The Witcher S1E3 Review – Betrayer Moon

by Fanboy SEO · December 23, 2019

Betrayer Moon is a pretty apt title for this episode because the Witcher team definitely upped the ante for the third episode. Here’s my The Witcher S1E3 review for the series which is now streaming on Netflix.

Also there will be spoilers in this post so SPOILER ALERT:

The Witcher takes on the toughest challenge yet in this series as we see Geralt of Rivia thrust once more into the world of politics and kings; a thing that made him a big name in their world. Meanwhile Ciri continues her quest to find her would be guardian and Yennefer makes the necessary changes to change her life completely with a really, really big cost.

Let me start this The Witcher S1E3 review by saying that I truly loved this episode. 3 episodes in and i’m deeply engrossed in the TV version. It found the right balance between action and intrigue and ofcourse there’s a bit of sex and nudity here for you horny toads out there. Above that though, Netflix’s Witcher series gives readers a lot of meat to bite on. Its also one of the episodes that shares one of the many many sidequests from The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt which has become one of the best video games for this generation and even beyond.

Betrayer Moon was a good title because there’s a number of betrayals that happen in this episode. There’s the betrayal by African-American Younger Tom Jones Istridd who previously revealed her lineage to Stregobor who in turn uses it to his advantage. There’s the Temerian official Ostrit’s betrayal and subsequent misdeeds for this love for the dead princess Adda, the sister to the current King Foltest. There’s the betrayal of Foltest to his people for a shameful act he had committed. There’s also a betrayal in the final confrontation between Geralt and the episode’s monster, the Striga.

Here’s a quick video on what a Striga is…

All of this betrayal though makes the world of the Witcher series a tad more interesting and the characters more endearing for the viewers. It helps propel the story forward making us want to see more.

While episode 2 “Four Marks” closed strong with their now rapidly gaining popularity ending segment with Jaskier’s rendition of “Toss a Coin for your Witcher”, episode three is just strong all throughout.

Cavill’s Geralt gets to really be The White Wolf here both in terms of sexual conquest and unabashed semi-nudity, to his skill in battling monsters. Throughout the episode, Cavill also shows us how his imposing physique made for good entertainment as we see him be Geralt by punching and intimidating. He’s so good in this one that I really thought I was watching a cut scene from the game rendered at the max settings.

Yennefer’s story for this episode is also one for the books as Anya Chalotra transforms from the misshapen desperate girl to the woman who will one day become one of the most powerful sorceress in “The Continent” and one with the most political “clout”. We see her writhe in pain as she sheds her old body to be reborn into the one gamers and readers of the book are most familiar with. She really did good here.

And there’s a segment in this episode that firmly sets the timeline of the stories for our heroes. I love how they revealed that very subtly. I had to do a double take on that scene just to confirm what the captions read.

The action here was so good too. You can clearly see that Geralt meant his word that he’ll lift the curse on the Striga for various reasons including one that connects to a past job done wrong. That’s another sign of how good and how layered the character Geralt is. We also get to see more of Cavill’s Geralt taking liberties with his potions and drinks to help make the fight a fair one. And we also get to see magic here employed to fight the monster. This fight together with Yennefer’s transformation scene juxtaposed with each other was easily my favorite for the series.

This episode’s Ciri adventure was one of the weaker one too but she does end the book with a nice hint of where she’s going. This episode marks the first appearance of Triss Merigold too and I’m really making this a footnote because I’m not a fan of the casting and the acting. Maybe in the next few episodes we can warm up to the character yeah?