His Dark Materials (BBC)

[touchingcloth]

I enjoyed this week's episode a lot. I'd been waiting for something to happen on a staircase ever since those car lads showed up last week.

[purlieu]

Underwhelming bear-death (although being a Sunday evening drama maybe we can't expect something as visceral as the film version). Otherwise no real complaints. Expected the staircase incident today so I'm obviously getting to grips with the pacing of this finally. I can't remember how Will's house is portrayed in the books, if there's even much of a description, but it really feels wrong in the series. I always imagined it to just be a normal suburban semi or something, rather than the strange slightly brutalist looking thing they've put him in here.

It also mentioned introducing him to make the next series less jarring in terms of new characters, but I'm less convinced by that argument.

Mm, I think they're playing the whole thing very safe, to be honest. Possibly because it is a Sunday evening BBC drama rather than Game of Thrones or a cult sci-fi thing, where a game-changing series opener would maybe go down better. They're probably afraid a casual viewer would tune into series 2, think "what the hell is this, this isn't the same show?!" and turn off.

[Thursday]

The fact that it's so jarring is what was so appealing about the 2nd book, maybe that'll play out differently for a TV viewer and wouldn't work so well, but we'll never know now.

[purlieu]

I mean it's going to be tonally so different to the first series anyway, so maybe the extra continuity will help some people. I'd definitely prefer the surprise opening, but I suppose this is one of the things of watching a show you've read the books of. I only watched Game of Thrones because I'd got bored of waiting for The Winds of Winter, and even then I spent most of it comparing it to the books and thinking about how I'd do it differently.

[touchingcloth]

The fact that it's so jarring is what was so appealing about the 2nd book, maybe that'll play out differently for a TV viewer and wouldn't work so well, but we'll never know now.

Yeah, I've only read the books once and quite a long time ago, but the opener of The Subtle Knife os burned into my memory, because book one leaves you on a cliff hanger and then you start the next book and Lyra's nowhere to be seen.

[Zetetic]

Iofur is motivated by more than mere greed, and becoming an official member of the gang seems trivial by comparison.

It's still about being given a soul and a particular kind of claim of personhood, isn't it?

It also raises the disturbing question about how Mrs Coulter is able to make such an offer.

But in this series, she can offer a baptism into the Magisterium because she works for the Magisterium. No mystery there.

Although the Church's attitudes to women isn't entirely clear and straightforward, and that seems a bit important to Coulter's motivations. At the same time, she's clearly meant to have advanced unusually within the Magisterium.

[Inspector Norse]

Another week, another strangely uneven episode.

I liked the bear fight - although it started with a bizarre bit of editing, Iorek walking through the main gates and then just suddenly appearing stripped of his armour and ready to rumble in front of an audience the throne room - and we finally know where all the CGI budget went. I could even get with the killing being offscreen: we don't actually need all that gore, and the way it was presented gave us a good opportunity to experience it from Lyra's point of view. Some good alethiometer scenes too, that aspect I think has started to feel more convincing.
And Will's plot started moving at last; I find his mum a bit annoying in that kind of stagey BBC acting kind of way, but finally some stuff happened there.

Otherwise, though: the polar bear rides are just irredeemably naff, there are still some wonky and inexplicable plot decisions (so after that scene with Iofur and Mrs Coulter talking about how he wanted a baptism, it turns out he did want a daemon anyway?), and I laughed at "DAEMONS?? for BEARS?!?!?!". It was a bit too obvious (to me) what Asriel was after at the end too.
And it's just rushed, isn't it? They've tried to fit in too much extra stuff - did we really need all those scenes of Mrs Coulter and the Magisterium packing for their jollies? or Boreal sitting in his car? - and that's meant that time we could be spending with character development for the main gang is instead spent on flat plot-pushing dialogue.

Still, I can hope that now they've got an established audience, they'll go a bit more for the feel of the book, and take things a bit slower and subtler (geddit?) next series.

[kalowski]

Based on what I see on the more well lauded shows such as those on HBO this is missing a scene where Lyra does a detailed yet dull task, such as building a table for her aleithiometer, which is soundtracked by an obscure bubblegum pop track.

[Zetetic]

It's really hard to get away from how poor it is at conveying the relationship between humans and their daemons. I wish it felt like... the scenes in Lyra's world were shot like someone in Lyra's world would shoot scenes.

[Johnny Yesno]

It's still about being given a soul and a particular kind of claim of personhood, isn't it?

Although the Church's attitudes to women isn't entirely clear and straightforward, and that seems a bit important to Coulter's motivations. At the same time, she's clearly meant to have advanced unusually within the Magisterium.

I think my question was answered in the most recent episode:

so after that scene with Iofur and Mrs Coulter talking about how he wanted a baptism, it turns out he did want a daemon anyway?

[Johnny Yesno]

It's really hard to get away from how poor it is at conveying the relationship between humans and their daemons. I wish it felt like... the scenes in Lyra's world were shot like someone in Lyra's world would shoot scenes.

Yes. They're shot as if they're pets rather than souls.

[Johnny Yesno]

Here's a question: why does Iofur Raknison have an acting credit and a voice credit (Peter Serafinapekkalawitch) when Iorek Byrnison only has an acting credit?

[NoSleep]

You see that in a fair number of productions (differently-credited actors). Must be in said actor's contract.

