Ep. 59 — 205 "Turn Your Back" from Netflix's The Witcher (Part 1)
James from the US and Robin from the Netherlands join Alyssa for our discussion of Netflix’s The Witcher Episode 205 “Turn Your Back”. Very important bits include: the introduction of new antagonists, flipped perspectives, fresh combinations of characters, the importance of building trust between actors, a deep dive into the Elder Blood plotline, splitting the party, how “Turn Your Back” is realized throughout the episode, and ‘Twisted Mermaids’.
This episode is available at Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google Podcasts, and Stitcher.
In this Episode
[0:00] Cold Open
[0:57] Introduction
[3:44] Discussion
[29:18] “Tidings from Toussaint”
[32:10] “Dear Friend”, Listener Call-in Segment
[33:15] Discussion
[56:53] Outro & Credits
Relevant Links
Transcript
Cold Open
ALYSSA: Yeah, but that'll be super fun. I think by the time this episode comes out, it'll probably be quite some time after Belfast. It's gonna be weird listening back to this and knowing what chaos we cause.
JAMES: What if we hate each other?
ALYSSA: What?
JAMES: I said what if we all hate each other? You can delete me out of this episode, it'll just be you and Robin.
ROBIN: Aww, no.
ALYSSA: Perfect. It's just the way that I like it.
[Breakfast in Beauclair theme music by MojoFilter Media]
Introduction
ALYSSA: Welcome to Breakfast in Beauclair, a global Witcher Podcast. My name is Alyssa from GoodMorhen, and I’ll be your host as you, I, and our international hanza accompany Geralt of Rivia and his destiny, Cirilla of Cintra, across the Continent.
[I got a new mic!]
[Postponed: An Interview with Netflix’s Tom Canton (Filavandrel)]
[Patron Announcements]
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[Episode Details]
As for this episode, James from the US and Robin from the Netherlands call in for our discussion of Netflix’s The Witcher Episode 205 “Turn Your Back”. Join us as we discuss the introduction of new antagonists, flipped perspectives, fresh combinations of characters, the importance of building trust between actors, a deep dive into the Elder Blood plotline, splitting the party, how “Turn Your Back” is realized throughout the episode, and ‘Twisted Mermaids.’
In our mid-episode news segment, “Tidings from Toussaint,” Lars from Witcherflix shares TKTKTK. After the break, don’t miss our listener call in segment, Dear Friend.
Without further ado, let’s get to our discussion of Netflix’s The Witcher 205 “Turn Your Back” (Part 1).
Discussion
[Breakfast in Beauclair stinger by MojoFilter Media]
ALYSSA: Welcome to Breakfast in Beauclair, my name is Alyssa, and today I'm welcoming two fantastic members of our Hanza to the show. My first guest is the Sports Information Director at Lesley University who handles live statistics and recaps of every athletic event. He's a staple in the Americas D&D game playing Branson, Idun, and now Lyell and DMs our Call of the Netherdeep campaign on Sundays. He's the Hanza's resident superhero and comics expert, and also the host of this summer's Hanza meet-up in Boston. Please welcome James from the US. Hello James.
JAMES: Hi, everybody's coming to my house!
ALYSSA: Oh my god, we're not all going to go to his house.
JAMES: No, no, only some, but I'm, I can't wait, I'm so excited.
ALYSSA: It'll be super fun. I'm so looking forward to that. That's going to be in August, so if any of you guys are interested in going, please let us know and join the Hanza discord for details on that. You will also recognize my second guest from Breakfast in Beauclair Episodes 17 and 18, covering “Four Marks”. Since her first appearance on the show, she's now a master of arts and cultural history and has also finally finished The Witcher books. She's also one of the Hanza's original D&D players, playing Emilia and now Ginny in the European Games. Please welcome back Robin from the Netherlands. Hello, Robin.
ROBIN: Hello!
ALYSSA: It's so nice to have you back, you were such a delight on your first episodes. Your dissertation on women in The Witcher was one of my favorite episodes from that season, and I'm so thrilled to hear what you're going to bring back this time around.
ROBIN: Well, thank you so much. Yeah, it's so fun to be on another episode. Good times.
ALYSSA: Well, before we get to the actual episode content, obviously, I'd love to hear more about both of you. And we'll start with James. So, James, how did you get into the Witcher?
JAMES: At the end of 2019, my friends and I all went to see The Rise of Skywalker. And we were all so disappointed, and on the car ride home, we were all kind of just sitting in silence. And one of my friends says, “Hey, at least The Witcher's coming out next week, that looks pretty cool.” And we were like, “Oh, thank god, we have something to talk about.” And so yeah, I started with season one, I watched that. And then I loved it. So, I bought The Last Wish and I read the whole thing on a plane ride to Florida. So, when I got home, I bought all the rest of the books. I was like, “Okay, I'll read these over the next few months.” And then the pandemic happened. So, I read them all in a month. Bought an Xbox, played The Witcher 3 for the next couple of months, and now I'm here.
ALYSSA: It's always surprised me that, like, you came into the Witcher universe with the Netflix show, just because I think of your general vigor. Like, you're so excited and so passionate about it. And so enthusiastic, like I feel like you have the aura of somebody who came in during the games or the books. So, like, I'm surprised that it, like, happened so quickly. And then like you were part of the Hanza and then that's kind of it.
JAMES: Yeah, I mean, that's kind of how my brain does stuff. Like Game of Thrones, the exact same way. I watched season one, and I was like, alright, I'm fully in, reading everything, watching everything. Now that, now that that's over, this is kind of my, my next one.
ALYSSA: Yeah, and speaking of Game of Thrones at the time of recording, it's only May 1st, Happy Belletyn. But we will be going to Belfast at the end of the month for, like, our first European Hanza meet-up? And that's entirely because James is a Game of Thrones fan and is already going to be in Belfast.
JAMES: Yes.
ALYSSA: And has somehow convinced all of these Europeans to come meet him as well as me.
JAMES: It’s because of my charm and magnetic personality.
ALYSSA: No, that's not it. And Robin, you've been up to so many things. I feel like since you were last on the show. I know that you finished your masters, which is super exciting. Congratulations. What else have you been up to?
JAMES: Yeah, congratulations!
ROBIN: Aw, yeah. Thanks, thanks. I was thinking today about like, all the things that I've been up to. It was also May, I think, that we recorded that episode two years ago, it was the beginning of the pandemic. I am currently doing a board year with my choir and orchestra, which is what takes up like 80% of my life at the moment. So, lots of music, lots of organizing, lots of running around and being like, Instruments! People! You know? That's, that's like 80% of my life right now. It's very taxing, but also a lot of fun. And yeah, I wrote my master's thesis. I remember I think we talked about that, on that episode that I just finished my bachelor's thesis. So now I just finished my master's thesis. So it's like, yeah, I've been doing a lot.
