His Dark Materials (2019-2022)

I came around to loving Philip Pullman’s His Dark Materials trilogy, and the HBO TV adaptation of the series captures it beautifully. This is a gorgeous show that examines the big ideas of the books as it brings the characters to life and delivers on its inventive fantasy concepts.

Young Lyra lives in the care of the scholars at Jordan College, generally running amok with her best friend Roger until someone corrals her long enough to give her a lesson. When the rumors of the mysterious “Gobblers” abducting children hit close to home, Lyra ventures out from the safety of the college into an uncertain world ruled by the theocratic Magisterium. She’s determined to root out what the Gobblers are up to and how it’s connected with the “Dust” that her uncle is studying.

That summary is the same one I wrote for the book of The Golden Compass. Fortunately, the show covers all three books, so we get to a lot more than just that, but it makes for a fine jumping-off point for the series. This show offers up all sorts of major elements from the books: alethiometers, armored bears, witches, windows, Spectres, Angels, and of course, dæmons. While I can’t say how well a non-book-reader would be able to follow everything, all of it works really well for me.

The production design and visual effects are simply stunning. I love the look of the windows and the use of the subtle knife, the CGI on Iorek Byrnison looks incredible, and the sets and costumes do an excellent job of creating the feel of this story. We visit multiple worlds and they all look fantastic, from the eerie stillness of Citágazze to the melancholy blankness of the land of the dead.

If I have one complaint to make about the visuals, it’s that there aren’t enough dæmons in the crowd scenes throughout the first season. Obviously, CGI costs add up quickly, but this is a world where every human has a dæmon, to the point where seeing somebody without one feels sickeningly unnatural. As such, it feels strange to see, for instance, Lyra and Lee Scoresby in a crowd of gyptians, but theirs are the only dæmons we see. From season 2 on, however, the show does a much better job of creating the sense of dæmons everywhere without having to render every single one—we get more shots of birds swooping overhead, salamanders and hedgehogs disappearing into pockets, and so on, enough to remind us that the dæmons are always there, even if we don’t see them in every single shot.

This is a dense story with lots of moving parts, and as I said in my reviews of the books, it doesn’t always seem like all the disparate elements should fit together. But the books make it work, and for the most part, the show does too. At the same time that it juggles all the large-scale plot stuff and world-hopping, it also makes space to explore the series’ themes and allow events to resonate for the characters. There are changes—in particular, following Will in our world prior to him meeting Lyra in season 2 is a good one—but it always feels like His Dark Materials and stays true to its origins.

The cast is great across the board. Dafne Keen, who made such a huge impact as X-22 in Logan, is a wonderful Lyra; she’s stubborn and a bit bratty, but she’s also clever and daring. I wasn’t familiar with Amir Wilson, who plays Will, but he’s excellent, equal parts emotionally intelligent and pragmatic. Among the adult cast, everyone turns in fine work. James McAvoy is every inch Lord Asriel, proud and brilliant and determined to a fault, and Ruth Wilson brings both soft menace and ferocious twisted love to Mrs. Coulter. After reading the books, I wasn’t sure what I’d think of Lin-Manuel Miranda as Lee Scoresby, but I wound up loving his performance—so many of his characters have this jittery energy to them, but even as Lee goes on adventures and gets himself into trouble, there’s a steadiness to him that really works. There are too many other memorable appearances to name them all, but just as a sample, the cast also includes Andrew Scott, Nina Sosanya (lately of Good Omens,) Adewale Akinnuoye-Agbaje (who I still remember best as Eko from Lost,) Anne-Marie Duff, and Clarke Peters.

Warnings

Violence (including violence against children,) disturbing images, language, drinking/smoking, and strong thematic elements.

The Amber Spyglass (2000)

*A few spoilers from The Golden Compass and The Subtle Knife.*

The final book in the His Dark Materials trilogy. I understand that Phillip Pullman is currently in the process of writing a second trilogy within this universe, but I haven’t dived into it yet. So while I don’t know what follows this story, I think the book is a strong conclusion to what came before.

The Magisterium is after Lyra. She’s part of a prophecy that could spell their ruin, and they’re determined to find her. Meanwhile, Lyra’s father Lord Asriel has accelerated his war against, not just the Magisterium, but the Authority itself (i.e. God,) and the subtle knife Will wields could be instrumental in the fight. But as everyone jockeys over the two kids, they’re making their own path. Will can use the knife to cut “windows” between different worlds, and Lyra has just asked him to go somewhere seemingly impossible: the land of the dead, where she hopes to find and help her late friend Roger.

This is such an interesting series. Each book introduces new fantastical elements that don’t seem like they’d mesh with what’s previously been established, and yet, somehow it all works. Lyra’s world already contains an intriguing mix of ingredients—dæmons, witches, armored bears, and so forth—and the introduction of other worlds increases that sense exponentially. In this book, we meet new beings like the Gallivespians and the mulefa, along with actual Angels, new Dust-based inventions from Asriel, and the concept of a world where each person’s Death manifests as a being who follows them throughout their life.

In some ways, The Amber Spyglass follows what’s expected for the final installment of a series like this. We have the prophecy coming to a head and a climactic battle against the forces of Heaven, along with a natural deepening in Lyra and Will’s relationship. But the book also takes us in unexpected directions. As the forces gather around them on all sides, it’s intriguing to have Will and Lyra pivoting away from the main conflict to seek the land of the dead. And that big final battle does end with a bang, but it comes further from the end of the book than you might expect. The denouement is pretty extensive, and for my money, the emotional punch of it hits harder than the flashier action that prefaces it.

As I said in my previous reviews, it took me a little while to fully come around to this series. I found its concepts and inventions interesting from the start, but I needed more time to really get invested in the characters and their relationships. Once I did come around, though, I fell pretty hard for them. The final book brings it all home in a really compelling way, and there were multiple chapters that I read from the edge of my seat.

Because I’m writing these posts some time after I actually finished reading the trilogy, I’ve since gotten through the whole TV adaptation as well. But I think I’ll pause for a bit before I review that, just to give the two versions of the story a bit of their own space.

Warnings

Violence, disturbing imagery, and strong thematic elements.