[NoSleep]

Here's an example: https://youtu.be/6jJRvZ72fLs?t=25

[touchingcloth]

Reading through the wiki article on the show I noticed that the actor playing Serafina Pekkala is called Ruta Gedmintas, and after thinking that "Ruta" rang a bell...yep, the head witch in the books is Ruta Skudi.

[Blinder Data]

Am I still meant to be confused? What is dust? What is point? I read the first book when I was a kid and have forgotten most of the plot.

It's all right, I guess. Decent adaptation of difficult source material - you'd have had to spend ALL the money on a million CGI animals and you wouldn't even get close to recreating the integrity of the book's world and the importance of daemons.

Yer man Hamilton is miscast but Ruth Wilson is tops. I find the dialogue really ropey at times.

6.5/10

[daf]

Am I still meant to be confused? What is dust? What is point?

- edited -

(sorry about that!)

[purlieu]

To be fair, at this point in the books, it's still not particularly clear what dust is either. There are mentions of it being related to sin (as also mentioned in the show), but the full understanding of it doesn't come until The Amber Spyglass.

But it's kind of the point of the whole story, so is very important.

[NoSleep]

No need to wonder about the mystery of dust anymore; thanks for the spoilers there (not you, purlieu).

Can all the book people start their own thread in the book folder, please?

[Johnny Yesno]

You see that in a fair number of productions (differently-credited actors). Must be in said actor's contract.

Here's an example: https://youtu.be/6jJRvZ72fLs?t=25

No, it's more than that. There are two actors credited for Raknison. As far as my colleague who I discuss the show with could ascertain, they feature in different episodes. But even then, why is one bear an acting part and the other bear a voice part?

[NoSleep]

As I said, stipulation by the actors about crediting. One regards it as an acting part and the other separates acting from voice parts in their portfolio.

[Thursday]

Nobody watch the last episode of the series then?

I guess we were all excited for it.

[Catalogue Trousers]

Or one bear actor was a Sooty-like puppeteer for Raknison's head and Serafinowicz got the other bear actor credit for the voice.

A really good last episode of first series. Was a refreshing shock to see the bears taken out so handily and easily by a bit of simple strategy. Also nice to see Asriel's unpleasantly ambitious side coming out, and as someone who hasn't read the books yet the death of poor Roger came as a genuine shock.

So, off to other worlds and other planes for Lyra and Will. Have we seen the last of Iorek, Scoresby etc? Somehow I doubt it. Looking forward to the next series a lot.

[purlieu]

Lyra and Pan deciding to go through and look for Dust was a bit sudden, but otherwise I thought that was pretty good. Roger's end was quite moving - the bit in the cages was really horrible - and Asriel's explanation of Dust felt like it was really upping the ante of the story, confirmation that this is about a lot more than just Lyra saving some children.

Overall, the daemon issue is one that persisted throughout the series, and the Will subplot was somewhat drawn out, but otherwise I enjoyed it a lot. That said, I'm much more excited to see where it goes next year, as Northern Lights was always my least favourite of the three books.

[touchingcloth]

Same, I actually false started Northern Lights a few times because I didn't get on with it, but at a certain point - maybe before The Subtle Knife, but if nothing else starting very soon into it - I became gripped to the point of reading the books well beyond my bedtime.

I hope it's not a spoiler to address the post above and say that we'll encounter Iorek and Scoresby again. I also hope it's not a spoiler to say that we'll see more world hopping (and in fact shouldn't have seen any of it before the culmination of this latest episode), and that things become all the more interesting because of it. If they manage to make all three books, you won't remember much of Lyra's world at all come the end.

[Johnny Yesno]

A really good last episode of first series. Was a refreshing shock to see the bears taken out so handily and easily by a bit of simple strategy. Also nice to see Asriel's unpleasantly ambitious side coming out, and as someone who hasn't read the books yet the death of poor Roger came as a genuine shock.

Yes, I'm glad they didn't flinch from the more unpleasant aspects of the story.

That Lyra had travelled all that way to assist the legendary Asriel only to find out he's a bit of a cunt is one of the more powerful themes in the book. The set-up to that is nice, with the reader's attention focussed on what a piece of work Mrs Coulter is.

In this final episode, the set-up to Roger's death is well done too. With the blade being difficult for Asriel to move, it totally looks like Lyra is going to save Roger at the very last second in one of the most overused film and television clichés there is.

Finally, a fantasy drama that doesn't treat us like children.

[NoSleep]

Yes, it's actually for children.

[Johnny Yesno]

Yes, it's actually for children.

That's not strictly true. I don't think Pullman wrote the books specifically with children in mind. On The Adam Buxton Podcast, he said that it was the publisher that aimed the books at young adults because they weren't confident they could sell fantasy novels outside of the children's section in book stores.

Either way, it's nice to see something that bucks the trend towards the infantilisation of culture.

[NoSleep]

I just wish it wasn't so dull and worthy (in a BBC drama kind of way) and that the standard of acting was generally better than what's on display. Probably too much to ask of the BBC, what with all the money they spend on propping up the Tories.

[Johnny Yesno]

I just wish it wasn't so dull and worthy (in a BBC drama kind of way) and that the standard of acting was generally better than what's on display.

Really? I thought it found its feet by the last couple of episodes (which is not ideal, admittedly). And Dafne Keen has been excellent.