ALYSSA: What was the subject of your master's thesis?
ROBIN: It was my choir and orchestra actually. My choir and orchestra is about 75 years old. It's very interesting how many young people come together and make music, especially music by Johann Sebastian Bach, even though that's like a very black and white view on it, but it's a very interesting [8:29] to me is if that's a word in English. And I was like, it's especially interesting if you look at the 60s, because that was a time in which old classical things just got thrown out the window by young people. So I was very interested in how people who were young in that time who were part of the protest generation, were also making that music and trying to combine all these roles and identities they had and how that changed the identity of the organization, really.
ALYSSA: Was there anything that, like, particularly surprised you in your research?
ROBIN: Not necessarily, but mostly stuff that just drew me in mostly just that they were having discussions in the early 60s about whether they could do dance parties?
ALYSSA: Yeah.
ROBIN: After concerts, because that's like a staple now, when, when we ever had a concert, we go have a party, but they were having like discussions, like, “Can we do that? Like, we as the board, do we think that's a bad idea, because it's decent, and it's not good for the atmosphere,” And I was like, damn, guys. So that was very interesting and that's like, drew me in this. This is a very interesting subject to talk about, because it's a very different worldview and you, like, that worldview was 1963, and it's just completely shifts in like, 5, 6, 7 years and that's just bizarre to me. So that whole decade is just super, super interesting. It took me a long time to write it, but I was very pleased with the result. And I'm still waiting until I can, like, show it to my fellow choir and orchestra people to be like, you know, look at how cool our organizations are, look at the history or, you know, a little bit like that.
ALYSSA: Yeah, I feel like university is such an interesting time to research, I feel like. Just because yeah, it's so transitory–
ROBIN: Yeah.
ALYSSA: –and you never have the same batch of people for longer than nine months, ten months really, and I'd imagine that it's one of those ecosystems that just circulates so quickly in terms of ideology and interests and all those things. It's a really interesting, like, petri dish study.
ROBIN: Yeah, absolutely.
ALYSSA: So, James, one of the things that you're, I think, famously infamously known for in the Hanza is your interest in like, comics, movies, all of the things. One of the questions that I love to ask guests on the podcast is for additional recommendations. So as far as The Witcher goes, do you have any recommendations in terms of comics or movies, or television shows that might interest listeners of Breakfast in Beauclair?
JAMES: I do. So, you can obviously start with the whole “old man taking care of a young child thing” and watch Logan. Obviously about Wolverine meeting his young clone, Laura. And then there's another, actually, X-Men related story in the mid to late 2000s. After “House of M”, where the Scarlet Witch decimates the mutant population, there's only like 198 of them left, a baby girl who's just been born, and she ends up being called the Mutant Messiah, like, she's the one who's going to bring back mutants, rebuild the population, make them Homo Superior again. For the next five years, there was like a three-part event saga called “The Messiah War” about Cable protecting Hope. It has the same vibes as Geralt and Ciri, this child of elder blood, child of immense power, who has the ability to change the world and all he wants to do is make sure that she is okay.
ALYSSA: Yeah, I feel like something called The Messiah War just feels very on the nose.
JAMES: Yes. Yep.
ALYSSA: I think for The Witcher especially, and we'll certainly see that, you know, in this episode, episode 205 "Turn Your Back". I think as Geralt is roaming around the continent and trying to look out for his child of destiny.
JAMES: Yeah.
ALYSSA: As we'll see. Today we'll continue our discussion of Netflix's The Witcher Season Two with Episode 205 "Turn Your Back". In which Geralt and Yennefer search for answers as Ciri, Triss, and Vesemir scheme back in Kaer Morhen. In the first scene, Lydia, I can’t even say this with a straight face. In the first scene, Lydia breaks Rience out of prison, in a flashback it's revealed that Rience was in the tavern as Jaskier performed Burn Butcher Burn. So. God.
JAMES: Talk about it.
ALYSSA: If you're a part of the Hanza and you're part of the Hanza Discord, you know that I have so many feelings about Rience as a character. If you've read the books, Rience is like the character to love to hate. And I was very stressed.
JAMES: Very stressed.
ALYSSA: Watching this episode, and I had, like, an epic meltdown because I love to hate this character. He's a, he's a dumb, incompetent, try-hard character in the books. It was the kind of thing that, like, when I saw him on screen, I was like, “Oh, no, why is he shirtless and oiled and scary.”
JAMES: I wrote in my notes “Rience is hot, Alyssa’s nightmare”.
ROBIN: Yeah.
ALYSSA: That’s not, it's not even the fact that he's hot. It's the fact that he's competent.
JAMES: That too.
ALYSSA: Like why did they make him so competent?
ROBIN: Honestly, the feeling that I had when reading the books, he, like, at the beginning, he doesn't necessarily feel incompetent, because I think that's something that happens later on that he that you're like, “Oh god, this dude”, I’m very neutral about this character. It's like, oh, yeah, he's scary, he wants to find Ciri. That's, that's scary enough.
JAMES: I think the thing about that is that at the start of the books he's facing off with Dandelion, who is also super incompetent.
ROBIN: Yeah.
JAMES: So, just by relation of that, Rience doesn't look super incompetent, but as we find out, he is.
ALYSSA: But we do get, like, a slightly different point of view on him and of Lydia, who we also met briefly in Blood of Elves. I actually really enjoy the majority of this perspective on the two of them, just because we see Lydia as a very capable character. She's coming down into these cells presumably below Cintra, they're not super explicit with where this person is, but we can assume it's probably in around Cintra, because he was imprisoned by Calanthe for 10 years. She comes down to this prison, finds Rience in a Dimeritium prison, where he's just kind of sitting in the corner and snapping his fingers and can't do anything because of the Dimeritium, which bars his use of magic. As they're chit chatting, it's clear that they at least have some passing relation with each other because they're familiar with each other's names. Then it's revealed that Lydia came to Rience specifically because she needs him to do a task for quote “her employer” and Rience is at first like, “I don't want to work for Nilfgaard” and she's like, “I didn't say anything about Nilfgaard” and he's suddenly interested.
JAMES: I love that. His only job requirement is “I will not work for Nilfgaard”. Presumably she tells him off-screen who her employer is, but I like the idea that he's like, “Not Nilfgaard, anything else. Works for me.”
ROBIN: I was thinking about Lydia and the way she's introduced into books and also who she works for, and then I felt like, if they're already introducing her and that she's working for somebody else, then we see her working for a specific person. Isn't there some reveal that is happening later on in the story in the books that is kind of already somewhat spoiled?
