A relatively quiet week for Netflix news this week with most of the headlines being outside of Netflix’s control. Nevertheless, we’re back with your weekly recap of all the essential Netflix news you may have missed this week.
Missed our news recap of last week? Check back over the big headlines that dominated here.
The Witcher: Blood Origin Cast Reveal
Early in the week, Netflix’s new prequel series The Witcher: Blood Origin got its full cast reveal. Much of the cast was revealed ahead of time by our friends over at Redanian Intelligence.
Here are the main new castings:
- Michelle Yeoh as Scian
- Lenny Henry as Balor
- Dylan Moran as Uthork One-Nut
- Jacob Collins-Levy as Eredin
- Sophia Brown as Éile
- Nathaniel Curtis as Brían
meet the new cast joining THE WITCHER: BLOOD ORIGIN
Mirren Mack as Merwyn
Lenny Henry as Balor
Jacob Collins Levy as Eredin
Lizzie Annis as Zacaré pic.twitter.com/8eqfxTYCFx— Netflix Geeked (@NetflixGeeked) August 17, 2021
It’s a good time to be a Witcher fan right now with the animated movie heading to Netflix next week and season 2 of the main show hitting Netflix in December.
Over the weekend, Studio Mir (the studio behind Nightmare of the Wolf) released some character designs ahead of the Netflix release.
— Studio Mir 스튜디오미르 (@StudioMir2010) August 20, 2021
Lauren Hissrich lands a Netflix overall deal
Sticking with The Witcher for just a second longer, Lauren S. Hissrich the creator and showrunner behind the main The Witcher series landed an overall deal with Netflix this week.
The deal means that Hissrich will continue working on The Witcher projects for Netflix and work on other projects too.
In a statement Hissrich said the following:
“I am so thrilled to have found my home at Netflix, and can’t wait to continue what’s been an incredibly fulfilling creative partnership. While my heart belongs to The Witcher Franchise, I equally look forward to digging in on other exciting projects for their global audience in the years to come.”
Hulu and Netflix Continues Fight With Local Governments on… Tax
Streaming taxes aren’t a new concept but court battles continue with Law.com reporting on separate filings from both Netflix and Hulu arguing that sharing revenues would “violate the federal Internet Tax Freedom Act”.
To the average Netflix user, this doesn’t mean much for the moment but should the floodgates open, it’s hard to believe any cost wouldn’t be eventually passed onto the consumer.
Manifest Season 4 Renewal Hopes Ongoing
If you’re on Twitter, the chances are you’ve seen the campaign to revive Manifest the show which has been lighting up the Netflix top 10s in recent months.
Deadline reports that things are moving on the resurrection with deals currently being put in place for talent in front and behind the camera.
Season 3 of Manifest arrived on Netflix US this weekend too with Netflix Canada due to receive the series later in the month.
Netflix Maintains 7% in Nielsen’s The Guage
In a chart endorsed by Reed Hastings, the Nielsen pie chart labeled The Guage tracks overall viewing habits in the United States.
In July 2021, Netflix continues to have 7% of overall viewing with streaming as a whole ticking up from 27% to 28%.
Netflix was at 6% in May 2021 before rising to 7% in June 2021.
Other Netflix Headlines
- Gabriela Tavakoli has jumped to Netflix after almost ten years at Discovery Inc’s TLC. She notably helped craft the popular 90 Day franchise that includes titles like 90 Day Fiancé, 90 Day Fiancé: Happily Ever After, 90 Day Fiancé: Before the 90 Days or 90 Day Fiancé: The Other Way.
- Never Have I Ever was renewed for season 2.
- Derek Tsang has been attached to direct David Benioff and D.B. Weiss’s new series Three-Body Problem.
- Brandon Katz of Observer did a deep dive into available Netflix viewership and define what constitutes as a hit.
- Joe and Anthony Russo have left the Magic: The Gathering project at Netflix. In a huge departure, they’ll now be replaced with Jeff Kline.
Ty Burr’s Definitive Netflix Movie Watchlist
Finally, on a less “newsy” note, we’d push you towards Ty Burr’s excellent list of the 93 movies he personally recommends. Ty Burr is a former critic and writer for the Boston Globe who has branched out to write on Substack.
And looking to our stories for the week, we published our big fall 2021 movie preview which is the most stacked movie lineup we’ve ever seen. In addition, we reported early on in the week that Netflix’s US library now consists of 40% Originals.
That’s all the news for this week, let us know if we missed any big headlines in the comments.
