'The Witcher: Blood Origin' star Mirren Mack talks "fun" villain Merwyn (2024)

The Witcher: Blood Origin has an unlikely villain in Princess Merwyn, a character who may seem meek at first but is really a rose with poisoned thorns, Mirren Mack told Newsweek.

Merwyn proved an interesting challenge for the actor, who shared how "fun" it was to bring her to life on the screen and give her the chance to find her voice in a world that wants to push it down.

Set 1,200 years before the events of The Witcher, and long before Geralt of Rivia (Henry Cavill) comes along, the show depicts the conflicts in the elven world before the Conjunction of the Spheres. Princess Merwyn, later Empress, is a key part in how this all goes down.

'The Witcher: Blood Origin' Star Mirren Mack Talks Villain Merwyn

Mack told Newsweek how she loved Merwyn from the moment she read the description of her in the script where she was said to be a "rose, but no one has realized that underneath her petals [are] poisoned thorns."

This idea was something that immediately appealed to Mack, as her character would not allow herself to be a pawn in her brother's machinations, deciding instead to take the throne for herself.

"That's what I loved about her," Mack said. "That she was put in this box and seen as this trinket to be traded but underneath is this huge, bubbling-away mind and she tries to be heard and listened to, and tries to communicate her ideas and want for the world.

"But, she doesn't get listened to and it's that sort of element of surprise that she manages to change her circ*mstances, for better or for worse. Well, for better that she's finally has the voice but the way in which she uses it then becomes this real slow ball of dangerous energy.

"I love that idea of someone breaking out of what you think of them, or what you first assume. That's what I hungered for in this role."

Mack said that creating the character as a fully rounded villain was a team effort, as she highlighted the work of the costume, hair and makeup departments as well as set designers who created the world around her as helping bring Merwyn to life.

"Every single aspect is building this character and bringing her to the forefront of the screen, and finding her story," Mack reflected. "So, it was a real team effort, which I loved."

In order to build the character, Mack focused on her love of literature and how that could influence her desire for change: "I think the way in which she is in that first episode—that woman who loves to read and escape through history books and that thirst for knowledge—I think that's what I really focused on.

"The love of stories and having a dream of 'we can just do that'—that love is what I focused on to make her seem real. Love that people can see as naive dreaming, whereas for her, it's a lifeline and it's what will drive her to make all the decisions she makes in this series"

Mack went on: "Villain-wise, for me to be able to play Merwyn to the best of my ability I had to really find the human parts of us that were the same things that I can empathise with [...] For me, I love to daydream, and I found this sort of middle ground between us. So all of this darkness and choices that are really hard to get my head around as a human being who cares about other people and who loves her family, for instance, I had to focus on the things that we had that were similar."

Merwyn's costumes, designed by Lucinda Wright, also helped in the portrayal of the character. Mack had the opportunity to wear intricately detailed gowns and outfits.

"I used to put them on and just sort of never want them to take them off," Mack gushed. "I was in the cubicles of the bathroom in a gown once and I was like 'no way, what is my life right now?'"

The Scottish actor shared how the blue dress that she wears when she is first named empress was her favorite: "All of the dresses are just the most impeccable, brilliant designs, but that one I really enjoyed from the start because I felt sort of like a bird of prey, or something. I love that, also because [it's] Scotland's flag colors, [I was a] Scottish queen."

The Witcher: Blood Origin is out on Netflix now.