Girls Gone Canon Cast - His Dark Materials Episode 20 - The Amber Spyglass Chapters 14-16

Episode Date: October 29, 2021

It's all about intentions—from those of the knife's unseen tip to Asriel's new vehicle to those of our heroes (and ambiguous villains). As the knife is mended, Iorek, Will, and Lyra begin to express doubts while Mrs. Coulter gives the performance of a lifetime.  --- Eliana's twitter: https://twitter.com/arhythmetric Eliana's reddit account: https://www.reddit.com/user/glass_table_girl Eliana's blog: https://themanyfacedblog.wordpress.com/ Chloe's twitter: https://twitter.com/liesandarbor Chloe's blog: www.liesandarborgold.com Intro: Waltz Of The Skeleton Keys by WombatNoisesAudio | https://soundcloud.com/user-734462061

You're listening to Girls Gone Canon Reads His Dark Materials, Episode 20, The Amber Spyglass, Chapters 14-16. I am one of your hosts, Eliana. And I am another one of your hosts, Chloe, and we are here. This is, we're past halfway point baby this is it we're on our way down we're descending through the story through chapters 14 through 16 which is of course 14 know what it is 15 the forge 16ention Craft. This is a great run of chapters. I'm so excited. They all link together so well.

They fit together like metal links, if you will. We've got some fun His Dark Materials stuff happening, Eliana. We do have some fun His Dark Materials stuff, even if what's happening in the chapters themselves are like more sad than fun but they're also fun in a way too but i mean this month's patreon episode for october is going to be his dark materials i'm excited for it if you're in the patreon tier at patreon.com slash girls gone canon stranger and above the five dollar tier you will have access to bonus episodes from us every month sometimes they're a song of ice and fire sometimes they're his dark

materials and sometimes they're other miscellaneous works that we want to talk about and this month we're doing the spirits and creatures in his dark materials we're going to talk about some of our favorite passages some inspiration or possible inspirations for certain entities in mythology and other stories and of course the usual lovable banter that you all are there for I'm sure that'll happen I mean I've been learning a lot

about banter and I've been really brushing up on like British culture Love Island how did you know I was going to talk about Love Island you're talking about Love Island I was going to talk about Love Island she fucking she fucking read me for Phil she knew where I was going

Eliana you're not on Love Island and you're not British I never want to be on Love Island but I definitely I've learned a lot about you know the culture that Philip Pullman has grown up in from from all of my life yes yes you have i think you really have a new perspective to bring to our audience here about his dark materials whether it's for the Patreon episode this month or if it's for chapters

14 through 16. A new perspective. Eliana has the British perspective on her side now. I just want to say, if you want to blame someone for this, one of the people who pushed me over the edge was actually one of our His Dark Materials experts, Candid.

So, you can blame her. Yes, she is watching it. Okay yes yeah we haven't talked to her in a while we got to bring her back on you know maybe that's something to eyebrow wiggle think about for the amber spyglass but if you were watching the show which is wrapping up soon in the next couple months for production i think they're finishing up we're getting to the end couple months for production, I think. They're finishing up. We're getting to the end of filming for series three of His Dark Materials that will cover the Amber Spyglass,

just like we're covering the Amber Spyglass, probably with better production, better visuals, better audio production. You know, that's not our fault. We're sorry. They have BAFTAs. We have BAFTAs. No, I don't. We don't. We don't have them. But they do. They have BAFTAs. We have BAFTAs. No, I don't.

We don't. We don't have them. But they do. They have BAFTAs. So watch that. They do have BAFTAs. We're just. Maybe we'll have Nickelodeon Teen Choice Awards.

MTV Awards. Oh my god. Eliana, will you tell us all what the spoiler policy is for these episodes? Because there is a spoiler policy for part of the episodes that I will try to adhere to. Yeah, allegedly, we have a spoiler policy in which we are covering everything in the His Dark Materials trilogy up until this point of the Amber Spyglass. So that obviously means everything from book one, Northern Lights slash the Golden Compass is fair game. Everything from book two, The Sub the golden compass is fair game everything from book two the subtle knife is fair game and everything chapters 1 through 13 of the amber spyglass is fair game but the things that are not will be under our discussion after we cover these

chapters which will include information from the books of dust as well as the novellas i love discussion because you know the no spoilers el discussion because, you know, the no spoilers, Eliana kind of plays good cop during no spoilers. Like, okay, now, Chloe, you can't say stuff like that. I kind of bent this time. I was like, this is not really spoilery. This episode. Listen, if you get to this point in the book, it's hard, right?

Not to just finish it in two days. I just am putting that out there. If you're at home patient right now, you are a better person than I for that. And we only have nine chapters left. I mean, this is incredible. Nine chapters in the Amber Spyglass that I have to hold out and not spoil until, you know, the end. Honestly, if you started this book series when we started covering Historic Materials as a podcast and you haven't finished the book series yet, I'm actually very impressed at your willpower.

That's like edging with books. Girls Gone Canon, edging with books. I tried to do that briefly for book five of A Song of Ice and Fire for Dance of Dragons because I didn't know when the sixth book was going to come out and here we are okay Eliana well

last but not least in our Jordan housekeeping is our Discord brunch is happening this weekend if you're listening to this episode you're probably getting it october 29th 2021 so if you're in the future hello if you're in the past hello if you're here right now listening hello but this weekend october 30th 1 to 3 p.m we're having brunch on discord with patrons in the thunder tier, $10 tier and above. It's brunch slash happy hour.

We do some shenanigans, right? Some shenanigans occur. We're going to, it's Halloween themed this time. For those of us here in the US that celebrate Halloween, I know there's a faction of our European friends on Discord that are like, I don't want to wear a costume, Chloe. And I'm like, bullshit. Costumes are encouraged. I'm wearing a costume. I'm wearing a costume. I'm working very hard wear a costume, Chloe. And I'm like, bullshit. Costumes are encouraged.

I'm wearing a costume. I'm wearing a costume. I'm working very hard on my costume. Yeah. I'm excited about your costume. I'm very thrilled. I think it will be fun. I think it's very thrilled.

Not completely thrilled together, but some things are. And I think I'm excited. I'm excited. So. I know you're possibly playing reindeer games that weekend for Halloween, but I'm not. I'm not playing reindeer games. I'm staying home mostly. So I'm gonna do it. You know, I'm making some accessories for brunch, for brunch happy hour. I'm gonna go all out. I think it'll be fun. I think it will be fun. It will be fun. It will. And yeah, I mean, Reindeer Games is more of, I think, that's more of Christmas.

This isn't like, not like fucking Jack Skellington over here. So. Hey, we are going to play a Reindeer Game, though. A Jackbox game. Ooh, a Jack Skellington box game. Exactly. What is in the box? Oh. Pain.

Pain. Pain. Pain. Pain. Pain. Pain. Pain. Pain. Pain. Pain. Pain. Pain. Pain. Pain. Pain. Pain. Pain. Pain. Pain. Pain. Pain. Pain. Pain. Pain. Pain. Pain. Pain. Pain. Pain. Pain. Pain. Pain. Pain. Pain. Pain. Pain. Pain. Pain. Pain. Pain. Pain. Pain. game exactly what is in the box oh pain yeah wow that's that was a lot of references there made just at once all at once all i think you're welcome that was like a quadruple entendre enjoy it and no we are gonna play jackbox games they're so fun it's just like silly little mad lib kind of games and a bunch of people can play at once and we revolve you know it people play for a round and then we make sure everyone gets in the next round who didn't play in the previous and we play a few rounds but we're gonna do one called monster seeking monster which is like you're a monster you know a halloween-esque monster and you are on a dating app and you have to like hook some dates and you can't let people know what your powers are.

So your goal is not to get revealed, but also to get the most dates. You've got to be out there swiping left, right, all that jazz. So I think it's going to be really silly. I think it's going to be ridiculous, and I think it's the perfect Halloween shenanigan to be had. Indeed, indeed.

