"The final rebellion has begun."
Hello everyone!
It's been a bit since I last posted on here, mostly because even bloggers and vloggers need a break, am I right?
So I took mine and I'm feeling properly energized for another year reviewing things for everyone.
And to start things off, I have a real banger for us.
Now it's been a bit since the first two seasons aired, because thanks to the pandemic things got really shuffled around in production and whatnot, BUT THAT ASIDE, we definitely got the conclusion through December, and WOW.
That's all I can say, WOW.
Well alright, there's some minor details, but other than that ... His Dark Materials return one last time for a final send-off.
Links to previous related posts (including the first two seasons) can be found at the bottom of the page, as per usual.
BUT to quickly recap: Lyra (Dafne Keen) lives in a world similar to our own, but with several differences, including the most important one, daemons, representations of the soul that everyone can see. She finds out her uncle is actually her father, her mother works for the Magisterium (think Church) and neither one of them is actually a good person, and she can read a mysterious object called the Alethiometer where everyone else fails even after years of study.
And oh also, she's going to save kids who've been taken - along the way discovering they're being separated from their daemons, and making friends with persons such as Lee Scoresby (Miranda) and Panserbjorn Iorek - which eventually leads her to her father Asriel (McAvoy).
Asriel uses her best friend and the energy surge that comes from separating a child from their daemon (effectively killing them) to open a rift between WORLDS, because that's right, there's more of them, and Lyra swears she'll figure out this Dust thing everyone's harping about. She teams up with a boy from OUR world, Will (Amir Wilson), who becomes the bearer of the Subtle Knife which opens windows between different worlds, and they embark on a dangerous journey together.
Beset on all sides, this eventually ends with Will's discovery of his father and Lyra's abduction by her own mother because - dun dun dun - she's prophesied to be the next Eve, so Mrs. Coulter will keep her safe at all costs.
This is where we tune into season 3, with Lyra held captive and drugged to sleep most of the time, and Will desperately searching for her. He teams up with two Angels - Baruk and Balthamos, lovers - who actually want to take him to Asriel because he's the Bearer. Will, however, says no, not until he finds and rescues Lyra.
He succeeds in this eventually, in a race against time as he and Iorek (because, obviously) face off against the Magisterium soldiers who've come to kill Eve.
The easiest way is also always the most gruesome, at that.
The only problem they encounter here is that, when being distracted by Mrs. Coulter and reminded of his own mother, the Subtle Knife breaks, and thus Will and Lyra are now forced to use the doors between worlds which already exist. Lyra has the bright idea to have Iorek fix the knife - which he does, with Will's help - and then they're going to be off to the Land of the Dead.
Why?
To rescue Roger, of course. Now, this isn't as well described in the show, but in the books, Lyra understands that some greater act is in play as the Alethiometer shows her the way forward is through the Land of the Dead, whereas in the show she keeps harping about apologizing to Roger over, and over again.
Much to Iorek's discomfort, Will does in fact cut through to said land, and they take on down there, learning that to reach the crossing and the Ferryman, they need to be guided by their own Death. Lyra calls hers and they make it to the ferry, where a painful separation takes place - because, essentially, daemons are the LIVING part of a human soul, and they cannot cross, so Lyra and Pantalaimon are forcefully separated, as are Will and the daemon he never knew he had.
However, at the very least, they do in fact find Roger among the other dead, and learn that the whole Heaven and Hell stories they're told are lies - the Land of the Dead is a purgatory somewhere in between, so the kids decide they'll bust everyone out of there. With a little help from our favourite, Lee Scoresby (ohmyGOD I cried when he went permanently bye), and Will's father, they cut a window out of the Land of the Dead, and extract a promise from the harpies guarding it that they'll guide souls there if said souls tell them stories about their lives.
Liars though? Will stay in purgatory. SERVES THEM RIGHT, and I'm looking at you, Father Gomez.
ANYWAY, once finally out of this purgatory and searching for Pan, the kids actually walk straight into the battlefield of ... well, the war for freedom.
Let's back it up a little.
The reason Will's needed by Asriel's forces is because Asriel's building his Republic, free of the Authority's control - and has learned the Authority is actually not God, just the first Angel created from Dust who styled himself as one. He then grew feeble and old and Metatron (an Angel who was once human) took over as Regent, and now rules with an iron fist, attempting to crush any rebellion and exert control over ALL worlds.
