"Once you understand something, you can master it."
Hello everyone!
Hopefully this will be a much better one than the one we've just gone through, and in the vein of that hope I am kick-starting all the blog posts on here with something really great.
There's a bunch of things to watch if you need something to distract yourself during lockdowns and quarantine, mind, but I suppose there are a few stand-outs even so, despite the fact that it's numerous all around.
Philip Pullman's trilogy already sparked controversy back in the day when it was first published and it's getting right back on track with that now with the television adaptation, but I mean, did we expect anything else at all? In this day and age?
Nope.
So sit back and relax as we take a look at the second season of His Dark Materials.
The link to the blog post for the first season can be found at the bottom of the page. I haven't yet written up the books for this blog, but I plan on doing so eventually, so keep an eye out for that, too!
As a short-ish recap if you haven't seen the first season, or you just don't feel like going through the entire thing there: Lyra Belacqua, daughter of famous explorer Asriel Belacqua, spends her days running around the college of Jordan in Oxford, in a world similar to ours but with remnants of the 18th century because the Magisterium (their form of the Church) has prohibited and prevented any special advancements, especially in technology. Asriel blows everything out of the water by discovering that Dust (particles that accumulate on people, particularly adults) may be more and more important, and things heat up with children going missing. While initially going with Mrs. Coulter to London and finding out she's her daughter, Lyra takes off on her own to find her best friend, Roger.
On the way North, where the Gobblers have taken the children, she meets up and befriends both the Gyptians, aeronaut Lee Scoresby, and Panserbjorn Iorek Byrnison.
Together, they discover that a section of the Magisterium is experimenting to separate children from their daemons (the part of their souls that's visible on the outside in animal form), which leaves the children in a zombie-like state. Reuniting with her father after destroying the research laboratory, Lyra unknowingly delivers Roger to him, and Asriel uses the energy from the child/daemon separation to open a rift between worlds.
Furious and terrified, Lyra and Pantalaimon follow after him, to find and see Dust for themselves, and this is where season two picks up.
Arriving through the portal to another world, Lyra and Pan find themselves in a weird, abandoned city, where they run into a human boy, Will, but he has no daemon - this is because he's from OUR world, and naturally he's startled by Pan who opens his mouth to speak to him. Lyra and Will do a little song and dance around one another before they trust each other enough to actually spend time together (and make and eat omelettes, though Will does it better than Lyra, hah), but mostly they acclimate to the strange city.
The city's name is Cittagazze, and all its adults have fled, leaving the children behind, and the reason for it is that spectres have taken over, ones who literally suck out the life of any adult, but a child is safe from them, so for now Will and Lyra are okay.
However, back in Lyra's world, things are gearing up as each faction reacts to Asriel's actions: the witches are preparing for war and so is the Magisterium, though they're more brutal and have Mrs. Coulter torture a captive witch, even if she does it for her own purposes. She wants to know about Lyra - but before the witch can reveal the prophecy Lyra is a part of, Queen Ruta Skadi arrives and kills her, as well as mortally wounds the Cardinal.
This later leads to Mrs. Coulter and Father MacPhail to leave him to die - mostly on Coulter's recommendation, as it leaves MacPhail as the man's possible successor, but then again Mrs. Coulter has her own agenda, always. She counsels him to do something bold (and potentially rash) to ensure his position as Cardinal, and his response is to attack the witch territory in the North, which of course earns him his sought-after approval but swears the witches to revenge.
It also backfires on him as Mrs. Coulter promises blackmail if he doesn't do what she wants him to, which in this case is to leave her the hell alone to do what she wants, so there. Men. Always such idiots.
While this is all going on, Will and Lyra cross to Will's Oxford, where Will checks on his mother and almost lands himself in a trap laid down by his grandparents, who want the letters Will's father sent his family before disappearing, but he gets away before the police arrive. In the meantime, Lyra wanders Oxford and runs into none other than Lord Boreal, not that she knows him, but he definitely knows her, and he wants her Alethiometer, which promises trouble.
Lyra ends up with Mary Malone, who's been trying to work with a computer to communicate with ... other-worldly beings, but Lyra shows her how it's done, with a trance she uses to speak with the Alethiometer. This is where things begin heating up as Lord Boreal's agent tracks Lyra to Dr. Malone, who helps the girl escape, but she then accepts a car ride from Boreal unknowingly, so he manages to swipe the Alethiometer from her. She and Will are backed into a corner as Boreal wants the knife from the city in the other world, or else the Alethiometer will stay with him.
These intrigues sort of continue with the Magisterium locking up anyone they consider a heretic (be they real or not), and with Lee Scoresby on his own mission, tasked by the witches to find a shaman, Grumman, who will be vital to helping Lyra, the girl from the prophecy.
Of course Lee, being Lee, ends up in a shoot-out, gets arrested, and finds himself interrogated by none other than Mrs. Coulter herself. He has TALENT, obviously.
Only, he's the one person who can stand up to her and she's got nothing on him.
What did I say about talent?
She eventually frees him, asking him to protect her daughter, and Lee has every intention of doing so but not because she asked - because he's come to love the girl like his own daughter, instead.
So he goes on his own little adventure and actually finds Grumman, who turns out to be a human from Will's world, and whose mission is to find the Subtle Knife to bring it to Asriel, who will need it for his Great War. While all this flies right over Lee's head - what does he care about a weird ass knife, as long as it protects Lyra? - it's definitely a lot more closer to home for Will and Lyra, who need to get said knife from the tower in the city.