I didn't know that's what you were playing, so I'm excited. Oh, it's going to be fun. It's going perfect Halloween shenanigan to be had. Indeed. Indeed. I didn't know that that's what you were playing, so I'm excited. Oh, it's going to be fun. It's going to be good. It's going to be good. Well, we hope to see you there at brunch happy hour on Discord. But this, of course, brings us to our first chapter of the day, chapter 14 in the Amber Spyglass. Know what it is. And we open the chapter with a quote

from John Ruskin. Labor without joy is base. Labor without sorrow is base. Sorrow without labor is base. Joy without labor is base. I love that John Ruskin's brought into this because he is an English writer and philosopher and was an art critic of the Victorian era and wrote about geology and architecture, mythos, ornithology, botany, economy, literature, he wrote about everything and his style and literary forms were equally varied. He was just like a really broad cover of writing, you know, he was the hard times mag No, I'm just kidding of our time and he actually was really influential up until the first world war which i do think there there's something interesting in some of the the things that pullman brings into the story that are a little world war

ask right of these people just going at it war the, it's never brought the worlds together till now. And in 1869, which this is a fun connection, in 1869, Ruskin became the first Slade Professor of Fine Art at the University of Oxford, where he established his own school, the Ruskin School of Drawing. So John Ruskin was super into the arts and education. And it makes sense that Pullman looks at that quote as kind of influential, right? Considering his background. Yeah, absolutely. And I love that also that University of Oxford. I feel like this quote kind of ties into like some of the way things manifest later on in the story in terms of certain rules that are set but i don't want to you

know i'm going to just be very vaguely touch that and just tease it but i will say when you were reading this aloud i was like i just started cracking up because i was like what if the quotes were like labor without joy is based labor without sorrow is based i was thinking that too in fact when i was trying to think about the quote in a deeper context i was thinking it was a total like based meme i was like is this what based means yeah john ruskin when i was trying to get deep is what i'm saying yeah he was based john ruskin was based that's actually all he should have said for this uh exclamation john ruskin was based. But.

Absolutely. And I think again. We're going to see this show up a little later in the story. But for now. As you'll all remember. Lyra said it's okay Will. I'm going to stay awake and protect you. But she fell asleep.

So Will and Lyra. Wake in the morning within seconds of each other. She's done very little to protect him. During their sleep. Even while they have the same thought. And then Chevalier Tiales guards them. Thankfully someone did. And tells them that the consensorial court has retreated. And Mrs. Coulter's on her way to Asriel with King Ogunway.

And he explains that he's been communicating with them through the lodestone resonator with his commander, Lord Droke, and he calls them their allies, that once they see the bear repair the knife, they will go to the Galabespians to finish their agenda. Will offers them some food, which both Galabespians accept. They're like, yeah, we also eat those foods, such as dried peaches and stale rye. But they're out of water apparently there's no water in this world which is a very unfortunate so they're gonna have to go back to another world to find some wow this is just like dune oh yeah no this is no i'm just

kidding oh my god i'm sorry i've seen it twice this week leave me alone uh lyra asks the alethiometer if there's danger in the valley but it says they're safe so they head back to the window that was already open the gallivespians examine it and they're astonished by it it's like a world wonder will says he'll have to close it once they head through it lyra playfully tries to close it herself but she can't find the edge of the window which i think that's very interesting because lyra is nosy and an only child and as a nosy only child like i would also be frustrated like what do you mean i can't close that i can do anything i put my mind to i'm an aries uh i love that will explains to tialis that he can enter endless worlds and he leads them and their dragonflies along the way.

Everything's tranquil until they come to the wreckage of an African pilot in a gyropter with three men burnt to cinders contorted across the way. More bodies lie along the path, and the Galavespians are kind of used to this, right? Like, they're a little more normalized through war, but the children are moving through the carnage in absolute shock. I found something really interesting about the Galavespians keep being referred to as the spies, right? with Mrs. Coulter soon of, you know, what they've kind of suffered in being oppressed in their society and how they act in their pride and why they're that prideful, which is interesting compared to Coulter, as we know, because she's also like that, right? She's also kind of prideful and suppressed. Interesting. And the Galavespians, they accept human food from them, which I think is interesting for dusty discussion reasonings. But them being referred to as spies starts to change. They kind of become more humanized in these chapters as we move along, right? Their arc begins to move.

They're not just these soulless spies. And it starts to change after they accept human food which i think is fun and they view lyra and will i don't know lyra and will are always described as children for us that are reading the books but the galavespians and the magisterium and other people view lyra and will as these prophesied kind of villains almost right like they're the ones disrupting the order of things that are happening whereas we just see them as kids fated children but the spies kind of even see them as killers right like they are part of this because of their delay because of them dragging their feet and because of what they're doing in the face of prophecy they're they're seen as killers almost to the galavespians and so there's almost this reckoning between them

where they have to kind of like come to the same common ground, which they do in the next few chapters, I think. And to be fair, like the Galavespians have been hunted their entire lives by humans. So like, why would Will and Lyra be that much different? They don't know. They don't know. I get it.

I think there's also kind of a connection with Yorick, right? Because Yorick right because Yorick in the following chapters sees himself as becoming more human and then you even get kind of in the face of these faded vilified prophesied children this moment where Will and Lyra are looking at the dead and they're shook right like they are straight up shooken straight up shaked they are just like shaking in their boots because death sucks and they weren't really ready to see all these people that died kind of for quote-unquote them right for their escape and they fight for Asriel's side which I might not like asriel but what he stands for and what these people that

are following him are fighting for it is the better cause right than the authority like we should very much think that's a better option uh and there's just so much love and loss and life and growth here for lyra and will and they head up to the top of the valley to finally get some water and lyra starts to think about of the valley to finally get some water, and Lyra starts to think about Ama, someone we just left behind, and we've talked about how we won't see her again in the story, likely. Lyra had asked the alethiometer the night before what happened to her, and Ama's okay, but she thinks Lyra and Will are devils, and she fears them. So their reaction, you know, to the death of these soldiers and them being vilified

in the face of all these different factions and Amma's fear of them is so sad, right? Because they are lonely children. As we will talk about today more, Lyra's a lonely child. Will is a lonely child. They're very alone. And Amma helped them so greatly.

But also they're kind of like, you know, Satanists to Ama right now. She's like, what the fuck? Salmakia told them in the previous chapter, they're like, you need to start taking this shit more seriously. And I kind of really love what you're saying about how the people who are seen as their enemy, right, like the humans, right, even though I guess the Galavespians are sort of human themselves based on other classifications, probably, like they're considered conscious beings as a king of Gunway will say but i mean there's a interesting contradiction in there that their enemy is also going to be is is where the you know the promised ones are coming from kind of like how the knife sounds very much like a contradiction as we're gonna find out but also i think it's just so, I do love that bit of humor, though, where Lyra's like, talking about what happened to Ama. And I'm so glad that we find out that she's okay. And we get that sort of closure. But she's like, yeah, she thinks we're devils now. And I feel like the way that's delivered adds a little levity to everything that's going on.

But I will say that I don't think that Ama is exactly wrong in terms of Will and Lyra being devils. Because that is kind of the point, right? That is the point of the books, right? That they are part of the side of the rebel angels in a way. And I mean, they're not wrong to think that Lyra and Will are killers. That's what Lyra knows about Will. And she's like, that's why I trust him. He's a killer. Gotta be a killer. Right? Have to be a killer. That's a Lyra knows about Will. And she's like, that's why I trust him. He's a killer. Gotta be a killer.

Right? Have to be a killer. That's a good thing here. And regarding the Galavespians being spies, I do think it's interesting, as you were saying, that they keep being called the spies and it feels like the children distrust them for that. And also that it's framed so negatively about them being spies, but not the other parts of it in terms of how spies

end up being framed in the secret commonwealth and i'll just leave it at that because we do have a discussion but i'm just like interesting there's actually something even closer to that here as we get to chapter 16 with coulter right the way a gunway regards coulter he says the questions that you're asking makes you seem like you're a spy. You know that, right? You're sounding very awfully spy-like right now. The distrust of spies is definitely rooted in these chapters

and it feels very significant. Very significant. People of the press. Absolutely. Yeah, that is a big discussion in these few chapters. A lot of things are repeated throughout these chapters. Yeah, they have some really bold themes. Yeah, they do.

It's well-thread throughout these. And continuing on, they continue on to go find Yorick. A wonderful reunion when it happens. But for now, Lyra is weak. She's exhausted and refuses to say anything about how she's feeling because she wants to keep pace with will until he eventually goes for a bathroom break and then she trembles and whimpers and lady salmachia says you need to rest there is no disgrace in being weary and lyra argues that she can't let will down she can't let him think that

she's weak or that she's holding him back but lady salmakia calls that impertinence and that that this is the last thing will would think about her and then she reiterates that lyra needs to rest and lyra feels mutinous and then remembers like lady salmakia's poison and then decides not to say anything back and i i guess this is this is one of those moments right that kind of ties back to the header quote for this chapter in terms of the work and needing to like rest and the sorrow and the joy. Yeah, I mean, all of life's flavors in the in-between. Yeah, it's based.

