The Witcher: Blood Origin’s Horrible Ratings Aren’t Just Because Of Review-Bombing – Looper

In September 2022, review bombing was heavily seen with the release of “The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power.” This led Amazon to halt reviews of the program on their website due to increasingly toxic comments from internet trolls. Toxic opinions are one thing, but fair and honest negative reactions are another matter, and typically more substantial than errant toxicity. “The Witcher: Blood Origin” is an example of the latter and not the former, as evidenced by its dismal critic and viewer ratings on Rotten Tomatoes. Professional reviewers are not holding back either, with Ben Travers of IndieWire observing, “The derivative origin story still misses its unborn monster hunter, as a simple story about the power of simple stories fails to conjure any power of its own.”

The Hollywood Reporter’s Angie Han was straight to the point by wryly stating, “To quote one of the characters, ‘it’s been done to death.'” Viewers were equally dismayed on a subreddit for the original Netflix series. Redditor u/Homzie83 said of the prequel, “It’s laugh out loud how bad it is, every tired fantasy trope and cliché is in full effect. My biggest complaint is the one guy at the end doesn’t say, ‘yeah I’m John witcher and it’s witchering time! 2/10.'” Inconsistencies with Andrzej Sapkowski’s books were also pointed out, with poster u/Vivec92 adding, “The elves also arrived with the conjuction [sic], they’re not native to the world. Gnomes and dragons are.”