His Dark Materials: Æsahættr (2x07)

A lot of stuff happens in this episode, but in some moments it still feels a bit clunky. Not terrible, but still...

Cons:

To start with a small nitpick, last week I was complimenting the decision to have Mary Malone stay and help the kids, but this week we only get the briefest glimpse of her, as she drops the kids off back with a community of adults, and then continues on, immediately picking up with her book plot and seeking another window. This was fine, but it felt weird to include that detour and then go nowhere with it. It's almost just like the writers felt sorry for the kids and wanted to wrap up their story arc a bit, but honestly? Kids die in this story. Kids are orphaned and hurt and lonely and powerless. It's part of what makes the story so striking and frightening.

A lot of exposition in this one, folks, and some of it was a bit overdone. Like, the performances are strong enough to bypass the worst of it, but when we finally get the "Eve" namedrop it's come after so much obvious buildup, and we still have Mrs. Coulter spelling it out for us: "she's going to doom us all, and we have to stop her from falling this time." Like, yeah, thanks, we got it.

Similarly, the conversation between Will and his father... look, I hesitate to put this in the "cons" section because the performances were very strong and I did get choked up at seeing them meet face to face. But as a contrast, in the book the conversation is short, confrontational, full of important information but also violence... and then there's a moment, where their eyes meet, and they both realize in that instant who the other one is. Will is looking at his father. Joseph Parry is looking at his son. They see each other realizing it, and then... bam, and arrow out of nowhere, ad Jopari is dead. 

I can't blame them for expanding this, for the sake of the performances, for the sake of the exposition dump... but god, that moment in the book gives me chills whenever I think about it, and this didn't have quite the same impact. The tragedy inherent in the situation is that they don't have time to say a single word to each other as father and son.

Pros:

That said, I will say that one thing I liked about the final scene between Will and his father is that he's killed by a Magesterium bad guy, part of the group of people looking for Lyra, instead of by a jilted witch who is angry that Jopari never loved her back. That worked in the book, sort of, because of how the witches are handled... but here it would have felt out of place, and it was a good subplot to cut, in my opinion.

Lee's death scene was everything I could have hoped for. So freakin' tragic. I think this is another ding against Parry's death, honestly, because we already had one long drawn out scene ending in a character's death, and the other should have been sharp and sudden and shocking. But setting that aside... what I love so much about Miranda's performance of Lee is the unending earnestness. He knows what staying behind to hold off the soldiers likely means, but he's willing to do it for Lyra. He sends Jopari on his way with some cheerful false optimism, and then he sets to work. He's impressive and a total bad-ass, but he's outnumbered. Hester's last words being "we're a-helping Lyra" just... I have been murdered by emotions. There's something so powerful and sweet and true about that kind of selfless love.

It's mirrored by Jopari dying by saving Will, which was another thing that I thought worked well as a change from the book. I would have cut out a lot of the talking, but still. This episode, this finale, sets up Asriel on the brink of war, gathering his army to fight the Authority. Fight God. Fight... the Father, if you will. And you've got both of Lyra's parents doing questionable things, albeit perhaps for good reasons. And then there are these two father figures. Lee for Lyra, Jopari for Will. And they both do everything they can to help. They come so close to being reunited with their charges, to being able to take the kids in hand and lift their burden of responsibility. And then to have that snatched away like that... truly heartrending, and I think it works so well as a way to raise the stakes here in the finale.

Speaking of Asriel, I heard that apparently there was going to be a whole Asriel-centric episode this season, that got cut because of COVID issues. That might have been cool to see, but what we got was still really powerful. The voiceover, and then finally that shot of him... oof. Such a bad-ass moment. And the angels have arrived! They're such a cool part of the third book, so I'm excited to see how the show handles them.

Pan and Will talking while Lyra is "asleep" was such a lovely moment, and as I keep saying, I'm so thrilled with the way the kids are being portrayed. Their relationship is really strong. And Lyra's conversation with Pan, about how she's changing, and that means Pan will stop changing... well, just knowing where this is all going is making me super-duper emotional already.

Favorite dialogue moment is probably when Jopari and Lee are walking through the woods and they see a daemon nearby. "That's not my daemon," Jopari says. There's a pause, and then... "Run," says Lee, as they take off and the gunfire begins. That was just such a cool start to an action sequence and it really got my blood pumping.

We end the season with Lyra in Mrs. Coulter's clutches, as Mrs. Coulter is determined to protect Lyra from her downfall as Eve. And we also get a glimpse of Roger, asking for Lyra's help from the beyond... I'm eagerly awaiting what's next!

8/10