Overview
Basilisks, dragons and more beasts haunt the Continent. Explore the mythologies of the mysterious monsters Geralt hunts to earn the coins tossed his way.
Reviews
3 min readThe Witcher’s Bestiary: A Monster Manual for the Curious and the Obsessed
I’ll admit it: I came to The Witcher Bestiary Season 1, Part 2 with low expectations. Not because I doubted the material—Andrzej Sapkowski’s world is rich with creatures that feel plucked from half-remembered nightmares—but because companion documentaries often feel like afterthoughts, the kind of content churned out to pad a streaming platform’s library. Yet here I am, ten minutes later, oddly charmed.
Not by spectacle, not by revelation, but by the quiet pleasure of watching a fantasy universe take its monsters seriously.
That’s the thing about The Witcher: its creatures aren’t just obstacles for Geralt to cleave in two. They’re remnants of older stories, fragments of folklore that Sapkowski repurposed with a mischievous grin. This documentary—fragmentary, brief, and unburdened by the need to explain itself—understands that.
It doesn’t waste time on exposition. Instead, it treats the basilisk, the dragon, the leshy as if they’re real, as if their existence is a given, and the only question worth asking is: What do they mean?
The bestiaries of old were never just catalogs. They were warnings, moral lessons, attempts to impose order on the chaos of the unknown. A medieval monk describing a dragon wasn’t just documenting a beast; he was reminding his readers of sin, of the devil’s cunning, of the need for vigilance. The Witcher Bestiary leans into that tradition, though with a modern twist.
Audience Opinions
"A bite-size Netflix documentary companion for fans of The Witcher Season 1."
This English documentary works as a short Netflix companion to The Witcher Season 1, running about 10 min with a Not Rated rating. It is presented by Netflix on YouTube and available to watch on Netflix with trailers and an official website, in original language English. latestnetflix.com's view is that Audience response sits at an Audience Score of 68, fitting a quick extra rather than a standalone feature.
- Quick companion format A short documentary-style extra tied to Season 1 that works as a fast watch between episodes.
- Easy Netflix access Available to watch on Netflix in original English with trailers and an official website.
- Very brief runtime At about 10 min, it plays like a bonus feature rather than a full documentary.
- Middle-ground reception An Audience Score of 68 suggests decent but not enthusiastic audience response.
Buzz & Rumors
Public reportsFans asked for a surprise. Netflix sent a monster lecture.
Day three of #Witchmas, December 18, 2020. The official Witcher account asked fans to pick a specific drop or take the Law of Surprise. They took Surprise. Game Rant says the other option was a toy sneak peek. Day two had already given fans set photos of Joey Batey as Jaskier. Day three was supposed to feel like a present. What arrived was an 11-minute YouTube video that Netflix also filed as a 10-minute documentary movie. Title: The Witcher Bestiary Season 1, Part 2. Basilisks, dragons, ghouls. latestnetflix.com's view is that Henry Cavill, Anya Chalotra, and Joey Batey are credited as if they star in a feature.They do not. They appear in clips. 
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Season 2 was still a rumor with a date attached. GamePressure noted the wait had stretched after Cavill's on-set injury. Game Rant still printed "coming to Netflix in 2021" as if that settled anything. The bestiary was how the show stayed loud without new episodes. ,
The head on the floor had a name.
Episode 6 throws a raptor-like head on the ground and never says what it is. ComicBook.com reported that Lauren Schmidt Hissrich confirmed it. Basilisk, from Sword of Destiny. She also treated it as future-season bait. "We're continuing to develop monsters for future seasons, so in our mind, this Ep 106 Basilisk is one of many subspecies. South Zerrikanian, Royal Basilisk, Protobasilisk, take your pick!"
The same video walks through the Hirikka, the endangered creature Geralt will not take a contract on, then the dragon. Hissrich's line on dragons is the one that traveled. She called them "kind of 'dragon Witchers'" because they protect common dragons from humans. ComicBook wanted that spin-off greenlit on the spot.
Ghouls, not nekkers.
The season 1 finale monsters had a fan argument attached. Nekkers or ghouls. The bestiary closes the file. Ghouls. Netflix's first bestiary went up in May 2020. Game Rant put its YouTube count above 1.4 million. Part 2 is the Christmas sequel, a lore dump dressed as a gift. TMDB even gave it a poster. ,
The extra still sits on Netflix as a movie. JustWatch clocks it at 10 minutes. The YouTube original is 11:50, chaptered Basilisk, Hirikka, Dragon, Ghoul. Watch it there if you want the embed. Watch it on the app if you want it filed next to Blood Origin like a real picture. Either way, the surprise was a lecture. , ,
Entertainment rumors and trivia aggregated from public reporting. Treat speculation as unverified unless a cited source confirms it.