YMMV / The Watch (2021)

• Broken Base: The show seems to have divided Discworld fans into two camps: those who are willing to take the series on its own merits and enjoy it as a separate entity to the main Discworld franchise and those who openly loathe the series for not being the faithful adaption that they have waited years for.
• Ending Fatigue: In the Season 1 finale, by the time the Watch solve the dragon issue and Carcer is erased from existence by his pissed off bosses, there's still about a third of the episode to go.
• Questionable Casting: The casting announcements for the BBC series based on the Watch were contentious at best, with many fans on a scale between "scratching their heads" and "livid."
  • Of particular note, Vetinari, Cutting Me Own Throat Dibbler, Doctor Cruces, and Lupin Wonse have all been gender swapped (and had their backgrounds/motivations altered - for example, CMOT Dibbler is now referred to as "Throat" and is a gang leader, rather than a simple opportunistic merchant). And Sybil Ramkin, described in the books as an older and rotund woman, whose primary hobby is raising swamp dragons, has been cast as a young, attractive woman who moonlights as a vigilante, not to mention the ~20 year age difference between Lara Rossi and Richard Dormer. About the only casting decisions fans seem to agree with are for Vimes and Carrot^note although their opinion of Vimes's character quickly turned negative after the show's release. Fans are particularly baffled after the spot-on casting of other Pratchett adaptations, like Good Omens (2019) and Hogfather.
  • Then there's the rather thorny issue of Cheery, who is now played by a non-binary actor of "normal" height (about six feet tall) and is beardless^note In the books, all dwarves - males and females alike - have beards, to the point where two individuals who are courting don't know the gender of the other person until their families have a private meeting, when in the books she retained her beard and much of the general dwarven aesthetic, only slightly modified to emphasize her gender. Read here for a proper explanation.
• So Okay, It's Average: Many who have been willing to watch the show and weren't turned off by the major changes or didn't care about them because they never really read Discworld in the first place feel that it's a reasonably fun and watchable show, but doesn't really don't do much to stand out and is often wildly inconsistent.
• They Changed It, Now It Sucks!: The show is widely derided by Discworld fans, many of whom outright refuse to recognize it as a real adaptation, due to the extreme liberties taken with the source material. Neil Gaiman and Rhianna Pratchett both pointed out the show is essentially an In Name Only adaptation at best.

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