes that we are aware of, because when you look into them, you find that none of his ābook accurateā changes are actually book accurate.Ā
His decision to make Geralt grunt and cut his lines.
HC: "All the grunts, I either added or I didn't say anything and just grunted instead. It was often up to the other actors to go, 'I think he's not gonna say anything now.'"
JB: "Henry likes to cut his lines, 'cause he's lazy. No, he literally just likes to cut them. He likes to do more up here [frames his face with his hands] and just with face and hmms and grunts. There's a lot of hmms, and so I often have to take a lot of his lines and turn it into a lot of my stuff so that the plot happens."
So, as everyone who has read the books knows that Geralt is and always has been a yapper. Gerakt often talks or thinks in monologues, and definitely not in short grunts.
Of course when the audience started making fun of Geralt for not being able to speak in full sentences Henry promptly went back on admitting the blame and instead said that the big bad writers were the ones who didn't give him lines, and now it was his lifeās mission to fight for a book accurate Geralt who speaks.Ā
After S2 came out, Lauren received a lot of backlash for Roachās death scene, with multiple sources citing that she wanted the moment to be more ācomedicā before the brave Henry Cavill stepped in and refused to participate in such horrible anti source material activities.
LH: "Henry was so unhappy with the line. Finally I said, 'You know what, you come up with something. I trust you, you know this material so well, you know the book so well, you don't even have to pitch it to me.' And he came back the next day with a beautiful speech that's at the end of 'Sword of Destiny' when Geralt is facing death.ā
This is the line he ended up using:
āEnjoy your last walk across the meadow and through the mist. Be not afraid of her for she is your friend."
This was Laurenās response AND the original line.
LH: āHere's what was scripted, in homage of the fact that a previous Roach had existed, and another one will exist soon. It's hardly a joke. Henry wanted a longer, more emotional moment, which I was more than happy to give him. Don't create drama where none exists.ā
So in S2 Geralt ends up quoting a part of his monologue from āSword of Destinyā when heās at his lowest after thinking that Yennefer had died at the battle of Sodden Hill, and he has nothing left to live for. Which to me doesn't work that well with Roach at all. That line was a response to Geralt thinking he's lost the love of his life, not his horse. In my opinion, the original line Lauren penned out is more heartfelt and actually more emotional and more book accurate as well.
The absolute removal of any Triss and Geralt āromanceā
This one we donāt have that much information on in comparison to others. But there were multiple reports that at the beginning of S2 Triss and Geralt were supposed to have some kind of a romantic scene with each other which then was cut during production, and it was largely speculated that it was due to Henry Cavill.Ā
āSeveral months ago we reported on a sex scene happening between Geralt and Triss, sometime in the first half of Season 2. That didnāt happen, as we all saw, but hereās what we know about the original plan for that:
Geralt and Triss are in a room together, they seem friendly at first. They are playing some kind of weird game. Whoever wins a round, gets to ask a question. Weāre not privy to the exact flow of the conversation, but it eventually leads to both of them ending up in bed.
We can only guess why this was cut, but perhaps it was thanks to Henry Cavill.ā
Now, irrelevantly on your feelings on book Triss and Geralt you have to admit that that short-lived āromanceā is indeed a part of the books and therefor book accurate. So the removal of it would go against Mr Iām fighting to make this show as much book accurate as possible.Ā
The removal of the Yen and Geralt sex scene in S2
"We just wanted to be very careful that it was true and real, and it didn't turn into something that we, as actors, didn't believe it should be," Cavill stated. When Yennefer and Geralt unite, they embrace, but it doesn't go further than that. He continued: "We wanted it to be emotional rather than sexual. It was really, really important, and we had to lean away from what was originally on the page." Initially, Geralt and Yennefer were written to have a more passionate night.
Henry Cavill and Anya Chalotra went to "The Witcher" producers and explained why they thought a steamy evening was not the way to go. "These are people who believe one thing about the fate of another and then find out something else is true," Cavill said about Geralt believing Yennefer was dead. "That's not how they behave," the actor added. "How they behave is they just want to be with the person and emotionally recognize their existence again in that shared space.ā
This one is a bit tricky because I am willing to get behind an actor who doesn't want to do a sex scene out of comfort reasons or whatnot, but Henry saying that "That's not how [Yennefer and Geralt] behaveā, is quite absurd in my opinion. Because that is very much how Geralt and Yennefer behave, especially in the short stories and ToC. They are inherently a very sexual couple who come crashing in and out of each otherās lives while having very passionate sex. But I can understand wanting this scene to be more āemotionalā (as if sex isn't emotional), so this one I am willing to give him a bit more leeway on. (But then again looking at the blinds saying that he refused any sex scenes because oh his āidealsā and was allegedly really nasty to Anya about it, well..)
Geralt being the perfect father figure to Ciri with no flaws and no struggles (which inevitably snowballed into the Yen Betrayal Arc)
This one I donāt see talked that much at all, and to me this one is his most detrimental one.Ā
@LHissrich: āIn interviews, Henry explains how he felt strongly that Geralt NOT be bumbling, nor a struggling father figure. In fact, a lot of S2 is about how Geralt does come from a loving (albeit unconventional) family. Henry was passionate about this shift, and we discussed it a lot, and ultimately thought it was wonderful for his character development. But it also had the domino effect of changing what Ciri needed from Yen when she entered the picture. Thus, introducing the idea of balance.ā
So I donāt know about you, but I love when characters have flaws and naturally progress be it for good or bad, some would say that that's what story telling is about, well that someone wouldn't be Henry Cavil. Geralt being a struggling father figure at first, someone who makes mistakes and learns from them and tries is very much a prominent theme in Blood of Elves and is actually very real, people make mistakes! Especially in huge shifts such as ābecoming a father overnightā but we didn't get that because Henry refused to play it that way. What we got is Geralt who already basically knows exactly how to parent, he always knows what to say, what pep talk to give and also doesn't hold any resentment and any negative feelings towards Vesemir at all. It's all one dimensional happy family here! Which goes against not only the books but what he preached about fighting tooth and nail to make the āforgottenā male characters three-dimensional as well because the horrible feminist Lauren only thinks about female characters.Ā
Lauren then goes on saying that āit also had the domino effect of changing what Ciri needed from Yen when she entered the picture. Thus, introducing the idea of balanceā So, it is fair to speculate that Henryās refusal to showcase Geralt having any flaws at all and act book accurate snowballed into The Controversial Yennefer Betrayal Arc.Ā
These are the ones that I can remember off the top off my head, so there might be more, thereās probably more that we arenāt even aware of. I think putting them all together showcase a very interesting picture. One of Henry Cavill never actually understanding who Geralt fundamentally is as a character, and of him not being a team player at all. I just hope that more and more people are aware of the insane PR his team did for him when it came to this show, and that more people are able to see through it.Ā
