His Dark Materials Season 3 starts sunday 18 December 2022 7pm BBC1

[IwantToRetire]

I'm starting this thread as I dont think anyone else has for this third series.

Mainly because I got really confused watching earlier episodes and am hoping others will take part and patiently explain things.

Not sure if will be on iPlayer after 1st episode or whether we will all have to watch at tv pace.

Haven’t rtft because I’m only on Ep 5, and I haven’t read the books so maybe I’m missing something, but… am I the only one who doesn’t get why Lyra is so damn obsessed with Roger? Yeah he was her little mate and I’m sure he was a nice kid and all but… is he really worth going to the land of the dead and leaving her daemon behind for?

Because she feels responsible for his death. She brought him to Asriel who then killed him to create the rift between worlds. Plus then she dreams of him when her mother is holding her asleep, the dreams are pretty powerful, more so in the book I think. In the book she uses the aletheometer more too which I think tells her she should go to the land of the dead.

Hmm … It’s hard to put into words - and you have to be ready to be persuaded, but, while I wouldn’t call Roger a MacGuffin, because the real quest is to discover the significance of Dust, he is a visible representation of Lyra’s character. All the strength, steadfastness and determination she brings to the narrative is given a focus in him. So I don’t think we need to understand exactly how she feels about the abduction, torture and death of her childhood friend - we just need to know that those feelings are a catalyst for the unfolding of her own extraordinariness.

(Personally I care more for and about Will.)

I enjoyed the first two series but this one is so tedious I’ve stopped watching. Such a shame but it’s just too slow for me and like others have said I’ve found it hard to understand the characters’ motivations at times.

I agree. I really enjoyed the first 2 series but this is just so dull and I'm watching now just to find out what happens.

What is the relevance of the Irish lady wandering about with sticks? I know she was in series 2 and has researched matter etc but every scene now seems to be her sweaty and aimlessly ambling about. I've obviously missed something but what is she doing?

Just finished it and I felt the last episode really fell flat, due to massive over-egging putting me off.

I love Mary Malone but I don't think the TV series sufficiently portrays her role in joining the dots for how all the different phenomena and different philosophical understandings of them across all the different worlds are one and the same.

I thought it was a shame how the mulefa are shown as pretty much mamalian. according to the books they are supposed to have a completely different skeleton shape, with a single front leg and hind leg and then a left and right leg in the middle.

She uses the i-ching/ sticks to connect with dust after being set the role of being the serpent by the angels, so she's getting her instructions as Lyra does with the alethiometer. When she reaches the mulefa world, she's instructed to stay.

In the books she creates more of a spyglass with the amber hence the name The Amber Spyglass, but she observes the change in the way that the muelfa world is decaying triggered by changes in the way that dust is being lost, initially caused by the Subtle Knife (as Xephania explains near the end), then Asriel's tear, then the abyss through the worlds caused by the bomb. It is there in the series, but is a bit brief and it's the kind of detail that's difficult to translate from thorough text into a much more visual medium, particularly as a sub-plot of a secondary character.

Thankyou for this explanation, much appreciated.

Ah yes, the Spyglass. I admit I was a little disappointed by that - in my mind it should have been more like the kaleidoscope I owned as a child, only a little smaller.

I do think it must be hard to fully translate concepts and things we’ve never seen, only imagined, into visual images that need to be accessible to people who haven’t read the books. It’s true the final episode lacked some of the deep portent and majestic significance of The Amber Spyglass itself. But I was glad they tried.

We watched the last 4 episodes on iPlayer last night (it was a late night) and it made me so sad. I really enjoyed it, but some things weren't how I thought they were in the books esp how I pictured the muelfa and how their wheel worked. The amber spyglass was great, but I thought it was attached to some sticks or something? Maybe misremembering as it has been many years since I read them. I loved Mary, the actress was perfect. I think all the cast were good. Loved the flashback to the young Lyra and Roger. They had grown up so much.

I finished watching last night, I read the books many years ago so couldn’t remember them very well. I enjoyed the series though. One thing that confused me, which world did the fighting take place in? Was it Lyra’s world or another one? I just couldn’t work it out.

It's the world through which Asriel blows a hole with the intercision at the end of 'Northern Lights'.