ALYSSA: Yeah.
ROBIN: Specifically who the employer is, who’s also after Ciri, which I feel like it's very carefully set up in the books. I was like, oh, I'm not sure how that's gonna play out. If they're already introducing Lydia here. I don't think it's a bad thing, or it's a bad idea. I'm just wondering how they're going to do that.
ALYSSA: I guess we can kind of parse spoilers on the podcast between what's been talked about in Blood of Elves versus what's coming up in Time of Contempt and on.
ROBIN: Yeah.
ALYSSA: So just as a recap for our listeners, when we first meet Lydia, I believe it's in chapter five of Blood of Elves? The lower half of her face is already gone, that disfigurement has already happened prior to the books taking place. This scene in question is from Tissaia’s perspective and she's going to visit Lydia's employer. Lydia is the one who greets them and kind of takes them through the house and serves them dinner and all that stuff. That's the context in which we get Lydia in the books. So, it's really interesting here, I would agree to, like, get her as her own autonomous person. She's up to something clearly, but she's also answering to somebody which makes it all the more interesting. I think, especially somebody who doesn't know the plot of the books, and then at some point, obviously Lydia breaks them out of jail, and then we have that whole gratuitous makeover scene in which, like, Chris Fulton is shaving and he takes off his shirt and he's super oily and it's just like oh.
JAMES: Looking great, looking great. Way to go, Chris.
ALYSSA: It's–okay. If you watch Bridgerton, Chris Fulton is the same actor that plays Sir Phillip Crane, Marina’s husband, and I don't remember how I found that out. But like, it was just mind-boggling to me, like, he definitely has the range, and he's so terrifying as Rience, and so unassuming as Sir Phillip Crane, but holy crap, like.
JAMES: He's so nice to Colin.
ROBIN: Yeah, he's so nice. Having seen both shows, I wouldn't have picked it out. Like, really. I wouldn't have seen it because it's not recognizable. If you've seen, like the first one or the other one. It's like so different. That's wild. I love it.
ALYSSA: Yeah, absolutely. Would have had no idea who's hiding like that freaking, like, washboard eight pack under all of his regency, oh man. But yeah, so it turns out he was in the tavern watching Jaskier as he was performing Burn Butcher Burn in the previous episode. So now we have a bit of a suspicion as to who might have attacked Jaskier at the docks.
JAMES: First of all, I love how the meaning of Burn Butcher Burn changes there, as it shows Rience and lingers on those words. And then we know later on in the episode that he's a fire mage, hear “Burn, butcher, burn” over his face, and you're like, uh oh, this is not going to go well for somebody. I also really enjoy how this episode, it's the first episode of the second half of the season. They take two scenes from the end of episode four and kind of flip the perspective, so in this one where we get a little bit of Jaskier doing his song and then the focus pulls away from him. We're still in the same scene, but now we're seeing that Rience was there the whole time, surprise.
ALYSSA: And as we move forward from the flashback in the tavern we are brought to Cintra. In this next scene Geralt's teleports into Istredd’s study in Cintra searching for relationship between the new monsters and the monoliths the mage studies. So, at the end of the last episode Geralt’s, uh, this is again the perspective shifting that James had mentioned, Geralt teleports into Istredd’s study and we get a brief, like, “Who goes there?” But in this episode, we get the scene from Istredd's perspective, since we last saw Istredd, maybe in episode, like, two or three? He's since made it to Cintra from Aretuza, and he's kind of muttering to himself that he's been given work from Fringilla, and he's just like, “Boats are no longer safe for elves, says Fringilla. Now we need a land route to Cintra, says Fringilla. Well, the Yaruga is flooded and unpassable, says Fringilla. Foltest has fortified Brugge beyond recognition. Brokilon. No. Merh.” And it's, it's a very cute little scene. He mutters to himself a lot in this season, because a lot of scenes are by himself. But it's cute. It's a little delightful.
ROBIN: Yeah.
JAMES: I love Royce Pierreson. I'm so glad that they found a way to keep Istredd in the story because once they do A Shard of Ice, he's gone. You don't see him again in the books, but I'm so, so glad that they found a way to keep him in, even if he said he's a monolith expert. I feel like that's a little narrow of a major. He's gonna have trouble on the job market if Ciri is destroying them all, but I'm so glad he's sticking around.
ROBIN: Yeah, and it is a good thing to hinge his character on then, if that's a thing in the lore that they want to move forward with, they’re like, “What can we attach Istredd to”, and then definitely a thing I like too. Also, I love the muttering bit too, that is just yeets a thing to the bust, and just like, he realizes mid-air like, oh shit, I shouldn’t have done that, just rushes to it too, like, save it from cluttering on the floor breaking. I love that, it was very funny.
ALYSSA: I will agree, like, with his character, I really like that they are continuing to use him, and it does make sense given that he's a historian, he's an archaeologist.
JAMES: Yeah.
ALYSSA: So, to have him go through the plotline and storyline that he has this season, I feel like makes a lot of sense.
ROBIN: Yeah.
ALYSSA: So, I'm, you know, thrilled to be seeing him back. And we'll kind of get to dive in, in this episode specifically, and really lean on Istredd, as we'll see Geralt to do as well. After portaling into the library, Geralt reveals that Triss sent him to Istredd for information, and while Istredd initially, you know, like brushing them aside, Geralt convinces him by unbagging the Myriapod head, and chucking it on the floor which startles him to say the least.
ROBIN: It's probably something that was said in the previous episodes as well, because this happens twice, but Geralt needing to sit down–
JAMES: Yes.
ROBIN: –after the portal because he's probably a bit nauseous or something. It's so, it's great. I love that little touch. It's like little touches here and there of that kind of comedy. It's just. I love it.
JAMES: Obviously, we've seen this from Geralt’s side, what he's doing, where he's going, who he's going to talk to, but Istredd is just doing his homework, and then all of a sudden, this large, dirty man has walked into your library and thrown a monster head on the floor. I would not be into that.
ALYSSA: Which he leaves there. We discover he leaves it there for the rest of the episode.
JAMES: Yeah, Geralt, what the hell?
ROBIN: Yeah.
ALYSSA: Just clean it up.
JAMES: You’re not gonna need that later?
ALYSSA: Oh, man.
ROBIN: I really liked that they're pairing Istredd and Geralt here, like, if they're going to still adapt A Shard of Ice, then I really liked that they've met each other before. And it's an unnatural pairing in terms of characters, but narratively speaking, it makes a whole heap of sense. I think. I like that a lot.