That's part of this, right? Yeah. It's based. But it is like Lyra is so conflicted, right? And she straight up is so stressed and exhausted that she just kind of bursts and says this to Salmakia. And something that I really love, again, between this chapter with Coulter later is how this manipulation and the manipulations we see Coulter do with Asriel. And Asriel do with Coulter.

It's going to be a very fun game of cat and mouse that we'll talk about, or cat and monkey. And here, though, Salmakia, I i mean later we see that she's teased it out of lyra like she knew just from this she's like oh you love him oh okay interesting gonna write that one down that girl loves him uh which is also so funny because later colter's like i don't know what lyra's thinking and selmakia is able to figure it out in 10 seconds that Lyra's weakness is Will. Yeah, she is. But they still make- Girl has it bad.

They still make some of the wrong assumptions. They're in this chapter. They're like, yeah, she's going to do whatever Will says. And I'm like, you got that the other way around. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Chevalier Tialis opens the lodestone resonator and Lyra watches him. And I have to bring this out because it's just so beautiful. The instrument looked like a short length of pencil made of a dull gray black stone resting on a stand of wood.

And the Chevalier swept a tiny bow like a violinist across the end while he pressed his fingers at various points along the surface. The places weren't marked, so he seemed to be touching it at random. But from the intensity of his expression and the certain fluency of his movements, Lyra knew it was as skillful and demanding a process as her own reading of the alethiometer. I love the usage and repetition of the word resonance here right in terms of like the lodestone resonator and then how this is very it calls it out right that it is reminiscent of a violin or a stringed instrument and it's such a great creative choice especially because of like the idea that it looks like random, but there's definitely a method to it that Tialis knows, and it feels very parallel to Will, right? Using the resonance of the different worlds to figure out which world it is, and then to also sort of feel at the edges to close the windows.

Oh, yes. It's that slight precision. Yeah. They use the word resonance yeah for for each world so i was like oh interesting how fun how cute and you know i love emotional resonance emotional we haven't used that term the magic we haven't said that in a long time wow throwbacks well i'm bringing it back here but I do I do find like the connection to and the intentional tools we're going to talk about the crafted tools throughout these three chapters. Yeah. But but there's something so resonant, literally resonant about it and how it hits with also with like possibly communicating through worlds like this is like a tin can telephone game but to the extreme right i think it's really well done and it's such a fun cut so much in his dark materials is a little steampunky right like just a little bit of cogs and shit and that's why the golden compass movie hit some of those cool looks just because it had steampunk stuff but they didn't quite deliver on the thematic and also chris got fucked anyways but it wasn't his fault you know it was too early it was too early

like that was the it really movies have changed a lot i'm in the way that culture regards things like that that era i think okay yeah and the studio controlled so much of it but the design works so well because of some of these concepts like this lodestone resonator and it's just this little like mini micro medieval thing and and lyra asks how it works because she's interested a liar oh my god sidebar in hadestown orpheus and eurydice when they meet he's like singing to her and she's like orpheus interesting so what are you going to tell me like that other dudes couldn't and he's like playing his liar and he's like i'm a player and she's like oh a player and a liar nice you know and that's how i feel about will and lyra because Oh, shit. Because, you know, it's good that Lyra gets a little eyeball of this lodestone resonator, right? Because she, too, appreciates these finer details like you and I do.

And she asks how it works. He says, scientists, whatever you call them in whatever world you are, know something called quantum entanglement, called quantum entanglement, meaning two particles can exist that only have properties in common so that whatever happens to one happens to the other at the same moment, no matter how far apart they are. This is some foreshadowing.

You know, if you're not there yet, I'm not telling you, but there's some foreshadowing coming soon that this could have to deal with, right? Like common property items, quantum entanglement, but it's also foreshadowing for something much bigger that I'm also not going to talk about. That said, I do want to talk about quantum entanglement

because I did a lot of reading on quantum entanglement. I wonder what it could all mean. I think it's a metaphor, Eliana. But quantum entanglement is I wonder what it could all mean. I think it's a metaphor, Eliana. But quantum entanglement is a phenomenon that happens when particles are interacting, generating, sharing proximity with one another in a way that the state of each particle of the group cannot be described independently of the state of the others, including when particles get separated by a large distance. The topic of quantum entanglement is the disparity

between classical and quantum physics it's a primary feature of mechanics lacking in classical mechanics and there have been suggestions to look at the concept of time for example as a phenomenon that's a side effect of quantum entanglement so it's like really relativity right like with that if we want to go, like, and that's like time only exists because someone else is there to look at you and say, yes, I agree, time exists. And that's your property you share.

It's all a metaphor is all I'm saying. I think it's a metaphor for something. It is a metaphor for something, but we are doing spoilers, even though we've definitely kind of been treading the line on it well i will say a fun fact adamant the legendary rock which i think we've discussed before and of which is the material for the adamant tower that we're going to come back to in like the last chapter of this episode was associated with lodestones and then also in regards to quantum entanglement i want the

obsidian of the hdm world it is it is it actually is but yeah so i it has always kind of been associated with that so that's kind of funny but i would like to once more in regards to Quantum Entanglement, recommend the Disney Channel original film Genius starring Emmy Russum. And it's also kind of about hockey. So maybe it's a great seasonal film to throw on right now. And it has a very great, I think, demonstration of Quantum Entanglement if you would like to watch the Disney Channel original film. Genius. I just have to say, is this just because you're being topical about hockey season? Is it hockey? Is it hockey season?

Well, that's why I'm like, did you know? It starts in early October, I guess, and it goes till April, but did you know that or were early october i guess and it goes till april but did you know that or were you just spitballing because i'm like i just associate with eliana the oracle with hockey you know i'm like but that was my question that you're like it's the season what fucking season is it eliana what do you celebrate right now hockey what the fuck i mean this is a i just associate hockey with the cold weather

and i was like that seems cozy maybe god i have never seen this film by the way i'm sorry maybe we'll have to watch it we'll have to watch it it's god that's actually literally when i how i first learned about i think this concept at like nine years old so wow so maybe it's a discord film maybe tiales explains a little bit more about you know quantum entanglement in the lodestone resonator though uh and says that when a person on each side reproduces the exact sound they can communicate and i'm also like you described a cell phone and he puts his lodestone resonator away and salmakia speaks quietly to him where lyra can't hear pan though becomes an owl and strains to hear and then will comes back and they move on puts his lodestone resonator away, and Salmakia speaks quietly to him where Lyra can't hear. Pan, though, becomes an owl and strains to hear,

and then Will comes back and they move on. They begin to move to snowy territory in rocky valleys, and Will can tell Lyra has no energy left. He has to see her feet and rubs blood moss ointment onto her blisters while the Galabas mains update them, and Lord Roke is sending a gyroptor to bring them

away as soon as they find yorick and will rubbing ointment and giving lyra a foot massage which is so sweet of him reminds me a little of mary magdalene washing and anointing jesus's feet and i mean as we know both of them are kind of promised ones will and lyra so that's interesting but also i i just think it's a really wonderful scene where Will is showing care towards Lyra because she's been pushing herself so hard because she doesn't want to be a burden. And by slowing down here and caring for her, he's demonstrating through his actions that Lyra doesn't need to push herself so hard. And he's creating this like safe, trusting between them i love what you said about

mary magdalene because i've been thinking a lot throughout this chapter of lyra's you know jesus energy going on like she's very she's got the disciples right yorick she's got will oh yeah even the galavespians are fucking following her you know the the two galavespians are with her even though they don't want to be they're're like, yeah, she's the real fucking deal. And there is something about that vulnerability that Will, she just has that argument with Salmakia, like, well, Will would this. No, Will would never do this.

And now here he is proving Salmakia's point that Will doesn't give a shit about that. Will cares about your well-being. And it's also important to like her self-worth like it's also people can care about you without drugging you in a cave for example right that's the other thing like will's showing you healthy love which is really great absolutely because she hasn't had very much of that in terms of uh some of the people closer she has at at least through people like

Lee and Yorick and Serafina. But anyway. Lyra puts her shoes back on and then off they go again. Night looming in the sky and they finally reach Yorick. Yorick and Lyra sure embrace a bear hug, if you will. And it's the best.