They find their way inside and run into the elderly knife-bearer, who explains he was attacked and the knife was stolen from him by a boy named Tulio, who attacks the lot of them and forces Will to fight him for the knife. He succeeds, but two of the fingers on his right hand are partly severed in the process, marking him as the rightful bearer of the Knife (Knife totally picked him, I bet it took lessons from the Ring). He is taught how to open and close portals between worlds - only one of the things the Knife can do - and then the kids leave, while the elderly former bearer poisons himself so the spectres can't get him (they do get Tulio).
At this point though, everyone and their mother is on the way through the portal, with Boreal leading Mrs. Coulter through, also telling her about his deal with Lyra (at which point she zeroes in on the fact that Boreal took something that belonged to her daughter, so Boreal ... be wary, idiot; why are men just SO STUPID SOMETIMES), and Serafina goes to attack the Magisterium ships with Ruta, continuing through the rift to find and protect Lyra as well.
Not to mention that Mary Malone rejects Boreal's offer of funding - because she's a smart cookie - finally communicating with Dust, and the particles reveal themselves to be Angels. They also tell her what she needs to do next (which is, play the role of serpent, journey to another world, and find the boy and girl) before shutting down and never being heard from again in her world. So she packs up and does exactly that, also heading straight for Cittagazze.
Things are getting heated there as Lyra and Will are accused of Tulio's demise, though technically they had nothing to do with it, and besides, they have bigger problems: they need to get the Knife to Boreal, not that they have any intention of ACTUALLY giving it to him.
Especially not as they later encounter Mrs. Coulter there, who pleads with Lyra (as she pleaded with Mary Malone, but Mary's much too street-smart for her), but a fight ensues between the kids and the adults, during which Will bests Boreal, cuts a window, and drags Lyra, the Alethiometer, and Pan through before closing it again. They do know the place is getting too hot for them, even if they can't know HOW hot: the Magisterium has declared the witch attack on their airships as punishment from the Authority, and MacPhail continues his quest of becoming Cardinal.
He also learns Lyra is part of a disastrous prophecy, in terms of what the Magisterium wants, as it's the exact opposite from their desires. So their mission now is to take out one girl - as if there's humanity in that, but we all sacrifice for the Greater Good, right??? - and they fly through the rift, actually following after Lee and Grumman who end up pursued by them, and forced to land after being shot out of the sky.
Also coming hot out of the sky is Serafina, who finally finds Lyra and Will, and lands to protect them from the enraged mob of kids who want to kill them (easily shifting blame on to someone else even though their city is basically responsible for the spectre problem anyway). The witches cast a healing spell on Will's hand, which up until then has refused to heal on its own, but they need stronger medicine from their own lands, even though the kids both reject going there.
Little do they know in how much trouble they're in - even as Will scares some spectres off who nearly get a witch - because Mrs. Coulter and Boreal are now also in this world, though Boreal only shortly. After she masters the spectres, suppressing her humanity and understanding it's humanity that attracts them in the first place, Mrs. Coulter poisons him and lets him die, saying he's in her way. She uses the spectres to hunt down Lyra, instead.
Also hunting for Lyra are Lee and Grumman, unknowingly, because looking for the Subtle Knife will bring them to her, but they're being followed by the Magisterium, and as both of them can't outrun the troops, Lee stays behind to cover the shaman's retreat, ending up fatally wounded and passing away before Serafina can reach him, even though he calls out to her for help.
Cue my absolute water-works during this scene. Seriously, I started as soon as Hester balled up and didn't stop.
The witch does get to him though, placing a spell of some sort on his body, but in doing so she leaves her own group exposed and vulnerable; with Ruta Skadi hunting for the same object everyone wants, the Knife, to bring it to Asriel for his war, and with Will off to finally meet with his father, Mrs. Coulter (who tortured another witch to get information on Lyra) sweeps in and abducts her daughter. She then drugs her and says she's taking her someplace safe.
In the meantime, Will reunited with his father, who urges him to take the Knife to Asriel, but ends up shot by a remaining Magisterium soldier, dying in his son's arms. He tells Will that the Angels will now guide him to Asriel.
Speaking of Angels, in our one and only sighting of Asriel this season (because a fully Asriel-centric episode was unfortunately cancelled due to COVID) he has them pledge their support to him in the upcoming war, and even in a five minute scene, James McAvoy steals the show.
And as the season ends, Lyra and Roger (!) call to each other in a world neither one of them knows, weird and terrifying.
With the board thus set, it's time for the long wait for season three!
Whew.
You MAY be wondering about the prophecy and what Lyra is supposed to be - it's the driving force behind most of what everyone's doing in the show - so I'll tell you: Lyra is destined to be the next Eve, and she will bring about the second Fall of Man, leaving humans essentially sin-ridden, with their own free will, and in control of their own fates. This goes directly against the Magisterium who want absolute control, so naturally they want to prevent this.
At this point, everyone, and I mean EVERYONE is on the look-out for Lyra, but she's nowhere to be found at the moment, so the points will have to intersect sometime in season three!
But man was this one explosive. Building on the momentum of the first season, and also giving us a glimpse of Iorek, though not much to do with him yet, His Dark Materials continues to be a dramatic and action-packed show about coming of age and the essential question about free will, and how much humans should be allowed to exercise it. Unlike the books, which are much more religion-heavy, the show explores other facets as well, plus gives us glimpses of characters we might not see in the books quite as much.
Not to mention that the cast DELIVERS. Dafne Keen is joined by Amir Wilson in the title roles now, and of course Ruth Wilson, Ruta Gedmintas and Lin-Manuel Miranda do another round up, this time also joined by Andrew Scott.
I could go on and on, but the best way to make a decision about this show is to watch it yourself - and I promise you, you won't be disappointed. Between stunning locations, shocking twists, and the gentle loyalty between Lyra and Will, this is one story you don't want to miss.
Now we wait for season three.
xx
*images and video not mine
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