JAMES: Yeah. And that's kind of the theme of this episode. We have Triss and Vesemir, butting heads. Yen and Jaskier, trying to escape. And then there's Geralt and Istredd, this whole episode is these odd pairings put together. And there's not a ton of action in this episode.
ROBIN: Yeah.
JAMES: It's kind of all, you know, moving the plot forward.
ROBIN: Yeah.
JAMES: Discussing things, and that's never a bad thing. I love episodes like that in any show. So, I'm glad that they're taking this opportunity to put these characters that you’ll not necessarily expect to work together or have to work together. Just putting them together and seeing the magic that happens, especially in the case of Yen and Jaskier.
ALYSSA: Yeah, absolutely. I had to mentally pause when you were just like, ‘I love shit like this.’
JAMES: I do love shit like this.
ALYSSA: In the next scene, Yennefer searches Jaskier at the docks having left the boat bound for Cintra. Back in the tavern Jaskier’s tortured by Rience, and in the morning Yennefer approaches sex worker to see if she can find information about Jaskier. At the cut off of episode four, Yen had her little eyeballs peeking out of the ship and that's just how we ended the episode.
JAMES: I love that shot so much.
ALYSSA: It was definitely like a cliffhanger, but just the shot itself was a little bit funny. As she actually leaves the boat, she has to make that decision whether to board again or whether to actually, you know, run off and really look for Jaskier. And as she's making this decision, we're watching the guards from the dock, stringing up Ba'lian, the elf from the previous episode by his feet, and he's clearly dead, which is a really sad outcome for that storyline from episode four.
ROBIN: Just the whole thing with the elves is just. It's so sad this season, especially because in Cintra, they're trying to, like, keep the hope up. But considering what else will happen with Francesca and her baby. It's kind of like, aw, man, this is going to be sad.
ALYSSA: Yeah.
ROBIN: You already know it.
JAMES: Yeah, I know Alyssa, you've mentioned this in previous episodes, but I, I really liked that they're doing stuff with the elves and Nilfgaard. Making that connection actually something that we get to see, instead of just hearing about secondhand. The POV here is usually going to be from Fringilla, which you don't necessarily trust everything she's doing because, you know, who she's working for, what she's coming from. But in the books with so much of the information we get about this coming from the Scoia'tael, who are also very, very unreliable narrators, just based on their position in the world and what they're fighting for. It is nice to actually see some version of what is going on behind the scenes, so we can understand it ourselves.
ALYSSA: At this point, we leave Yennefer, we're back in the tavern with Jaskier and Rience, where Rience has bound Jaskier to a chair and just starting to interrogate him about Geralt. This is pretty similar in terms of content to what we see in Blood of Elves. Yeah, so, we start to see the beginning of that interrogation and we see how panicked Jaskier really is.
ROBIN: We already see how great both of these actors really are.
JAMES: Yeah.
ROBIN: Because this is already, like, I always feel like torture scenes must be one of the hardest things to, to really act. How do you act like you're so much in pain, like, you're probably never hopefully never have been that much of a pain in your life? How are you going to act that, like?
ALYSSA: Right.
ROBIN: I'm just very, I'm always very impressed when people do that, doing it, but also when they pull it off very well it must be very emotionally draining. So, I always have, like, huge respect for both actors involved.
ALYSSA: It must be insane, like, trying to calm down from that as well and trying to release that character.
JAMES: Yeah.
ALYSSA: I feel like I've heard of actors who when they do very emotionally intense scenes, or have emotionally intense characters or storylines that they have to, like, it'll take them weeks or months to sometimes come down from like, what their character was feeling and what they experienced in character, which isn't a light, a light subject at all.
JAMES: There has to be so much trust between the actors to be able to do that, like, going back to Game of Thrones, the actors who played Ramsay and Theon, during seasons three and four, it's all torture, it's all torture of Theon. You know, the way they got through it is just becoming friends outside of it. They would just go to pubs together after filming, just hang out, and they're like best of friends for life now. They had to build that trust to pull through these scenes, and another thing about this scene, so you kind of see how loyal of a friend Jaskier is to Geralt. Even though he's so angry at him. He's written this biting song about him about all the bad shit he's done to him, he left him. He hasn't seen him in months, but he can't give Geralt up, he's not going to do it. This is one of the first times that you really see the effect that Geralt has on these people. He's not going to give them away.
ALYSSA: I wonder if like the way that they have intimacy coordinators for, you know, romantic scenes or sexual scenes in film. I wonder if they have intimacy coordinators or like something adjacent for scenes like this? Because like, going back to your note about trust, like I wonder if that's something that, actually, probably should be monitored on set for sure.
JAMES: I believe they usually had, for Game of Thrones, I think they had a couple of therapists on hand just in case.
ROBIN: Yeah.
JAMES: For throughout the show. It's, it was such an intense show, anybody might need a therapist, and I believe I read somewhere that The Witcher has one as well. Don't quote me on that. Cut this out if I'm wrong, I don't want to look like a fool, but.
ALYSSA: I probably won't cut it out.
JAMES: Okay. That’s, that’s alright, that's fine. I’ll take it.
ROBIN: Something, a thought that I had about, like, acting in general as a job, what you were saying about that people will sometimes have weeks or months to, like, let go of a character and really come back to yourself. It's like, it could totally imagine that, that can cause, like, small identity crises like, like acting you're usually people who are very talented, but you probably also, like, need to have the talent to be able to deal with that, especially if you're playing very emotionally taxing characters. So, like, again, like this is just praise and just respect for people who are actors like, damn. So cool.
ALYSSA: Absolutely. And you know, as we move forward throughout the episode in the season, we'll get to see that as the season kind of hits it's emotional and action high. But before we move on, Yennefer and the sex worker.
JAMES: Oh boy.
ALYSSA: So, Yennefer goes up to a sex worker and tries to find out if she can get information about Jaskier. She asks the woman if she's available, basically. And the woman's like, “You're pretty, like, what do you want a twisted mermaid? It's gonna cost you extra. My knees aren't what they used to be.” It’s like–
JAMES: The twisted mermaid.
ALYSSA: What’s a twisted mermaid?
JAMES: I don't want to know what the twisted part of it is. I can't, I can't even imagine.
ALYSSA: You need your knees.
JAMES: Apparently, you do.
ALYSSA: That’s the only thing we know.
ROBIN: Yeah, apparently.
ALYSSA: We see Yennefer give her some sort of currency, and then the woman takes a little bite out of it. And “it's like, alright, you know, I'll go I'll go see if there's a Jaskier or any information about a Jaskier down at the barracks.” And then kind of wanders off, and this feels like the worst part of a D&D game of like, holy crap, what NPC did I just get?
JAMES: The party is split.
ROBIN: Oh.
JAMES: One of them is making bad decisions.
