The comparisons of Witcher to GoT are probably inevitable, given the common elements both shows have: magic, mythical monsters, sword battles, court intrigue, the somewhat cynical view of human nature, etc. But the two shows are really very different. Magic in GoT was always mysterious and vaguely defined, whereas many of the magical rules of Witcher have been carefully sculpted over numerous books and games. GoT avoided having any single "hero" of the story, while Witcher names the hero right in the title. GoT has magical creatures, but they're rare and awe-inspiring to residents of that world, while Witcher brings in a rich mythology of creatures and makes them omnipresent in society, always just at the fringes of human civilization, to say nothing of the demihuman races like Elves and Dwarves.

But the biggest difference between the two franchises is in how the stories are told. GoT was breathtakingly epic in scope; individual stories were just threads being weaved into the giant tapestry of that worlds history. The Witcher, on the other hand, while still building a broader story arch in the background, is a much more personal tale that focuses on the intimate details of each of the heroes stories. It's more of a story about a legendary magical family whose lives created an epic story rather than an epic story with legendary participants, if that makes sense.

The other key difference, and the reason I think Witcher might ultimately fare better than GoT did as the seasons continue, is that Witcher has a full set of stories about his adventures leading up to the climax of the larger story arc. GoT creators had a real challenge after they brought the story to the latest installment of Martin's books: everything he had built previously was contributing to a single conclusion. There really weren't a lot of reference points for them to take detours around that stories conclusion. They pretty much had no choice other than to try and press ahead of the creator, and the quality differences were pretty stark. But the producers of Witcher have plenty of runway to tell some of the well-crafted smaller stories in multiple books before they plunge ahead, and Netflix has the resources to allow them to make it look every bit as stunning as HBO did with GoT.

I've been a fan of Witcher since the very first game with its terrible English translations and beautiful, moody visuals (and its cheesecake collectible sex cards that they wisely dropped from the third game installment, lol). I have to admit though, I never pictured it as a live action thing. But now that I've seen the show I'm a huge fan, even if I thought one or two episodes missed the mark a bit. The visuals are incredible, they've remained mostly faithful to the source material (I know, I know, he doesn't have his silver sword), and Henry Cavill really embodies the character amazingly well. It all comes together to bring the fantasy world to life in a big way, and I can't recommend it strongly enough to fans of fantasy storytelling.