The One Regret Kim Bodnia Has About His Witcher Season 2 Performance

Season 2 of Netflix's "The Witcher” introduces a few fresh faces to the fantasy drama series, though, there's perhaps no new character as important as Geralt of Rivia's (Henry Cavill) old mentor, Vesemir (Kim Bodnia). The show's second season follows Geralt (Henry Cavill) and Ciri (Freya Allan) as the two travel to the ancient Witcher fortress of Kaer Morhen, where Vesemir resides with the last remaining Witchers. He is a gruff old man scarred by time who is interested in restoring the Witchers to their former glory and reviving the lost art of mutating his pupils into new Witchers.

As the oldest living Witcher, Vesemir's skills and knowledge are invaluable when it comes to training Ciri, but when he discovers that her blood may hold the key to unlocking the Witcher mutagen, he grows torn between what is best for his followers and what is morally right. In the show, he is a haunted character whose harrowing past has hardened him into a stoic, sarcastic old man.

Taking all that into account, actor Kim Bodnia says that there is something he regrets about his performance as Vesemir in "The Witcher" Season 2, particularly after becoming more acquainted with the lighter side of Vesemir's past.

Back in August, Netflix released a standalone "Witcher" anime film titled "The Nightmare of the Wolf," which features a young Vesemir as its protagonist and depicts the brutal attack on Kaer Morhen that left the School of the Wolf in shambles. In an interview with Decider, Kim Bodnia revealed that he wished he had seen the anime film before tackling his own version of Vesemir, as it wasn't until after filming that he realized just how different the two versions of the character are.

"We were shooting the season, and I was told they wanted to create 'Nightmare of the Wolf' when he was young," Bodnia explained. "I didn't know I had so much fun when I was young. I would have definitely played [it] differently." 

The Vesemir viewers see in "Nightmare of the Wolf" is a cocky young Witcher who acts like he's on top of the world and, as Bodnia says, has a whole lot of fun roaming around the Continent taking out monsters wherever he pleases. It's only after the massacre at Kaer Morhen that his arrogance fades, and he begins to transform into the more reserved Vesemir introduced in "The Witcher."

Bodnia may regret not leaning more into the cockiness seen in "Nightmare of the Wolf," but as far as Vesemir's transformation goes, it's undeniably compelling to see how the character's life has molded him into the haunted older Witcher viewers meet in the show's second season.