ALYSSA: Hey, James, what's that like? You think?
JAMES: I plead the fifth.
ALYSSA (VOICEOVER): Before we continue our discussion, we’re going to hand it over to Lars from WitcherFlix for recent news on the Netflix show. When we come back, James, Robin, and I will continue our discussion of “Turn Your Back”.
“Tidings from Toussaint”
[“Tidings from Toussaint” theme music by MojoFilter Media]
LARS FROM WITCHERFLIX: Hey, it's Lars from WitcherFlix and this is "Tidings from Toussaint". Welcome back everybody! The filming for Season 3 is still in full swing, but it has becoming harder and harder to learn what exactly is happening on the Witcher set. As a result, this is a very short installment of "Tidings from Toussaint".
After all in all two weeks of filming, the Witcher crew has wrapped its production in Morocco. Thanks to Redanian Intelligence we know that Freya Allan was present during the filming in the deserts around Erfoud. Moreover photos were posted on social media that confirmed that at least two white horses have been on the Witcher set. Of course, this whole scene makes you think of Ciri's episode in the Korath desert. This means that one or both horses will almost definitely stand in for unicorns. We can expect that their horns will be digitally added in post production. This would also mean that a very special unicorn named Ihuarraquax is confirmed to appear in Season 3.
But not only unicorns will make an appearance in the Korath desert in Season 3. According to Gaia Mondadori's posts on Instagram she has been in Morocco as well to film some scene. Gaia played Ciri's mother Princess Pavetta in Season 2 and 3. This means that Pavetta could appear in another dream or vision sequence as well when Ciri wanders the deserts. Moreover, KFTV reports on a new rumor: The Witcher could continue its global tour as the crew could move to Costa Rica and possibly the Maldives in the coming weeks for filming establishing shots, which means that no cast members would be involved. We will see if this rumor is true.
Before I finish this tiny episode "Tidings from Toussaint", there are still two great pieces of news to report: First, Season 2 of The Witcher has earned itself three Emmy nominations. The show was nominated for Outstanding Fantasy/ScFi costumes, Special Visual Effects and Stunt Coordination. Congratulations to everyone involved! I am already keeping my fingers crossed for the big Emmy night! Second, Netflix has finally shed some light on the release date of the Witcher spinoff miniseries "Blood Origin": Unfortunately they aren't too specific, but Netflix UK posted on Twitter that Blood Origin will be released "later in 2022". This isn't a lot, but it is something. Good to hear official news about Blood Origin again!
Anyway guys, that's it for me for today. I hope you all stay safe and well. We'll talk again in the next episode of Breakfast in Beauclair. Until then, thanks again for listening and good luck on the path!
[“Tidings from Toussaint” theme music by MojoFilter Media]
“Dear Friend…”: Listener Call-in Segment
[Music by MojoFilter Media]
ALYSSA (VOICEOVER): Hi everyone! Welcome to our listener call-in segment, “Dear Friend…”. Keep on listening as members of our international hanza share their thoughts on what we’re discussing in this episode:
MICHELLE: Transcript to come.
CHRISTIAAN: Transcript to come.
ALYSSA (VOICEOVER): Thanks to Michelle and Christiaan for sending in their thoughts on Episode 205 “Turn Your Back”! Hear your voice in a future “Dear Friend…” segment by emailing greetings@breakfastinbeauclair.com or DMing the podcast on social for more information.
[Music by MojoFilter Media]
Discussion
ALYSSA (VOICEOVER): Hey everyone! Welcome back from the break. When we left off, Geralt had sought out Istredd for his expertise on the Continent’s monoliths as Yennefer searches for Jaskier, who is being tortured by the recently escaped fire mage, Rience.
And we circle back around to Geralt and Istredd, who heads to the Stellacite monolith outside of Cintra. This will be a familiar location to everybody who's seen season one episode one, The End’s Beginning, and continually throughout the series we've talked about and seen this monolith outside of Cintra, and now we get to revisit it after the Battle of Cintra. This scene is really just Geralt and Istredd kind of walking on the path like having a bit of a chitchat, and Istredd trying to suss out Geralt and why he's actually here, and Geralt being like, “Uh, because monsters, right?”
JAMES: Protecting the world, making sure everyone's safe.
ALYSSA: Yeah, obviously. It's like a bit of a silly little conversation.
JAMES: Every conversation they have is a silly little conversation, if we're being honest here.
ALYSSA: Oh my god, they're, they're equally dumb in a different way from Rience, but we're gonna get to that.
ROBIN: Yeah.
ALYSSA: We're gonna get to that in the next few scenes.
ROBIN: Yeah, but I love how they're bouncing off of each other though.
JAMES: Oh, they have such great chemistry.
ALYSSA: Yeah.
ROBIN: Yes. And they're like just, it would perfectly set up like a rivalry for A Shard of Ice if this is like the energy that's happening between them so I love that.
JAMES: Their little fight scene with the guards when Geralt knocks one out, and Istredd is like, “I can do it too.” Pow!
ROBIN: Yeah. Like upstaging each other.
JAMES: Yeah.
ALYSSA: Anything you could do I could do better. That's all that feels like.
JAMES: Exactly.
ALYSSA: I do you think you're right Robin, like if this is the energy that we're getting and there's like no stakes, like what happens when, when we start adding, like, romantic stakes to the equation.
JAMES: Oh, maybe that's a little foreshadowing. Geralt knows that Istredd is capable. And obviously Geralt is capable too, now, now Geralt knows, if I gotta fight this guy to the death for the love of my life, I gotta be careful.
ALYSSA: I don't know. I have, I have…we'll see what happens. But the one little, like, tidbit that we do get from Istredd here is that it's revealed that Calanthe didn't allow access to this monolith. The thing is that Nilfgaard question mark does? But we do hear that from Istredd off the top of the scene. But yeah, so we're starting to kind of put in the foundations for this mystery that'll take Istredd through the rest of the season.
ROBIN: What I was thinking like, if Calanthe was trying to hide this, there's like a lot of out of chronologic puzzle pieces in this episode, because first, like, when they're talking, Istredd says like, “Okay, the sheer force it would require what could possibly do that?” And that immediately, like, gives us the clue again, of like, okay, yeah, Ciri’s powers are strange, and slightly otherworldly, and perhaps like, something that is a bit impossible. It's also revealed that Calanthe did not allow access to the monolith. So maybe Calanthe was trying to hide her family's connection to these monoliths, and to the conjunction, which is what is implied throughout the second half of this episode. So, like, there's a lot of off-hand comments and things that are said in the scene that are actually like little clues already for where they think they're trying to do with this episode. So that's what I really like. Like there's little, little lines and puzzle pieces everywhere.
