The Witcher Season 3 Is Seriously Down In Netflix Viewers
Viewership for The Witcher Season 3 appears to be down about 30 percent from the previous season. According to Kotaku, the people at a Witcher fan site called Redanian Intelligence have done their own analysis of Netflix viewing data that indicates the viewership dip. Fans of the streaming series, of course, have begun their own speculations regarding why fewer people seem to be turning out this time around.
Redanian Intelligence based their assessment of The Witcher Season 3’s popularity on data from Netflix, which used to just show the number of hours a season had been streamed but has now been adjusted. Those hours are now divided by a season’s overall runtime.
Viewership for The Witcher Season 3 appears to be down 30 percent from Season 2.
Taking that approach, the site’s staff found that Season Two had 310 million viewing hours over the course of its first 10 days which, divided by its runtime, comes out to a total of 41.8 million views.
However, in its first 11 days, The Witcher Season 3 had racked up 139.5 million viewing hours which means, according to the same formula, that it’s had 29 million views. This is how the site figures that 30 percent decline in viewership. The steep drop is not the only thing, though, that is plaguing this season.
Why The Witcher Viewership Is Decreasing
It’s no secret that The Witcher Season 3 is the final season for star Henry Cavill, which one might think would actually increase viewership with fans eager to see his Geralt one last time before the role passes to Liam Hemsworth in Season 4. But it could also be that fans are angry that he’s leaving and don’t want to engage. More likely, it’s a combination of at least two factors that have led to the current viewership slump.
The first thing that might be dragging The Witcher Season 3 down is that the season has been broken into two parts. Unlike other streaming services like Paramount+ that release series one episode at a time over a course of weeks, Netflix still relies on the model it pioneered: dumping entire seasons out at once. This, of course, led to the once-ubiquitous but now somewhat waning trend of binging.
With The Witcher Season 3 dropping in two chunks, fans might be waiting to watch it all at once. This makes some sense since, now that the first five episodes in the season are out, there are only three remaining in the second part. But the split itself is only one factor.
The other factor in the viewings decline for The Witcher Season 3 might be Cavill’s exit. Given that this season is the swan song for his rendition of Geralt, fans might be even more motivated to wait so they can see the entire season uninterrupted.
With The Witcher Season 3 dropping in two chunks, fans might be waiting to watch it all at once.
While an increasing number of viewers and observers in fan culture have appreciated a return to the format of weekly releases for some properties, if one is going to binge, one might as well go the whole way with it, especially when saying goodbye to a beloved actor.
There is also the matter of the rather spotty reviews that have so far been doled out for The Witcher Season 3, which could be contributing to the slippage as well. Or maybe people are just on vacation. Whatever the reason, it remains to be seen how this season will shake out, even as Liam Hemsworth is getting ready to try on his white wig.