Lyra forgets her weariness in that moment. She's so happy and it gets a little less happy after when she asks yorick for an update about his kingdom if mr scoresby is safe she's riding proudly on his back will doesn't listen while they talk only hears a little bit of the crosstalk and unfortunately during this time yorick breaks the news about mr scoresby's death and then Lyra cries out in dismay, and then Will realizes, oh, I actually might know some of this, and had heard it from the gangels while Lyra is weeping freely, and Yorick swears to avenge him, and Will's like,

I don't really know how to comfort people here, because, uh, Lee Scoresby kind of died to save my dad and like they actually knew and loved least scores being like didn't and he's like i feel awkward what uh this is a complex emotion like and i think a lot of people have had that kind of emotion especially as an adult coming to terms with someone's life and memory you don't know but because of someone's soul who might be quantumly entangled with your own on your path you are you know having to help and be involved even though you feel awkward and like you you are intruding on something it's an intrusion i had a really good friend pass away that like it was weird because there was a whole other life that i wasn't a part of but i i knew them know, and it's that kind of intrusion of like, but Will, it's not even a good friend of his, right?

The line is, they had loved him and known him and Will had not. And it's empty and lonely. And he feels partially responsible, I think, because not just for that, you know, like he's feeling responsible throughout this whole chapter for everything. He feels so guilty about his mom and Lyra and the gangles and Lee, his dad. He's got a lot on his shoulders on his plate right now, and he's trying to carry it all. It's just like Lyra is too, right? And it's so they're not telling each other things because they can't as we see when they take the time to they do take time to have asides and be vulnerable with each

other and say this is how I'm actually feeling now that the spies aren't here and uh just Will's loyalty to Lyra and and I mean her loyalty to him in some aspects too like it really shines through here yeah and in terms of them not opening up yet I mean that's a learned thing right it's not something you just come into the world knowing especially since both of them have been as you pointed out earlier they've been lonely children for a long time and they're only now like but especially they can't right now i mean the spies that's also true they can't i mean but they have opened up like i mean they opened up throughout all the subtle knife to each other like that's not the problem the problem here is like

they both know they can't say what they want to say and need to say yeah and that's also something that comes off really apparently like that they're, really need to fucking talk to Lyra. Really need to fucking talk to Will. Really fucking can't because these spies are here. Yeah. The spies are ruining. They only trust each other. The spies are ruining the mood.

The honeymoon. Yeah, the honeymoon. Oh my God. Well, Will desperately wants to talk to her, but he doesn't know where the spies are in the cave. So he's kind of just sitting exhausted in there. Yorick is roasting lamb for them. He likes his raw. And he tells Lyra his people can't live in these mountains.

He starts to ask them what their plan is, and Will begins to address the king. He starts to lead with his broken knife, but then he realizes the spies are listening in on them from a corner they appear they show their faces and will demands they show the king respect not having asked permission to enter his cave lyra of course is enamored with this she's like yes yes that's real will rocks but chevalier tialis is displeased with this display. Yeah, I think most spies don't like having their cover blown. It's kind of like, oh, did I do a bad job? But the reason Will's able to do it, right, even though he can't see them, and he's able to point directly at the wall that they're hiding behind,

is because he has, I mean, that very supernatural intuition and ability to sense things, right? It's part of how he's able to find and close the worlds and it's it's a gift i hope his senses stay sharp as well i truly do i truly do well chevalier then accuses them of being dishonest with them for bringing them to this cave and without telling them that the knife was broken and will rises up telling him that you know what it was necessary for us to deceive you uh and you're just gonna have to put up with it because he explains like that you know they're as real spies to yorick and says that well if you were both truly on our side you wouldn't hide an eavesdrop on them so makia is also pissed about this and Chevalier like acknowledges Will's logic

of like we had to lie to you or else you would have made us do this thing and then Tiales like apologizes though shoots cold resentful looks at Will and Lyra. Lady Salmachia just ignores the children completely and asks for forgiveness to Yorick and admits that they failed to pay proper respects as they've been among their enemies for so long and i'm just kind of like i understand like why will would deceive them but i'm not sure i completely understand his logic as to why he was right and or like how he is more right than chevalier tiales in this i'm like they were all wrong yeah they were all being very rather bratty right like all four of them were being brats all four of them

and I don't know I do feel maybe Pullman's really pushing this tension right to put that kind of tension between those dynamics between them I don't know what they needed to necessarily be like this but that said they are rigid about getting back to Asriel yeah who's payrolling them you know i mean like they they are on his dime and it is hard to explain right from all sides like they can't go back to asriel

and be like well it turns out your daughter is a little shithead you know he kind of knows they he already knows yeah and they haven't been with will Lyra, so they don't know them before now. They've heard some of these things that they've seen and done, but they're kind of on blind faith themselves. But all of their behavior is just a little petty, right? A little forced. And maybe I just haven't met many Galavaspians or many Will-Lyras, but a little forced. but a little forced yeah like especially in terms of who ends up being right and i'm just like i don't know about all this but you're saying yeah all four of them are being bratty but you know who's not being bratty and it's probably just like i don't know what the fuck is happening here yorick yorick is there being great accepts their apologies invites them to eat by the fire and then let's will continue asking him to mend the knife. Yorick examines the knife, explaining, yes, I can fix it, and Lyra realizes, uh, yes, he can fix it doesn't mean yes, he will do it, and kind of, like, follows up, and Yorick

explains he doesn't trust that knife, says it's a deadly weapon with an unlimited harm factor, and says, you know what, Will's intentions with this knife might be good, but the knife has intentions too, and Atul's intentions are what it does. And we've got this great quote from Yorick of,

But sometimes Atul may have other uses you don't know. Sometimes in doing what you intend, you also do what the knife intends without knowing oh my god oh my god i'm very happy that you got to bring it back thank you it was about time it's it's about time it was about time what is it about time. What is it, Lord Tywin Lannister, from the show, book, based upon, etc., Game of Thrones? There's a tool for every task and a task for every tool. I'm just kidding.

That's literally unrelated. But I love this little passage because, I don't know, the fact that what you do has meaning, right? That's what this chapter is all about. Lyra cares so much about bringing peace to Roger or trying to do so. Will cares so much about doing this so that he can go back to his mom and take care of her, right? Like he's like, I have a goal to go home and give her the care that she deserves. What you do has meaning. And I think we're going to talk a little bit about prophecy here and there today. But in the face of the prophecy about them, this is them fighting to have their own arc in their own story.

Absolutely. That's such a great point. It is what this chapter is really emphasizing about meeting and being intentional about what you mean to do so and you know i love that shit i love intentional art it's like the thing i love like when you know someone put a scene next to another scene in a movie because of like the mood or the tone like they were like well if i put this this pair it's how we cover a song of ice and fire you know like we put povs that we think mean things together near each other and see what fucking cooks up in the pan. And I love intentional art.

I love just things meaning shit. So this is a chapter I like. It's a chapter I like. And Pullman does a great job of being very intentional about these chapters. About the intentional chapters, yes. Yes, yes. Well, Yorick then asks Will if he can see the knife's sharpest edge in terms of knowing what the knife does, and Will admits, yeah, I guess I can't

see it because it's so infinitesimally small. And Yorick then asks, how can you know everything it does? And I just am fascinated by some of the language about Will and the knife in these sequences. You know, like, especially when it comes to later on in the forging scenes, it feels a little bit like Will's relationship with the knife is almost like a demon, right? Being one with the knife and being able to feel everything it feels. And also the way that Will's relationship to the knife is likened to the bears and their armor, but yet how Will doesn't reallyra argues that the people in Bolvanger were wicked, and Yorick knows that, and that if they don't try, these people just can keep going forever. How great is that connection, right?