JAMES: Yeah, that's such a great point. I didn't pick up on that at all, that Calanthe wasn't just, I don’t know, trying to keep people away from it that she actually had this reason, because she doesn't like her bloodline. I never thought of that. That's a great point.
ALYSSA: Yeah. And it's something that we talk about more in Episode 206, as well as Istredd actually kind of uncovers all of this at Codringher and Fenn’s.
ROBIN: You know Geralt he says to, like, “Okay, are you okay with like, joining Nilfgaard and working, sort of, working for them to help the elves while you know they're actually mass murderers” and like, Istredd shoots back and like, as opposed to only helping people when there's coordinated, and like, there's a little bit of duality of morals going on here, which is also part of like, their little rivalry that they might be setting up here. But it's mostly the thought that I had about this is like, oh, yeah, they're, they're trying to show us again, like, this is a gray world. This is a world that is not black and white, like there's not good and evil. Istredd is someone who is trying to do something good, which is like help the elves, and Geralt’s like, “Yeah, but you know, you're also sort of helping Nilfgaard who are, like, mass murderers.” And if you read the books, but also if you've seen the first season, you already know about this world, like it's, it's gray, it's always gray. It’s never black and white, it's never good versus evil, there's always a big area in between. And that's, I feel like they're being consistent with that if they put in like little bits of that everywhere, too. So, I like that a lot.
JAMES: I think that's one of the spots in this episode that the title connects. Because “Turn Your Back”, it doesn't have a very specific point in this episode, where it's like, oh, that's what that means. But I think this is one of those where you can pick up on it is Istredd turning his back on the bad parts of Nilfgaard to do what he thinks is right, and then he puts that back on Geralt if there's money in it, you'll turn your back on any of your morals. And I think that carries through into the next few scenes as well in different places with different characters.
ALYSSA: And in the next scene, Ciri continues training as Triss and Vesemir quietly argue about using her blood to create more Witchers. So Ciri’s back up on the Pendulum, we see her she's really really going at it and she's training independently, which is awesome. And Triss comes up to her and is kind of telling her to, like, come inside and she's like, “No, I'm gonna train, I'm gonna get it right I'm going to be the best fighter I can possibly be.” And as Triss is walking away, Vesemir comes up and he tries to convince her again of their use of Ciri’s blood to create more Witcher mutagen. Triss says to Vesemir “you know what, I still think this is a terrible idea, but if we do it, it has to be her decision to participate.”
ROBIN: Yeah, I mean, we already had, like, a big discussion about it, even in text form which was really great, actually. If Ciri’s already on the Pendulum being like “I want to be big, stronk”, you know that, like I just need to, just need to be the best I can be. And that's like, the whole vibe that Ciri’s been having in this episode was she's like, I just gotta be good there is like this perfectionist streak here, which, like, kind of explains what she's going through in this episode. Yeah. How do you start this discussion?
JAMES: I did put it, I did put an extra note and at the end you did convince me of, I'm mostly on your side now. So, I have a few problems with the whole making more witchers plot line, starting with Vesemir as a character, first of all, most of this doesn't happen. So, Vesemir’s character is much smaller, his role is not as expansive.
ALYSSA: He’s in the books for exactly two chapters in Blood of Elves, and that's it. We never see him again.
ROBIN: Yeah.
JAMES: Yeah, so most, most of what we love about Vesemir is from The Witcher 3.
ROBIN: Yeah.
JAMES: This character feels inconsistent with that, which is fine. He's not supposed to be the exact same character in the video game, because technically, this show does not have much to do with the games. But after the whole situation with Eskel, he has become desperate, it is a decent continuation of his character from Nightmare of the Wolf. He's tired of watching his boys die over all these years, trying to raise them, and do the Trial of the Grasses and turn them into witchers to keep the family going, it's all about family with the witchers.
ROBIN: Yeah.
JAMES: I've always had trouble grasping the fact that the previous attempts at the Trials of the Grasses have been so scarring for him, that he would get this desperate this quickly to try it again. Obviously, having the opportunity with Ciri with her Elder Blood, which is growing flowers, that can get a man excited. I don't like the way I said that. I'm sorry. But then I also feel like some of this situation has to be put on Triss’ shoulders. She is the leading magical expert at Kaer Morhen right now, probably the smartest person in that entire building. She's essentially in charge of Ciri right now. Geralt has gone, he has kind of left the burden of taking care of her mostly on everybody there, but specifically on Triss and Vesemir. And Lambert to an extent. To hand it off to Robin in a second, I initially thought that Triss putting the decision on Ciri is reckless and dangerous because as you can clearly see in the background of this very shot, she is training her ass off on the pendulum to, like Robin said, become bigger and stronger, get those big muscles, beat everybody up who wants to kill her. So of course, she's gonna say yes. But, Robin, now explain why I am not fully correct.
ROBIN: I think Triss is trying to give agency back to Ciri, and that's like both Triss as a character as like a person within this universe, but also the writers through Triss, trying to give Ciri agency and I think that's something that returns later on in this episode, but that it's mostly about Triss giving Ciri the agency to be like, what does she want? Because there's a lot of stuff that's been going on Ciri’s life that's happened without her consent.
JAMES: Her entire life.
ROBIN: Yeah.
JAMES: Everything happens to her.
ROBIN: Exactly. And it's mostly just that Triss is now being like, yeah, okay, but a lot of stuff is decided about her and now she gets to decide herself, what she wants. And there's no talk yet about like what happens later with the Trial of the Grasses thingy, but it's just about giving her blood, and I feel like that makes sense.
ALYSSA: Right. But I feel like there's still a level of, like, guardianship. Geralt left his child surprise in Triss’ care.
ROBIN: Yeah.
ALYSSA: By entertaining this idea at all with Vesemir, she's still complicit, like, in the fact that it's even on the table by giving him the freedom to be like, “Okay, I can go like ask Ciri to do this now”, it almost feels like she's like, well, if I give her agency, then it's not my problem, because I told her she could what she wants.
JAMES: Yeah, not my fault!
ALYSSA: Exactly. It means she kind of, like, pushes the blame, any blame off of herself specifically because it was Ciri’s choice, and Vesemir is gonna go get her to do it. So, I'm kind of, like, mixed on it. In that, like, I do think it makes sense for Triss' character to want to respect Ciri’s decision and Ciri’s choice.
JAMES: Right.
ALYSSA: At the same time, it feels like a bit of a cop out.
ROBIN: Yeah, I think that is something that you can trace back to the way that this show is written. So that's an out-of-universe explanation for why I think this happens this way because it's, I think, it's all about giving Ciri agency as a character.
ALYSSA: Yeah.
