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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Deset Gled" data-source="post: 7910955" data-attributes="member: 7808">I wouldn't call non-linear storytelling objectively bad, but the Witcher has the worst execution of it that I can think of in recent history.  It failed for me in the following ways:- Really bad editing.  A number of episodes cut between different plots in a way that implies they are occurring simultaneously.  They rarely are.  As a person who didn't know they weren't simultaneous for the first few episodes, I felt both confused and lied to when I figured out how the timeline worked.- Lack of visual indicators.  Normally, shows that cut between different times will have something visual that gives you information about it.  A time/location stamp, a visual cue or filter, or different makeup/haircuts/actors for characters to show that they're a different age.  The Witcher makes no attempt whatsoever to do that.  What's worse, they have multiple characters that don't age and always wear the same/similar costumes.- No scheduling reason.  I can understand with shows that air once a week, you sometimes have to throw in a secondary story about a character just because you haven't seen them in awhile. But this show is only available on Netflix, where viewers can control their pace.  Alternatively, due to filming schedules, shows sometimes have to delay a planned episode for later in the season.  But this was released all at one time.  So I can't think of any logistic reason we couldn't have an all Geralt episode followed by a Yennifer episode.- Required external information.  I can honestly say that without looking at the timeline on the internet, there are a few events that I would never had been able to put in the proper order.  That's a problem for me.  I expect a show to run autonomously, especially when there are multiple versions that may conflict with each other.  If I want to look up supplemental information, that's my choice.  But if I have to do extra reading to make sense of it, the show has screwed up.- No obvious narrative reason.  At the end of the season, I honestly don't understand what they were trying to accomplish with all the time edits.  There was no reveal or twist that was enhanced by the weird timeline.  It felt more like a film student's homework assignment in non-linear storytelling than a legitimate artistic choice.Obviously YMMV on these.  But I get the general impression I'm not the only viewer with these complaints.</blockquote>

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