Connecting the knife to Bolvanger, and I mean the subtle knife even, like that book. We learn so much of this knife and its effects and what the people who once had control of it could do and wanted to do with it. Connecting it to Bull of Anger, where the doctors stood by and did nothing while children were tortured. Will feels like if he doesn't try to use the knife and try to get it back and try to have it on their side, he's doing nothing, which is worse. It's worse than doing something and failing

this reminds me so much of this passage from hebrews 412 for the word of god is alive and active sharper than any double-edged sword it penetrates even to dividing soul and spirit joints and marrow it judges the thoughts and attitudes of the heart i think there's so much here of will and lyra's path being laid out in front of them as fated children and them doing what little they can to attain agency in those prophecies right like those little bits of just like taking these things for yourself like i'm going to do this the way i'm going to do it i'm going to kill whatever do whatever eat the fucking apple be eve and it's all about faith like having faith in the tools intentions even if you can't know them like there's no way will can know what the knife means

without lyra looking it up on the alethiometer and getting a half-baked answer as we're gonna see it makes you wonder is the path faded because they're on it or are they faded because of the path they're on you know and you wonder it's a big question throughout the book who came first the chicken or the egg chicken or the egg well to come back to another tool that also has intentions i would say the alethiometer. Lyra consults it. She's like, what is up with the knife's intentions? And Will says nothing. He's thinking about what the broken knife means to him, which a lot of things, right? The things you could already guess. Never going home, never seeing his mom again, abandoning her like his father did, he thinks that he must use it to return to her or never

forgive himself. Yorick finally agrees to fix the knife on one condition, because while his people have no gods or demons, they have language and tools. If Lyra reads the alethiometer and gives the final decision, he'll mend it. Lyra reads the alethiometer and it's wildly confused. It calls for balance. It says the knife could be bad or good depending on the bearer, Will's, wishes. And then it said, repair it. Yorick nods. Lyra offers fuel for his fire. He directs them to a resinous brushy area. But Will knows Lyra wants to talk away from the spies, so once they're away in these resinous bushes, he asks what else the alethiometer really said. Lyra says she didn't really understand all of it, but she thinks it said the knife would be the death of dust, but the only way to keep

dust alive. The alethiometer also warned them that if you went to the world of the dead you might never come back you might never survive which quite frankly is always a risk for everyone when they go to the world of the dead so did they not think that was a risk i wonder that anyways it's in the name right i know right i'm like i feel like that was an implied risk going to the world of the dead. Anyway, she doesn't understand, though, as she said earlier, the rest of the alethiometer's message, probably because it spoke to her in fucking weird-ass shit. And she says all she saw was blankness and emptiness. But she thinks it meant that even if it's dangerous, they should still try to rescue

Roger. She says that she's smarter than she was when she first tried to free him at Bolvanger, but the place in her subconscious that she visited was even worse than Bolvanger, and that's what she's truly afraid of. Will takes a deep breath and tells her his fears, never seeing his mother again out of nowhere he remembers being young and ill before her troubles first began and her singing nursery rhymes to him and telling him stories and how he had felt safe he couldn't abandon her now and as if she could hear his thoughts lyra comforts him saying that would be an awful thing you know right on that same track of what you were saying earlier about kind of that intimacy

they've developed i love how patient and kind they are with one another like kids right kids are assholes and i was an asshole i was a kid once and kids love one upping one another right and these two kids as we said lonely only. And they're very different from maybe the normal, normal kid. You know, your baseline run of the mill elementary school, little snot nosed kid. They're different than those, but they're very kind and patient. They don't try to one up each other's grief ever. One person isn't more important. Like they are two parts of a whole in the way they operate on this mission. And I think their relationship is really special and really highlighted in that. And they're open to the things they share. held i don't remember being cuddled i i don't even remember mrs lonsdale holding me she says

mrs lonsdale only taught me about manners and keeping clean interesting we're gonna talk about that in the discussion talk about ungrateful kids fucking ungrateful snot-nosed motherfucker lyra remarks though in the cave lyra thought coulter had really loved her truly that she thought lyra was sick or diseased and she was nursing her back to health she never stopped looking after her and lyra even remembers her holding her in her arms maybe once or twice that's what i'd do in her place if i had a child she says oh myra oh sweet Oh, Lyra. Oh, sweet. Sears into camera. It's very sad. It's so sad.

Yeah. It's like, it's really sad because part of it is like, Lyra knows how horrible her mom is, but she also like sees some of the humanity. people that are gaining humanity in these chapters coulter is finally kind of growing a spine back yeah after removing it for so many years surgically and giving it to the faith yeah absolutely she is and it is really sad and i mean the truth is somewhere in between right the truth of what happened there right it's somewhere in between like yeah mrs coulter did this terrible thing because will like realizes oh lyra doesn't understand her mom was like actually poisoning her but like as we see in in mrs coulter's like monologue later on i mean she does love her and he's like should i tell lyra and betray that memory and then he decides that he shouldn't it's a lot like in Frozen when you know

Kristoff is about to be like I'm gonna tell him regarding spring to Olaf and Anna's like don't you dare and they find the resinous bushes, they gather armfuls of the bush and they agree that they won't be saying anything

to those little spies and I just, you know in reflection in this scene and will deciding not to tell lyra because he sees it as this like objectively bad thing i don't think he truly understands yet that there very much is another kind of symmetry to both lyra and his relationships with their mothers and especially in terms of the way that they misunderstand their mothers, because yeah, Will knows the truth about Lyra's slumber and isn't going to reveal to her the sinister nature behind why she

was asleep, you know, again, which is like that, oh yeah, it was your own mother who's keeping you back, ha ha! Ha ha! And so he thinks that he's, like, allowing Lyra to keep this, like, really idyllic, but not really true vision of her mother. While, you know, Will's actually very much doing the same when it comes to his own mother.

Because yeah, he remembers his mother caring for him and holding him once upon a time in his own illness. And from that feels this fierce need to protect his mother for the rest of his life or for hers. But I think he fails to understand that like, this isn't actually a very good situation either, right? What his mother has put upon him isn't good. Like, yeah, Elaine might be a good person and definitely does not kill children or actively harm them for like fucking science or self, science or self you know for her career but she has put her son in a position where he's been forced to take on the care for his mother and that the roles of parenthood have been reversed and that's really really been harmful to him as we see uh it's hard because both of them are kind of reckoning with like parents not perfect and obviously elaine did the best to her abilities as being a single

mother let alone uh having health issues on top of that that's a lot to cope with like i don't have a child and i don't know if i could have one because like of my health you know like i don't know about my health giving them health issues and then also being awake enough to somehow like care for a child's needs and raise a human and like make them into like this is some next level shit you know so like elaine was doing the best she could but it is like will and lyra grew up very lonely children for a reason yeah it is and i because of that absenteeism going on for both yeah in different ways and i don't think will will sees his actions and the way he feels towards his mother as this is a positive thing to feel and not realizing it's really hurtful and i think the knife snapping is meant to be sort of a a metaphor like, this is actually also painful for you, you know, Will.

He hasn't reckoned with that yet. Well, speaking of the knife breaking, let's get to its mending in The Forge, Chapter 15. We open with the line, As I was walking among the fires of hell delighted with the enjoyments of genius from william blake and i will say that the word genius is capitalized in this quote so william blake is also recommending the 1999 disney channel original movie genius my fucking god I cannot deal with you. Meanwhile, the Galavaspians are speaking about the very knife that we're speaking about.

Salmachia complains Will is too alert, but the girl is trusting and loves easily. Tialis reminds her Will has the knife and he's going to break them into another world and run away from us as soon as it's fixed yeah so speaking of tools and intentions all of these assumptions about will and lyra are going to blow up in the gallivespians face later on because they like asriel are kind of failing to understand that sometimes your pawns can have intentions of their own something we discuss in another book series but anyways it's the same lesson that lyra and will are learning now about their own tools salmakia reluctantly agrees watching yorick improvise a workshop to fix the knife with and the mighty workers in asriel's factories would

have probably laughed at the setup but that's dumb of them all right because yorick's a fucking master and the anvil contains some of yorick's own armor wow beautiful but the bear was certain in his movements they realize this and muffle their scorn will and lyra support yorick by keeping branches in the fire at certain angles and the heat in the cave becomes intense they gather more fuel for the operation and then find some stones that york shows them next and he's like we have to do the stones like this because they're going to give off a gas to keep air from the hot metal of the blade i have no idea if any of this shit is true or not but i'm like yes and the branches that they gathered when they were like having their secret talk are described as being you know resinous full of

resin right um which is kind of fun because resin is going to come back and play a big part in this book it is fun i love that and i also love the anvil having some of yorick's armor because his armor is his soul as we learn it's what he has he put himself in there as part of protection i mean i think that's why he gets so upset yeah i mean he's putting himself in in it yeah to forge this he's part of it it's amazing and he gets so burdened he does literally literally his paws his poor paws poor babby dad daddy boy um will ends up being the fire manager he performs his duties with excision yorick warns him the knife might be a little shorter and the surface will be changed color

wise and the handle will be charred but it'll work i love this chapter following the quantum entanglement of will and lyra right that knife being welded in this chapter is symbolizing the entire journey they're going through they're the knife right like maybe the friends we made all along were isa header and they're trying to parse and fix their traumas together as we leave the last chapter right that that end of the chapter like you said where they're like oh my mom's great lol uh they're processing some of this and now lyra wants to go free roger with the power of friendship and and maybe make further traumas or fix further traumas or whatever the power of

further traumas are compelling them through all of this yeah exactly it could be further trauma i mean they could die which again i feel like that was always a pretty self-evident risk it could happen it could still happen we have nine chapters left yeah i just always felt like that was a clear risk when you go to the world of the dead i watched the disney hercules movie and i saw what happened when he swam through that river of souls so oh oh it happened pan changes into a crow to help with the forge and fanning the flames adorable and lyra wafts the stone gas over the fire the metal of the knife glows red yellow and then white then yorick places it on the anvil singeing his claws a little but working with extraordinary

speed to hammer the blade into one it It's honestly amazing. Will watches, his every sense trembling, knowing his future depends on his blade, and Yorick then yells above the noise for Will to hold it still in your mind, you have to forge it too. This is your task as much as mine. And so Will keeps the fire lit, and Lyra gets new stones for Yorick, and Will struggles but holds out until the end of the forging. Before the last piece is heated, Yorick makes meaningful eye contact with Will, and while Will can't really read what's on his mind because he's like, they're just black bear eyes, he feels it. They're all equal to this task, and even though it's hard, Will must brace himself for the final blow. The blade cools and Will readies himself to wield his knife again.