ROBIN: Which we'll touch upon later. I think.
JAMES: I do also think that it's consistent with Triss’ character, like–
ALYSSA: Yeah.
JAMES: –she's one of the youngest sorcerers, relatively, she's naive, at least to start the books, passing this off to her quote unquote “sister”, is something that Triss would do. Like, if this was Yennefer it would be a different story, she would put her foot down, say, “Hell no, this is dangerous you're not doing it.” But Triss is very much kind of a person who would rather people make their own choices. And anything that Triss is doing right now is better than what she was doing at this point in the books, if we’re being honest.
ALYSSA: Ah, I mean, I guess. Yeah.
JAMES: At least she's doing something and not laying in the back of a cart.
ALYSSA: Right, right. Well, I guess at this point, she was still training Ciri—
ROBIN: Yeah.
ALYSSA: In magic and teaching her self-esteem.
JAMES: Yes.
ALYSSA: So maybe that teaching agency and self-esteem has maybe as you said, in the spirit of this character.
ROBIN: I think a lot of this also has to do with the fact that they sort of aged Ciri up a bit. So that also makes, like, a difference. Like she's also like, at some point later in this episode, she says I'm not a child. And that's like, very true in the show. Because in the, in the books, it would have been like a 12-year-old saying, “I'm not a child”, and you will be like, “Oh, yeah, you are.” But with a 15-year-old, that's different, so.
ALYSSA: We've had this conversation continually throughout every single episode of the podcast. Like no one really knows how old Ciri’s meant to be–
ROBIN: Yeah.
ALYSSA: –because she’s meant to be twelve in season one, but now it's only been, like, two months.
JAMES: She's nebulously a teenager.
ALYSSA: Yeah, she's somewhere there. It's unclear. We’ll–and you'll hear this conversation again in the next episode as well. And the next scene, as Yennefer fruitlessly attempts to help an elven mother and daughter, the Deathless Mother reaches out to tempt her. She's interrupted by the sex worker who recommends Yen try the first place she found Jaskier, the tavern. She finds Rience and Jaskier there and disfigures Rience in their escape. We start to see that, well, again, we go back to the discrimination and the violence that is being, is being imparted against elves. And we see an elven woman being separated from her child and taken away. Yennefer from the shadows attempts to help them with magic and is attempting to cast a spell, but as we know, it's not going to work. But then she gets that voice in the back of her head from the Deathless Mother, the Deathless Mother tells her: “Your power, you need it, all you have to do is ask”, and Yennefer shouts out loud, like no. So, she's still very much resisting this, but it's it is, as you said, James, heartbreaking that she's unable to help them.
ROBIN: I feel like she has a feeling that's a continuation of like, last season, like she feels like she needs her powers to be worthy as a human being or worthy of existing. Like, that's kind of the characterization they've given Yennefer. And even if she tries to, like, do something good in this world, she, she can't even do that, because she doesn't have her powers. And there's like this sense of helplessness and powerlessness, that she has not had for a long time, and that feeling of powerlessness is lost in her story at the exact moment that she becomes a fully realized sorcerer. So, so right now she's like, right back at that traumatic moment in her life that she thought she left behind. And she's very much struggling, like, trying to find out who am I? How am I going to navigate this world now that I do not have my powers?
JAMES: Yeah.
ROBIN: Because she has hung up her self-worth so much on her magical powers that's like exactly why she'll, at the end of the episode too, come to the Deathless Mother and actually do it and get her powers back.
JAMES: Yeah, I think this connects back to one of my favorite scenes from season one. Yennefer, on the beach with the corpse of the baby. As a character, she has this soft spot for children, mothers, deep down, that's what she wants.
ROBIN: Yeah.
JAMES: Every time she has some experience with a child, or a mother, or a dead baby, it's so sad. She wants so desperately to help, and as she says in her speech, that child, the world sucks. It's never going to be fair for women, for children, for anybody, and she wants so desperately to help. And now she has all this power to and it's locked away. It's, it's really tough to watch that.
ALYSSA: And then at this point Yennefer is then approached by that sex worker who tells her like, “Didn't find anything, but you know, I would recommend looking at the first place you tried because whenever I do that, I always find my man at the bottom of a bottle in the morning”. Yennefer takes that to heart and goes back to the tavern where surprise, surprise! She finds Jaskier and Rience, who has been at this all night. It's now the morning. And Jaskier has blood just like, dribbling down his face and onto his clothing. At the beginning of this scene, of this morning scene, Rience finally takes off his coat and starts to really torture Jaskier with his fire. We get that reiteration of like fire magic is forbidden. But you know, most people can't use that, but you have to be very talented. Oh, yeah! And you also have to get rid of your soul. No big deal! I can do it! And then yeah, again, the acting between Joey Batey and Chris Fulton is just–
JAMES: So good.
ALYSSA: –incredible in this scene. And yeah, and then we get this delightful entrance from Yennefer who comes in pretending to be drunk, pretending to be Jaskier’s wife.
JAMES: So, so,good.
ROBIN: Yeah, absolutely.
ALYSSA: Everything. Like, hiccups and all.
ROBIN: Yeah.
ALYSSA: She's like, “You left me at home, you scoundrel man!” And Jaskier panics because he obviously has been at this all night, and he does not want to see Yennefer be harmed. So, he warns her against it, and Yennefer presses Rience who eventually, like, kind of grabs her and turns her away toward a post, and she takes a swig of her alcohol, and when he lights up his fingers, she shoots the alcohol back in his face–
JAMES: Genius.
ALYSSA: –and then immediately burns him.
ROBIN: So great.
ALYSSA: Yeah, Yen's discovery of Jaskier is a lot here, but what did you guys think of this entire sequence?
JAMES: It's one of my favorite scenes of the episode. First of all, this is where we get our first hint of Rience’s incompetence, taking Jaskier back to the place where he found him and just torturing him there in the tavern. My guy, that is not smart.
ALYSSA: No, food service shifts started like 8am. Like, I don't know why you do that.
JAMES: Yeah.
ROBIN: Yeah, like, isn't this tavern supposed to be full? Like, why are there no people? Why, Where's the owner of this establishment?
JAMES: I guess they don't serve breakfast.
ALYSSA: Even places that open for dinner are still doing prep in the morning.
ROBIN: Yes!
ALYSSA: If I've learned anything from YouTube, it's that.
JAMES: I don't know if this is an intentional choice by Joey Batey, or if it's just something that I'm insane and I'm just hearing things, but there's a point during the torture where his accent kind of slips into…if you listen to any interview with Joey Batey, or even his music, his accent is slightly different from the one he puts on for Jaskier. I don't know if he's doing that as some sort of like, Jaskier’s putting on this accent to see more refined, more professional as a bard. If he’s, when he's under this intense pressure, the accent drops and he goes back to, I don't know, basic Jaskier or something. So, I reached out to my UK correspondent, Harold, on the Hanza Discord.