Asriel gathers the best soldiers from all the worlds he can travel to, and eventually has Mrs. Coulter in his grasp as well. These two are convoluted lovers - both STILL love each other, but Mrs. Coulter is now blinded by her love for Lyra as well, though Asriel doesn't quite believe HE managed to produce the next Eve.
However, when he challenges Metatron directly, and the Angel opens up a rift into which Dust is now streaming, away from humanity, Serafina Pekkala shows up after one of her sisters dies because of it (her daemon accidentally gets sucked in, and it's more oblivion rather than true death, which is worse). They all then come to the conclusion that - just as Lyra and Will have now defeated Death - they're instrumental to this rebellion as well.
Serafina may look down on Asriel for it, but I argue that without the rebellion, Lyra wouldn't have started her journey, either, so it's all more connected than the witch gives it credit for.
The fight with Metatron's forces begins, though it's more a diversion than anything else as Serafina hurries to deliver the two daemons to safety, and Asriel's best men get Lyra and Will into the fortress. As for Asriel and Mrs. Coulter? They both face Metatron, each in their own way, and Mrs. Coulter's daemon - whom she can separate from like the witches do - pulls the trigger to destabilize and weaken him.
The two parents then commit the one joint act of protection for their daughter, sacrificing themselves into the abyss so they can pull Metatron down with them.
With the Kingdom of Heaven now defeated, Lyra and Will accidentally free the Authority, who 's so weak he becomes molecules immediately, and then head on to find their daemons.
Said daemons had been sent to the world of the Mulefas for safety, which is where the children follow them to - and it's in this world they reunite with Mary Malone, who helped them back in season two, and who's been learning about Dust and how it's disappearing at a rapid pace, slowly but surely killing the world's inhabitants who depend on it.
Not really knowing what to do, she follows the Mulefa's advice and tells the kids stories - stories about herself, her life, her choices, which led her to become a scientist rather than a nun. The stories conveniently speak of love, something that we've slowly been privy to the enchantment of as Will and Lyra have grown closer and out of childhood friendship.
Lo and behold, you know Lyra's Eve, right? Well, Will happens to represent Adam - and the thing that the Magisterium understands as sin (and created a bomb to kill with, which thankfully missed) is actually the choice to go from innocence to experience, the choice of FREE WILL, when Lyra and Will choose one another and share their first kiss.
This reverts the flow of Dust, but it isn't over yet; remember Father Gomez? Well, the bozo has no clue things went bad for his side, and still wants to kill either Mary (the snake) or the kids, but Balthamos confronts him and kills his daemon, becoming fatally wounded himself and perishing.
And Xaphania, the leader of the initial rebellion against the Authority, arrives - after Serafina urges the two daemons, Pan and Kirjava, to reunite with their humans - to explain they need to stopper Dust once and for all. The only way to do it? To close all the remaining doorways the Subtle Knife created.
And because a spectre is released each time a doorway is made, not to mention the Dust problem, only one can remain open - the one from the Land of the Dead. Given no one can survive in a world not their own for long, this means Will and Lyra have to part ways, regardless that they only just found one another.
Despite the pain of first love and first heartbreak, they choose the right thing because it IS the right thing to do - and Will destroys the Subtle Knife once and for all once he's back in his own world, so the Angels can close the remaining passages.
And each year on midsummer's day, in their respective worlds, Will and Lyra sit on a bench in Oxford Botanic Garden - just as they promised. They live full lives - just as they promised, with Will becoming a surgeon and Lyra learning to read the Alethiometer like she used to.
Lyra and Pan continue into a new adventure - but that's a story for another time.
Because His Dark Materials come to a close there, with a final FIN.
Whew!
Emotional, charged, though perhaps a little rushed and poorly advertised as though HBO was trying to wrap this up quickly instead of ramping up the tension pre-release, the show is a fairly faithful adaptation to the books, even if it manages to leave a lot of things out or unsaid. However, it hits all the major points, for what it's worth, and the actors do a phenomenal job.
I laughed, I growled, I cried, I did all those emotional things that such a show should by nature elicit from me. And I thoroughly enjoyed it.
I know there's plenty of people out there that are disappointed, but honestly? This was a GOOD show and a faithful enough representation. Did it have its weak moments? Yes. Did it occasionally not describe things to the best of its ability? Also yes.
But it told the story, and delivered its message just the same: free will, imagination, the daring to try, the courage to do things, those are ours for the taking. Does it matter what religion we belong to, if any? Which race? We all have stories to share.
True stories are nourishing, they say in the show. They're correct. It's the truth that sets us free.
So remember: make your choices. Brave the unknown.
And tell them stories.
xx
*images and video not mine
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