Ciri in The Witcher Season 4 – Picture: Netflix
Alongside the big boxing match between Canelo Álvarez vs. Terence Crawford this past weekend, Netflix debuted its long-awaited first look for The Witcher season 4, alongside announcing its release date for October 30th. Alongside the new season, we’ve learned, Netflix will be debuting the long-awaited and troubled production The Rats as a stand-alone film dubbed A Witcher Tale.
The Rats: A Witcher Tale has been somewhat of an open secret for quite some time. You’ll find our first preview for the series, which went under the codename Riff Raff, as early as 2023, with the project rumored long before that, as early as 2021. It ultimately did get into production in South Africa in 2023. While it was in production, it eventually ended prematurely, with subsequent reporting labeling the production as a “disaster.” To date, Netflix has never officially announced the series.
Originally meant to be a stand-alone series, akin to that of The Witcher: Blood Origin, the troubled production ultimately looked poised at various points to be axed entirely.
Reporting, mostly from Redanian Intelligence, began surfacing throughout 2024, suggesting that it’d be worked into season 4 as a special episode, worked into flashback sequences throughout season 4, or even a stand-alone movie (special episode) of some description. Netflix has opted for the latter of those options.
To date, the only logline about the story of The Rats has been, “Six teenage thieves must rely on their criminal skills as they plan the biggest heist of their careers against the most dangerous crime ring in the kingdom.”
The new special episode, which we believe will be labeled a film, is directed by Mairzee Almas (The Sandman, Shadow & Bone) with Haily Hall as writer. The Witcher showrunner Lauren Hissrich and executive producer Tomek Baginski are producing this series.
No runtime or first looks just yet, although they’re expecting them in the coming days and weeks.
Who’s in The Rats: A Witcher Tale?
The Rats in season 3 episode 8 of The Witcher – Picture: Netflix
As previously announced and already found in the show, the gang of teenage criminals called The Rats consists of Giselher, Mistle, Kayleigh, Iskra, Reef, and Asse. They are played by Ben Radcliffe, Christelle Elwin, Fabian McCallum, Aggy K. Adams, Juliette Alexandra, and Connor Crawford, respectively. They all made their first appearance in these roles during The Witcher Season 3 Episode 8 and will reprise their roles in this spin-off.
Additionally, the 80s and 90s action star Dolph Lundgren has been cast as a ruthless rogue witcher from the School of the Cat called Brehen. Brehen briefly appears in Andrzej Sapkowski’s Season of Storms, where he has a confrontation with Geralt of Rivia. Deoudone van der Merwe as Junpier, Morgan Santo as Dulcie and Stevel Marc as Lord Ridot round out the currently known cast.
The Witcher will be coming to an end on Netflix with its upcoming fifth and final season, which is in the final portion of filming in the United Kingdom as we speak. Season 4’s announcement over the weekend was met with, it’s fair to say, a mixed to negative response to Henry Cavill being replaced by Liam Hemsworth. Truthfully, the IP at Netflix has never been a slam dunk. While season 1 earned a lot of goodwill with audiences, subsequent seasons that felt misguided, a split season 3 that caused viewership to drop, behind-the-scenes drama, and spin-offs that have either been critical disasters (The Witcher: Blood Origin) or scrapped entirely (kids’ Witcher project) mean The Witcher’s legacy on Netflix will be clouded. Fingers crossed that these final two seasons and maybe even this new stand-alone special can go some way toward repairing that legacy.
Netflix declined to comment on speculation.
Are you looking forward to The Rats: A Witcher Tale? Let us know in the comments down below.