But Yorick says, not quite yet. We have to go talk outside. He directs Lyra to guard the knife from the spies and also guard the fire. Don't let it die. They have one final task. Outside, Yorick tells Will, they shouldn't have done this. They shouldn't have fixed this knife he's full of doubt and he says that's a human thing not a bear thing

if i am becoming human something's wrong something's bad and i've made it worse i don't know how many more of these I'm going to get, okay? I'm going to ham it up. Will argues the first pantserborn to make armor would have been bad in that same sense, right? He's like, well, logically, that means the first bear that made his own armor is bad. So how could all of you be bad? Oh, is that a metaphor? How could everyone else be bad after original sin uh and

yorick is silent choosing to roll in a snow bank just for a hot second gotta love that stands up he shakes off the snow and then he answers will yes maybe that was evil too oh i get it the knife is original sin also the knife's original sin yorick building armor armor building his original sin uh yorick becoming human that's his worst fear right now and that is ridiculously interesting because we see how jofer rackinson is torn apart in the opposite manner right he becomes corrupted by the magisterium and their promise of riches and resources to use how he pleases in his kingdom literally turns to filth and shit and yorick is picking up these pieces currently trying to return his people to some sort of semblance of normalcy something resembling their culture without this human

interference right of what they've had happen to them and here comes his human best friend lyra the other side not the magisterium the opposite of that not like other humans lyra silver tongue and his paw is kind of forced right likely because of lyra yeah i love i love what you said i didn't even realize like yes absolutely the knife is bare original sin and i mean yeah obviously the armor was like part one of that but the weapon intention intention is part of it like that's such a big part i think of what pullman is saying is key to being human and this idea of doubt right like when isn't the idea like when adam and Eve like bit into the apple, then they felt shame for the first time.

And that's what Yorick is feeling here. Maybe a bit of shame. And Lyra plays both the serpent and Eve and is like, offers that knowledge, right? She gives the knowledge from the alethiometer that says, yeah, we should repair the knife. And so Yorick does it. He takes the bite and is part of everything everything that's gonna come after in that way so and i don't like you said is it a bad thing is it not i don't know like

yorick has kind of already been maybe on this path already right like when we first see him he's doing some weird human-y shit too by like doubting himself and giving into like alcoholism right and because his armor was stolen so yeah yeah he's kind of i mean it's interesting because humans are supposed to be full of life right and humans are supposed to be full of like vigor for life because we're human and we have everything we could absolutely desire we have souls do we and but yeah right but in that same manner like yorick was just like working a shit-ass job like exploited at this job his only thing he liked was taken away from him and he started drinking and becoming like an alcoholic.

Like, that's more human to me than what he's talking about. Yeah. But I also... I'm like, that's human. I like this assertion, though, that doubt is part of... It's a very self-awareness. Yeah, it's part of being a human. That is for fucking sure.

I am full of doubt. I, too, am full of doubt. And gas. Doubt and gas. Yeah. God. Well. I am full of gas.

You're right. I'm trying to hold it in. So, before this weapon, there was no other great mass weapon that people knew of. Even though they have flamethrowers. Even though they have flamethrowers. And humans follow their customs without question because their nature is weak without it like a bear without its armor but yorick says that this means he stepped outside bear nature that he's as foolish as

jofer rackinson and then he asks will why did the knife break and will explains honestly that he looked at mrs coulter he thought about his mom and that shit snapped right in half yorick takes a note and he's like did you know that when you talk about the knife you talk about your parents and he's like thank you thank you dr yorick thanks dr yorick in like little glasses right little notepad little sketch pad what are you drawing over there yorick you just like look at it and it's just like scribbles york what do you see in the blobs i'm a fucking bear will explains all that and york's like so wait what do you want to do with the knife and will hesitates because he's like i don't i don't know actually i just know i need it and york lunges and cuffs him. He's like, answer me

truthfully. And Will says, I don't know because I haven't figured out yet what I'm supposed to do. And it scares me and it scares Lyra too, but I have to do Lyra's bidding. So we're going to go to the land of the dead and meet her ghost ex-boyfriend, Roger. And then he also was like, I'm a little scared about that too, though, because the angels told me I should take the knife to Asriel, but I want to go back and take care of my mom after all this, after everything I've seen. Will explains that Balthamos, who wasn't a warrior, convinced him what the right thing to do was. He explained to York why he hesitated, speaking of Balthamos and saying, He did as much as he could, and then he couldn't do any more.

He wasn't the only one to be afraid. I'm afraid too. So I have to think it through. Maybe sometimes we don't do the right thing because the wrong thing looks more dangerous, and we don't want to look scared, so we go and do the wrong thing just because it's dangerous. We're more concerned with not looking scared than with judging right. It's very hard. That's why I didn't answer you.

Aw. I love that. That is such a great... I love Will. Yeah. What a good boy. That's such a great passage of humanity and doubt, right? It's doubt. It's exactly what we were just saying, what you were saying.

I'm full of doubt, and will was full of doubt and worry and it is good that will clarified though because i can see why that little hesitation of like what are you gonna do with the knife will and will's like and york's like i said what are you gonna do with the knife he's just afraid of saying the wrong thing man isn't that what we're all afraid of i'm always afraid of saying the wrong thing, man. Isn't that what we're all afraid of? I'm always afraid of saying the wrong thing. Or like, I'm always saying the wrong thing. And, you know, he's like, my saying the wrong thing right now is kind of like, it could affect humanity, bro. Yeah, I feel that. Mine doesn't affect humanity, but I get it.

Yeah. It doesn't, me doing the wrong thing and saying the wrong thing doesn't affect humanity, but perhaps it affects you, listeners. Also you, Chloe. I meant the listeners, but whatever. You're humanity. And, you know, as you're saying, like, I do love this scene, right? For all the reasons that you said regarding that doubt and that hesitation.

I also love the scene following this with Yorick and lyra but i really just love this one between will and yorick because yeah will's clarifying he doesn't want to do the wrong thing and he's just being so vulnerable about not knowing what to do and i'm like yeah you're a literal child of course you don't know what to do and i don't as an adult and and that he expresses that he doesn't want to just do the dangerous thing because he doesn't want to look scared and i think that this is so great because especially in terms of will being like you know a boy on the cusp of manhood and i feel like sometimes toxic masculinity pushes young men to do the dangerous thing and

place it off as right or heroic, right? They're like, it's the dangerous thing, so you gotta, like, man up and do this, but I love that Will's opening up about this and the need to really think that through and not just be rash, and I feel like just this scene in general, though, like, where both Will and Yorick are sharing their insecurities with one another, for example, Like, where both Will and Yorick are sharing their insecurities with one another. For example, like, Yorick realizing, I might have made a mistake coming south. Also, I might have made a mistake mending the knife. I just don't know where it's all going to lead, right?

But he is grateful to have helped Lyra and saved her. And I just, like, really love that these two characters are depending on one another like that. And it's really just touching to me to see them both support each other emotionally it is like a another father figure for will now since he's lost his father-in-law it's the first one yeah father-in-law oh my god father of the bride anyways he is though they they stand in silence and finally yorick says if you're gonna succeed you have to set your mother aside if you're divided the knife will break then he says he must speak privately with lyra and commands will to keep the spies busy will thanks him and they head back inside to finish mending the knife which i have to read this i think it's a beautiful passage. I love Pullman prose, proseman. He laid it among the brighter cinders until the blade was glowing and Will and Lyra saw a hundred colors swirling in the smoky depths of the metal.