ALYSSA: I love that we're subcontracting–
JAMES: Yes.
ALYSSA: –throughout the episode.
JAMES: I needed the help, because I couldn't have figured this out myself. So, Joey Batey speaks with the Geordie dialect, but his accent itself has most likely been muted from living and training at Oxford and in Paris. And it seems like he's even toned it down a little further to the standard Jaskier accent. So, if he did intentionally slip back into his regular Joey Batey accent during the scene, I love that choice. Maybe Jaskier has built himself up a little bit to seem more refined, and now he's just getting all torn down as he's basically at his lowest point that we've seen him so far.
ALYSSA: Interesting. Thanks, Harry, for that information, as well.
JAMES: Yes, thank you, Harold. I appreciate your, all your work.
ALYSSA: Robin, did you have anything to add?
ROBIN: Yeah, I was. I mean, I've read the books once all the way through now. So, I forgot how it featured in the books exactly. But like the fire magic thing seems like, something that was kind of a no-go zone in the lore, like, you can't do it. Don't do it. I feel like they explain it very well why it is something that at least exists in the show or like, it's something that exists in this world with the idea of like, oh, yeah, you shouldn't do it because it usually consumes the, or unless you’re very talented, it consumes the soul. It explains why fire magic is probably not such a good idea. Unless you're very talented, like our incompetent man, Rience. And it also, like, explains why Yennefer may have lost her powers when she did the fire surge at the end of season one, like, that's very consistent. That makes a whole heap of sense.
JAMES: Yeah.
ROBIN: So, I like that explanation.
ALYSSA: Yeah. And, you know, that's a nice way to come back around to the fact of his disfigurement. We know this happens in chapter one of Blood of Elves, like, right out the gate in the books. After Rience tortures Dandelion, he hops through a portal, and Yennefer gets there fast enough to throw something some sort of very violent spell at him, that when we re-meet him later, his face is now burned and scarred. I was curious how they were going to do that in the season, when we first saw Rience’s character, he didn't have any scarring at all. And obviously, Yen didn't have her magic. So, when the heck would this happen, and how? So, I do like what they did here though, and that they were still able to incorporate it and keep that a part of their relationship and storyline.
ROBIN: Yeah.
ALYSSA: And cause and build the vendetta that Rience has against Yennefer still. So I did like that, and I thought it was a very clever use of Yennefer’s cunning, really, in this episode.
JAMES: Yeah, and this is what I was talking about at the start of the episode where the meaning of “Burn Butcher Burn” kind of takes on another life here. As you know, you see the shot of Rience at the start and it's, “Watch me burn all the memories of you.” And then, now he's getting burned. So, it was a nice tiny little bit of foreshadowing that if you hadn't read the books, you wouldn't have gotten. Yennefer burns him. Also, this is a bit of a tangent, but Rience very much comes from the Doctor Strange School of Magic in which, in the comics there, Doctor Strange is always like, there's a price for magic, every spell you do costs something, you have to pay the cost, but my guy has like, at least five times, put the world in jeopardy by saying “I'm not gonna pay the cost! I have to do what I gotta do to save the world!” And Rience is very much the same. He's gonna do this forbidden magic, who needs a soul? I'm good. I got my fire magic.
ALYSSA: It's one hundo p going to be the downfall of Rience, and I’m so excited to see it.
JAMES: Gotta learn your lesson earlier, man.
ALYSSA: I can’t wait.
ROBIN: Oh, man. Same
ALYSSA: In the next scene Istredd and Geralt arrive at the site of the monolith and are stunned to find a deep gorge. Yeah, I mean, this scene is what it sounds like. They just, like, kind of climb to the side of this gorge. And they're just like, “Oh, damn.”
JAMES: Big hole!
ALYSSA: And Istredd goes on this whole thing of being like, “It's unprecedented! There's no historical records of anything like this! You've never seen anything like this!” And Geralt’s like, it's a canyon dude. Like, it's like, I know it's weird but, like, we should go down there and check it out. Like–
JAMES: Geralt’s like get the rope buddy, we gotta go down!
ROBIN: Although I do really respect how they, like, how they make these two characters analyze the situation.
ALYSSA: Yeah,
JAMES: Yeah, you see both of their skill sets.
ROBIN: Yeah, it's very befitting of their characters and their occupations. It's like, I would have the same, I would be Istredd, like, “What? This is not possible! What is the historical record?”
JAMES: And I would be the one getting the rope out of my backpack.
ROBIN: Yeah!
JAMES: Are Robin and I actually Geralt and Istredd, whoaaaa.
ROBIN: Would you yeet a Myriapod head at my feet? Get in bitch, we're going monoliths searching! I don’t know.
JAMES: If the situation called for it, I absolutely wouldn't clean it up. I can tell you that right now.
ALYSSA: Oh my god. No. Let’s see…
JAMES: We’ve lost it. Okay, back on track.
ROBIN: I'm fine, I’m fine.
ALYSSA (VOICEOVER): Before we get to the rest of the discussion, we’re going to take a break here. Next episode, join me, James from the US, and Robin for the Netherlands as we conclude our discussion of Netflix's The Witcher 205, “Turn Your Back.”
Outro & Credits
[Breakfast in Beauclair theme music by MojoFilter Media]
ALYSSA: Thanks for joining us at the breakfast table! For show notes, transcripts of each episode, and a complete list of our social platforms and listening services, head over to breakfastinbeauclair.com.
Breakfast in Beauclair is created by Alyssa from GoodMorhen. It’s hosted by Alyssa with the “Tidings from Toussaint” News Segment by Lars from WitcherFlix. The show is edited by Alyssa with music by MojoFilter Media.
Breakfast in Beauclair is produced by Alyssa in New York City with Luis of Kovir, The Owner of The Churlish Porpoise, Katie (The Redhead of Toussaint), Jacob B., Ayvo of Gulet, Bee Haven of the Edge of the World, Charlotte from Vengerberg Glamarye, RedKite, The Original Roach, Codringher’s Cat, Libby, Jennidy Mundilovitch, Wolf, Corey from the US, John of Ryblia, Tom from Australia, Jill Cate, The Tabby Witch, Olle from Sweden, James Carson III, Father of Bean, Psilocybe Sorcerer, A Toussaint Knight, Jeanette of Brokilon, Miriam of Temeria, and Softie.
Special thanks to James and Robin for joining us for this episode and our international hanza for their support.
Transcriptionist: JM Sarong