It's empty except for the cliff-ghasts. He designates it his new republic of heaven builds his metal fortress there. In 'The Subtle Knife' the witches Ruta Skadi (who is Asriel's former lover) and Serafina Pekkala follow Lyra to that world, as they want to find the child from their witches' prophecy. Also the 'Gobblers' acts of intercision have galvanised them to fight against the Magisterium. Ruta visits Asriel and then rallies the witch clans to the war.

Just got the last episode to go. Found the Land of the Dead one very confusing.

Finished it last night. It was well done and I understand most of the changes in terms of conveying the story for TV rather than a book. They were a bit heavy handed south the whole love saving the world thing though.

I had to laugh a little at Will and Lyra keeping up with the midsummer bench for the rest of their lives but I honestly can't remember whether that is something Pullman had said or not. I know the intention to do so is in the books. Not that I don't think it is a lovely thing, but that Will goes on to study medicine and given he lives in our world he'll have been chucked around his deanery with no control over his shifts so I'm not sure how he would manage!

Also Will has a dæmon now… how’s he gonna be a surgeon with a cat following him everywhere he goes?

I don’t remember what if anything was said in the final book about the transition of Will’s daemon to his world. Presumably having not had her as a conscious presence from birth the two of them could be at some distance without too much pain? So she wouldn’t have to go into lectures or around hospital wards with him.

Was there really not something about other people in his world walking around with visible daemons - and how these strangers might recognise each other? I may have invented that.

I miss Will and his mother’s house, still.

I always assumed that just because they have learned to see their daemon it doesn't mean everybody else can back in their world. Although that would go against everybody being able to see Pan wouldn't it so now I've talked myself in circles.

Though yes Will and his daemon can be apart now like the witches and like Lyra and Pan.

Haven't finished the series yet but have read the books multiple times. Will and his daemon can separate, as a consequence of going to the land of the dead in the same way Lyra and Pan can separate.

Completely changed my mind after seeing eps 5 and 6. I'd previously said i was bored by episode 4, why on earth was Lyra risking so much based on a few dreams but seeing them set the ghosts free was so moving and beautifully done. Even telling Gracious Wings stories to help them on their way (I think) was again quite moving.

Not overly keen on the Asriel scenes, but quite liked Mrs Coulter saying sorry to her Dæmon 🥺.

We laughed a lot about Will's daemon. How v handy that it happened to be a cat. If it had been a horse... we had visions of a gowned and masked horse in an operating theatre, clumsily passing a scalpel clutches between two hooves 😂

This is the problem with the TV series. A lot of the relationships seem very superficial on screen (e.g. Hunger Ga,es main character and the obsession with Pieeeeter all the time). The books do an excellent job of showing the depth of feeling Lyra has for her friend, but it all gets a bit lost/glossed over on Tv.

I loved it. Have read all the books several times, and eagerly waiting for the next one.
I thought it was really well done, with some heartrending scenes near the end. I thought the angels were a bit too 'solid' though, given the possibilities of CGI etc (and they were wearing clompy boots ...), although the ethereal appearing and disappearing was good, and the Gallivespians weren't riding on dragonflies. The Mulefa - would like to have seen more of them, and they could have made them the right shape at least!
Asriel didn't seem right casting wise, preferred Daniel Craig in The Golden Compass. Anyhow, great job by the BBC, but marvelling at how anyone could follow it if they haven't read the books.

Not sure why but I stopped watching this half way through, and finding nothing else to watch was prompted by BBC iPlayer to continue watching.

As someone who never really got to grips with the different worlds and beings I found that I was able to enjoy watching with the same level of understanding.

ie I have no overeall understanding, but get intrigue by each circumstance as they occur.

And really like the representation (design?) and imagery. I just love all the daemons.

Was Mrs Coulter's dæmon the only one who had some sort of independent decision making and actions?

As mentioned up thread, I found the last episode a bit of a come down, and it is a shame they didn't expand the second to last episode into the first part of the last one. But I suppose they wanted it to finish on a really dramatic moment. But got bored of all the mooning about.

Also got confused because they showed clips from Will and Lyra's adventures and you could see how young they had been. But then in the last episode Will says something like if you had told me 2 years ago I would have a daemon, but the clips shows they had aged more than 2 years. (Maybe I am being a bit picky!)

At the very end after the different shots of the park bench year by year there was a caption about never meeting, but then something along the lines of until their next adventure.

Was that just a bit of tv adaptation whimsy or is there more?

@Popfan IMO a lot gets lost in the TV adaptation. The books are fairly dense and go into far more detail about this. And also some parts of the second/third book are a bit silly.