And when he judged the moment was right, Yorick told Will to take it and plunge it directly into the snow drifted outside. The rosewood handle was charred and scorched, but Will wrapped his hand in several folds of a shirt and did as Yorick told him. In the hiss and flare of steam, Hmm. less elegant, and there was a dull silver surface over each of the joins. It looked ugly now. It looked like what it was, wounded. Hmm. So I have no idea if the knife is actually, like, really ugly or not,

but I guess the text says it is, so it probably is, but I'm going to just ignore that. It sounds like a pretty cool knife still. And there's a lot of metaphors going on here, right? You talked about one earlier, Chloe, and here, I kind of want to think about the knife being a metaphor for like, you know, the way that Will talks about it as wounded, and of course, like his own hands being wounded. I mean, that one's pretty explicit. session that we just tuned into pointed out, Will does associate the knife with his father and mother and like the knife that wounded him immeasurably, just like the absence of his father and then was also healed by him. But he still carries that wound, right?

It's not like he was perfectly made whole again. And the knife also itself was wounded by thinking of his mother and you know again not to speak too much of what will happen but i see the knives breaking and reforging as it's being also kind of about heartbreak and like how we like the knife and like will can change and can be reforged we might not look the same but as will points out it's still just as sharp. And just as Will had to actively work through the reforging of the knife, he had to put in like mental and physical effort. It wasn't easy. And I think that's kind of what heartbreak can be like, too. But in the end, we can still be reforged. too, but in the end, we can still be reforged. Yeah. It's such a metaphor, right?

It's all a fucking metaphor. It's insane. I think it's so beautiful, just showing like, I mean, this is quantum entanglement, dude. This is it. Yeah. It's just, I think, really, it's a beautiful story, and that's why we're doing this series. Forever.

Forever. For nine more chapters nine more chapters and then it's over Lyra speaks to Yorick and she explains her plan visit the dead see Roger's ghost again because she's wracked with guilt and she thinks she should finish what she started

and rescue him she's hedging her bets on Will opening a window into that world but Yorick, he doesn't like this plan. He's like, while you're alive, living is your priority. Like, your business is with life, not with the dead. But Lyra says, no, my business is keeping promises. I can't break my promise, no matter how difficult it is. And she asks what he plans to do. And he says he wants to take his people north to live in the sea. And then he says that he has to wait because he can smell war coming. And Seraphina Pecula said

she was going to meet with the Egyptian faction and choose sides soon. So it's coming for him. War's coming. Before Lyra can get too excited about Seraphina and Lord Fa, Yorick interrupts and reminds her, we're not going to meet again if you don't leave the world of the dead. I don't have a ghost. If we survive, though, he says that she's always a welcome guest at Svalbard. Will, too. Aw. Yorick tells her all about meeting Will, how Will out clevered him, and he gives her his blessing, saying, you're worthy of one another. He wishes her to go well, and Lyra gives him another bear hug

Will meets Lyra out on the path promising the Galavespians he'll be back but he finds her weeping silent PanaLayman in wolf form beside her guarding her God this is so sad because he like you know was licking it to heal her hands and then like just like

sits there with her in between his like bare arms and it's so i like cried rereading the scene oh my god i did it was so sad it was so because like besides yeah yorick giving like will his blessing you know being in the role of one of lyra's adopted father slash now will's father-in-law he's like telling Lyra you know that they may never see each other again and like because he doesn't have a ghost and besides like Lyra's realization of like what that means like in in a second um it and like how he's getting older like it's just so heartbreaking I think for Yorick to also say that because you know this is Yorick who we saw like once lost his crown and like his way in life and then he's now lost his home and he's like what am I gonna do

for all my people and now he's recently just lost his best friend and now he has to like face the possibility of forever losing his adopted daughter and I was like no Yorick it's too sad it's too sad yeah and he knows like for what a little liar and little bullshitter she is she's also probably one of the most pure-hearted beings that he's ever met right like out of all these corrupted humans he's had to be around he believes in her unquestionably full faith right blind? Blind faith in Lyra. And just like how Will has to let go of his mother, Yorick has to let go of Lyra, you know, just in case, just in case that's stopping her from fulfilling her destiny. Yeah. Yeah. And she tells Will, you know, I love Yorick. But then as she says that, she realizes after the fact, oh, Yorick looks old and hungry and sad. And suddenly there's this huge realization crashing down upon her that like, oh, my God, we're fucking alone and growing up.

And Will's like, Lyra, don't be afraid. We can do it. But if we stay here in this world, the Galavesians they called the gyroctors for us like they're going to come and get us we have to go and we have to make the galavaspians go with us and that's just the saddest like she realizes he's aging and she's like oh i have to let go too if he has to let go i have to let go we have to fucking go oh my god we're aging it's all happening i never cried oh my god i'm crying okay we have nine chapters left and you're gonna cry at least six of them so It's all happening. I never cry during these episodes. I'm crying.

We have nine chapters left and you're going to cry at least six of them. Allegedly. It's so sad. This is the literal axis of growing up right here. Like time to grow up right now. You guys got to go. So Pantalaimon turns into a tiger from his wolf form. Will and lyra go get their rucksacks and they confront the galavespians who demand they wait for the gyroctors but will's like no we're going to another world and the spies call him a liar and lyra's like actually

i'm the one that lied to you guys will doesn't lie that's my job that's my job security there please don't intrude. Salmachia says leaving is a mistake. And Will says, well, you can come with us or you can go back empty handed. Yeah. So I'm like, yes, Lyra the Deceiver is back. So excited. Lyra's silver tongue.

But I will say, I feel like I've kind of seen Will lie before. You know, like he was thinking about that in regards to his interactions with Mrs. Coulter. And I mean, he's definitely, like, not as talented as Lyra when it comes to lying, but we can't, like, all be lying prodigies, alright? I will say, though, that I love this because

the Galabespians thought, like, they were all saying, like, yeah, the girl is the more innocent one, and she's just way more trusting. And I'm like, excuse me, Lyra has learned that she can't just trust anyone anymore. And they also, I mean, they did it, right? They made the mistake everyone made in the first book. They bought her act of innocence, which she has been using since literally day one of the whole series.

That's what happens when you don't read the first two books, Tiales and Salmakia. Anyways. Oh my god. So Will, yeah, opens the window into where he had been with Baruch and Balthamos, a warm beach with fern-like trees, and he lets them through, closing it behind them at once.

And Lady Salmakia keeps watch while Lyra and Will lie down exhausted, and Chevalier Tiales writes a message with his lodestone resonator. Oh my god, I would be so mad. I'd be so mad if I was like, fine, I'm gonna watch the kids sleep after they fucking tricked me again. It is kind of like, how did we become these over-glorified babysitters? This is bullshit. Like, that is the mood. Right? That's the mood. Let's roll into the last chapter of the day chapter 16 intention craft from the arched roof pendant by subtle magic many a row of starry lamps and blazing crescents fed with naphtha and asphaltus yielded light john milton so this is john milton's description of pandemonium the capital of hell

a very baroque place where angels consoled themselves for losing out on heaven uh there's a great artwork that i really encourage you guys to look up by john martin i think it's from 1824 it's a beautiful look at pandemonium and his take on it, but in Paradise Lost, Milton goes into what Hell's Capital looks like. A dungeon horrible, on all sides round, as one great furnace flamed, yet from those flames no light, but rather darkness visible served only to discover sites of woe. Regions of sorrow, doleleful shades where peace and rest can never dwell hope never comes that comes to all but torture without end it's amazing it's such like the perfect this chapter the way we get to see asriel's kingdom and the inner workings and uh even the forge it you get

that sight of hellfire the ever-burning sulfurs you feel the heat the flames of the forge, you get that sight of hellfire, the ever-burning sulfurs. You feel the heat, the flames of the forge licking you off the pages. And I love it. I love it. Absolutely. I love that John Martin's name sounds a lot like John Milton's too. It does. It really is annoying. I'm like, can't you guys have different names?

