His Dark Materials: No Way Out (3x05)

This was an excellent episode!

Cons:

The stuff with Mary Malone continues to be a weak point, and honestly I think that's the consequence of trying to adapt this story in the first place. Atal and the others of her kind are interesting in theory, but they feel so random, so disconnected from the rest of the journey. And they're not quite as weird and alien as I always thought of them from the books, so I think in the back of my head I was really looking forward to the Mulefa and then I saw them and it was sort of a letdown. What Mary learns here about Dust and how it's dying is really important, but with so little time spent setting this up, it feels like it could have been learned elsewhere and without Mary even existing as a character.

I kind of missed checking in with Asriel this week; his plot is "keeps getting ready to do war in the background", which, fine, but I think more of an impending sense of his presence would be helpful.

And my eternal complaint that the daemons should be more integrated into the story. We see how much Lyra is suffering without Pan, we see Mrs. Coulter about to be separated from her own daemon... I think what would be helpful is if we saw the other daemons with the Magisterium characters a bit more. Heard them talk, watched them interact with their environment and bring key insights into certain moments, instead of just feeling like an afterthought.

Pros:

But like I said, this is a really good episode! Let's start with Marisa: again, huge acting props to the incomparable Ruth Wilson, she gives me chills. I love how her character encompasses the ferocity of a mother's love and the ruthlessness of pure ambition. Her complicated relationship with her daemon, all the ways in which she's not connected to him the way she maybe "should" be, but also just the visceral horror of being tied down and potentially severed from him forever... and how this very act of violence will be the means by which her enemies will kill her daughter... there is just so much going on here and I feel like I can see it in Marisa's eyes, all the complexity, every different aspect of this situation that is tormenting her. She'll never give up, not 'til the very end.

The bulk of this episode was spent where it should be: with Lyra and Will among the land of the dead. I thought pretty much everything about this worked wonderfully. They didn't go too over the top with the spooky vibes, but nevertheless everything had this sort of... unsettled quality to it, and the actual dead souls are dreary and depressing. There are also the shades or whatever you call them, who are reaching out to Lyra and Will and trying to make them doubt and give into their fears. Specifically, Lyra runs into a phantom voice of Pan, who tells her she's always been selfish. And then we have the moment where Lyra realizes she's not here to save Roger, she's here to save all of them. To fix the afterlife system entirely.

I'd kind of like to take back what I said earlier about Lyra taking this detour feeling very unmotivated within the pacing of the season. I think it works as part of Lyra's journey and a bigger part of the overall quest. See, Lyra wanted to make things right with Roger, who she feels she let down and got killed. But in doing so, she sees a systemic injustice and realizes that she needs to try and help as best as she can. Asriel, meanwhile, is like "I wanna fistfight God", but theoretically underneath his posturing and his overinflated ego, he's doing it for the same reason: he wants to break down a system that hurts people, take back power for those who have to live with the consequences. So I think that works as a good parallel.

Seeing Roger was very sweet, I like that he and Lyra got that chance to connect. Although, seeing their friendship chemistry just emphasized to me again how much more intense and special and precious the bond between Will and Lyra has grown to be. I really liked Will standing up and also offering to help, and how both kids were honest about not knowing how it'll all turn out in the end.

And then seeing Lee Scorseby! I got so emotional about it! I particularly loved the way he at first freaked out about seeing Lyra, thinking she was dead, then immediately switched into reassuring her that he was alright even though he'd been killed. It's just so heartbreaking that Lyra didn't know! Although it does make me laugh that Iorek didn't bother to mention it. Come on, dude. It was really sad, though, seeing Lee without Hester by his side: that remains probably the best human/daemon team-up the show ever pulled off, I really got the sense of the two of them working in tandem and being two halves of one whole.

And... yeah! I feel like I don't go into a ton of detail in these reviews, mostly because overall I feel satisfied by the experience of seeing this story play out on the small screen, while secretly kinda-sorta dreading how badly the finale is going to make me cry my eyes out!

8/10