With many fans ready to write Netflix’s The Witcher off before the next season even airs because of Witcher‘s struggles with pacing and plot, and many other fantasy shows struggling to find their footing for similar reasons, it’s time to wonder what series the major streaming platforms will snap up in hopes of finding the next hit adaptation. One particularly ideal candidate is a series of Australian fantasy novels that will turn 30 years old in 2025: Sabriel.
Fantasy is having a bit of a moment right now, in ways both positive and negative, largely thanks to Netflix. Netflix was the first streamer all-in on adapting fantasy book series, such as Shadow & Bone, Cursed, Sandman, and others. However, Netflix has also been quick to give the ax to these same series, canceling shows even as beloved and successful as Shadow & Bone. Still, it seems Netflix is still high up on fantasy, with the newly-acquired Quicksilver adaptation a promising replacement for The Witcher. Even so, there’s an even better fantasy adaptation for Netflix to turn to if The Witcher fizzles out.
Garth Nix’s Old Kingdom Series Has Everything The Witcher Does, And More
Magic, Swords, Monsters, World-Ending Stakes, And A Wise-Cracking Sidekick
Garth Nix’s The Old Kingdom series, known as Abhorsen in North America, is a standout example of the genre, packed to the brim with all the ingredients for a smash streaming series. The Old Kingdom series starts with a trilogy of books – Sabriel, Lirael, and Abhorsen – that follow the eponymous Sabriel and her family as she takes up the weighty mantle of her forebears and becomes the Abhorsen, the Kingdom’s sole defender against the predations of the horrifying, restless Dead and other twisted Free Magic constructs. Using the dark art of necromancy, Sabriel must stand against the Dead as they try to destroy the Kingdom once and for all.
Author Garth Nix picked the name “Abhorsen” as a reference to William Shakespeare’s
Measure for Measure
, in which there is an executioner by the name of Abhorson.
These books have quite a few similarities to The Witcher, but clearly aren’t derivative. Sabriel fills the role of a protagonist that uses magic and swords to battle horrible eldritch foes; she develops romantic tension with Touchstone, an even terser swordsman than Geralt with a mysterious past. And rounding out the initial protagonists is the wise-cracking third wheel, except instead of The Witcher‘s real-life troubadour Joey Batey, he’s a talking cat named Mogget with his own share of mystical secrets.
The Titular Old Kingdom Is Only Half Of The World Of The Books
Beyond The Wall, There’s An Even Stranger Place With No Magic At All
The Old Kingdom, where magic and monsters abound, is only a part of this world; the Kingdom ends at the Wall, a giant stone barrier reminiscent of Hadrian’s Wall in England, past which magic fails. On the other side of the Wall is Ancelstierre, a country reminiscent of early-1900s England, right down to having private schools and a cultural obsession with tea. Sabriel herself is originally from the Old Kingdom, but was raised in Ancelstierre, and when she’s forced to take up her legacy as Abhorsen, she finds her education completely failed to prepare her for what is to come.
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The series plays well with the juxtaposition between Ancelstierran technology and Old Kingdom magic; with Sabriel only having a perfunctory knowledge of her homeland, she makes an excellent viewpoint character as she struggles to keep up with everything she learns on the fly. And, of course, her servant, the magical Mogget, is only ever as helpful as one would expect a cat to be.
Netflix Would Be Wise To Bring The Magic Of The Old Kingdom To The Screen
Audiences Clearly Want More Girls With Swords In Their Coming-Of-Age Stories
With magic that literally lives in drawn symbols, enchanted bells that charm or even destroy the undead, and a whole parallel world of Death for the protagonists to explore, The Old Kingdom has a unique and brilliant approach to fantasy that would be engaging to fans of The Witcher or Game of Thrones. More importantly, the placing of Sabriel as a protagonist would resonate similarly to other female-led fantasy films like Netflix’s hit Damsel or Hulu’s The Princess.
The placing of Sabriel as a protagonist would resonate similarly to other female-led fantasy films like
Netflix’s hit
Damsel
or Hulu’s
The Princess
.
Sabriel and its sequels are ripe for adaptation from any network looking to try gambling on a new series in today’s streaming ecosystem; author Garth Nix apparently courted several film deals in the mid-2000s, but no news has surfaced of any other attempts in some time. In the meantime, the series expanded past the original trilogy with the prequels Clariel and Terciel & Elinor, the sequel Goldenhands, and several pieces of short fiction, all of which are ripe for adapting, if only someone would take the chance. If Netflix is smart, they’d snap it up as a replacement for The Witcher, but honor the source material better this time.
Based on the novels by Polish author Andrzej Sapkowski and the video games, The Witcher follows the story of Geralt of Rivia, a monster hunter who struggles to find his place in a world where people often prove more wicked than beasts. “Ciri” Cirilla is the Princess of Cintra, who has magical abilities and whose fate has been linked to Geralt’s. Yennefer of Vengerberg, a sorceress who trains to become a mage before deserting her duties and going solo, is also a main character in the Netflix series. The show’s storylines are intertwined but told throughout different timelines, all of which eventually catch up to Ciri’s, whose timeline of events is the most recent. Set on the Continent where men, monsters, and elves exist together, the characters all have separate journeys, though their destinies bring them into each others’ orbits.
- Release Date
- December 20, 2019
- Franchise(s)
- The Witcher
- Cast
- Tom Canton , Maciej Musial , Björn Hlynur Haraldsson , Anna Shaffer , MyAnna Buring , Lars Mikkelsen , Royce Pierreson , Eamon Farren , Wilson Radjou-Pujalte , Joey Batey , Jodhi May , Therica Wilson-Read , Anya Chalotra , Mimi Ndiweni , Henry Cavill , Freya Allan , Adam Levy , Amit Shah , Liam Hemsworth , Laurence Fishburne
- Seasons
- 3
- Writers
- Lauren Schmidt Hissrich
- Directors
- Lauren Schmidt Hissrich
- Showrunner
- Lauren Schmidt Hissrich