I know, right? But yes, absolutely. It really captures, I feel like what milton was going for i mean here's where you really get to see pullman doing his love letter to paradise lost in i think those moments in yeah asriel's pandemonium well here we are in pandemonium mrs coulter despairs at lyra being separated from her she's bound to a chair disheveled clothing torn and her demon thrashes on the floor in a silver chain lord azrael sits nearby scribbling

on a piece of paper taking no notice the orderly waits for orders from azrael then uh nervously glances at mrs coulter while azrael writes and then finally handing him the paper and dismissing him. Azrael then addresses Mrs. Coulter, saying, I don't care for Lyra, that she should have stayed put, like she was told, and that she's wasting his time and resources, and that if she refuses to be helped,

let her deal with the consequences. He's like, says, the fuss that that girl has caused is out of proportion to her merits and that she is an ordinary plain english girl but mrs culture argues no she's unique she's not like other girls and tells him not to patientize lyra and asriel calls marisa tamed and soft because of lyra he's all like your fire has been quenched from sentimental piety. And I'm just like, wow, Asriel, the biggest tsundere of them all. Like, wow, move over. He's mean.

He calls her a doting mother because of Lyra. And he's like, you're going to have to be quiet. I'm holding an emergency conference call in this room with my chief commanders. And Asriel has spent all this time like being able to be close to Lyra, but yet holds her at a distance, right? With no interest in getting to know her. Maybe it's out of fear, being too afraid to really actually let anyone get close to that vulnerability ever again in his life. But comparing it to Marisa, who's like ready to claw anyone apart just to get to Lyra. like she gave up being a mother for her own personal ambitions just like asriel did and and

yes there was the poisoning spell we've talked about that for that little bit of time but here this is the most genuine she's been in the book like this entire chapter she has some really big actress moments but she's also literally raw and authentic and arguing for their daughter this entire chapter. And for Asriel to deny that, it's also a rejection of her because, like, Lyra's brilliant. She's the product of them. Of course she's fucking smart. Like, these are two sexy, smart psychopaths, right, that have some probably some pretty intense sex and lyra's well adjusted in the face of their shittiness and their abandonment of her and she was also raised

in a really great place by good people so she got really lucky on that to have like absolutely nothing to do with you motherfuckers uh but of course she's smart of course she's brilliant and for him to say she's not that is like a personal like arrow being shot at marisa like no she's not marisa she's not special because you're not special that's because he's being a sundari all right but like i don't know yeah i i i was i was really mad though i remember when I was reading this again, like, before I was like, shut the fuck up, Azrul. You don't even know her. That's my baby girl. And that's probably how Mrs. Coulter feels, but way more.

But also she doesn't know her. So it's like, what's the truth? That's true. What is the truth? She's, I think, interestingly kind of putting lyra up on a little pedestal too which is also unhealthy don't do that to your kids either well mrs coulter tries to bear her claws telling him how bad it would look to display her tied to a chair in front of his under officers but he doubles down taking a silk scarf from the drawer

to silence her with i'm like interesting and she begins to beg him not to humiliate her and he unties her but leaves her demon in chains there's a lot going on in this scene yes there is he offers her a washing room to clean up in since she looks a little worse for the wear from the galavespian poison and she takes her demon with her to wash up like he's still like in chains though she has to carry him but i and i love the detail right that the demon that the monkey demon does stay chained and not marisa because i think that really shows where people see that the real power and fear of marisa's is it's like her her soul yeah they're not afraid of like her they're afraid of her yeah deeply within like exactly

they're afraid of what they've made her asriel's orderly returns and he announces king a gunway in his very sharp uniform and lord roke who comes in on his blue hawk and there's something cool going on with the blue hawk that lord roke rides. It's actually reminding me of the Gyptians, the Costa demons. The only other hawks we see in the story are Tony Costa and Ma Costa's hawks, I'm pretty sure. So it's interesting that Lord Roke has a blue hawk. Because in some aspects, he reminds me a little bit of Lord Fa as just like a harsh commander. Yeah. Yeah.

So I kind of I know it's not a perfect thought, but it is an interesting comparison. Just think of them, especially in the context of being, you know, spiritual messengers. Crows have really good eyesight and they're really determined and they're seen as spiritual messengers and so are hawks and makes me think about them all a little bit. And they're kind of, I mean, they're not,

Galavespians are not far as far as like, you know, they are different from what everyone else in the magisterium's rule, as far as people and culture, right? Like they have just a little bit in common there of being from different cultures and having to adapt to different skills that help them survive. I wonder if it's sort of like an archetype, right, in terms of leaders that that Pullman seems to really enjoy. But also, as you said, there's some great parallels between yeah, the Gyptians and the Galavespians. And while the Gyptians I feel are more associated with water, obviously the Galavespians more associated with air.

Oh, airbenders. Yeah. Oh, they feel, are more associated with water. Obviously, the Galavespians are more associated with air. Oh, airbenders, yeah. Oh, they kind of are, a little. Very different vibe, I think, in terms of their attitude than airbenders. But I think Lyra is like the most airbendery, perhaps. I mean, even the witches. I guess some of the witches also. Anyways. That's a good one, yeah.

Zephaniah is next. She's an angel, much higher ranking than Baruch or Balthamos, and is barely visible but for a shimmering light. Then Mrs. Coulter emerges and the commanders bow to her. She inclines her head, sitting peacefully with the monkey. Asriel charges in, asking a gunway, what happened out there? And he recants that the girl and the boy escaped, and

they killed 17 Swiss guards and destroyed two zeppelins, but they also lost five men and a gyroptor. And of course, despite Mrs. Coulter's courageous defense, they have brought her here! He also mentions that he hopes Mrs. Coulter felt that she was treated courteously, and she

is very clear, she's like, she's quite content with the treatment, but as though she's trying to like make a jab of like but not from you asriel exes i did love that i loved that so much yes and lord roke is next and tells them that his spies have kept a close eye on the children the girl was drugged to sleep for many days and the boy lost use of his knife around that time, shattering it into pieces. But a giant bear from your world, Asriel, has fixed it, and they entered another world! But there has been some difficulty, as it turns out the Galabespians cannot compel the boy to do anything while he wields the knife,

but they will at least follow him for as long as they can. And of course, now that- I love that. Yeah. least follow him for as long as they can and of course now that i love that yeah that's like they they thought they had it but yet these little obstinate children are what's in their way and now the agents are stuck with the kids they have no magisterium eye so they have to rely on the alethiometer reader uh and coulter gives what knowledge she has. She says, look, the Magisterium's reader is thorough, but slow. Fra Pavel won't know the children's location for at least a couple more hours.

She says that the boy with Lyra, Will, is stubborn and used to keeping secrets, but Lyra was impossible to read. She doesn't know what their plan is. And again, hysterical that Salmah is able to figure out kind of their whole thing and what their dynamic is a little easily. But Coulter's like, I don't know what Lyra wants. I just put her to sleep for a month. You know, I don't know. I have no clue.

And I do think if Coulter had actually maybe for one moment tried to get to know her instead of forming her into a weird baby murder doll and, you know her to work for her keep her drugged if she had tried she might actually know more about lyra at this point or even if she really listened right because in her sleep lyra was murmuring like about roger and i'm like man if you paid attention to your daughter's best friends you would know who roger is and if you knew you would also know that your daughter's best friend was killed by your ex slash maybe not ex lover who is right here and would understand like maybe this is what lyra wants like the pieces are there in front of her yeah and yeah it's it's uh she's not hard to read like i mean we've read a couple books, uh, she's not hard to read. Like, I mean, we've read a couple books of her, but she ain't hard to read. I love reading Lyra.

Oh, my God. Kang Agunwe interrupts them, and he's like, hey, sorry, but what the fuck is with this chick again? Should Mrs. Coulter even be here? And Asriel's like, you know, she might be useful as captive and guest. And Lord Roke is like, torture guy. He's like, is she going to reveal everything everything willingly or will i need to torture her and coulter laughs she's like i thought you'd know better than to expect truth from torture lord asriel couldn't help enjoying her bare-faced insincerity throughout the whole chapter asriel is just like punctuating

it with like he loved watching them squirm when she lied to them, you know, and it's basically sexual kink tension between Coulter and Asriel. It's basically just them admiring how much of a bad person the other one is and continually going on from there. I'm not going to kink shame like if that's what you're into, you know, like do it. But that's what's happening here. I'm diagnosing it. I mean, that's that is what's happening here i'm diagnosing it i mean that's that is what's happening here and i do find that line from her kind of funny that she's like i thought you knew better than to expect truth from torture and him thinking she's insincere about it i'm like oh yeah that's right

maybe she thinks tortures people yeah i was like oh maybe she's just decided clearly that strategy wasn't working for me but who knows because yeah maybe she preemptively absolved herself of that probably or she was just like i've tried torturing people a lot and got nothing so i'm better than that now now that i've tortured like a bazillion people fuck it took some practice but here we are did a lot of experiments well Asriel says I guarantee her behavior and that she

knows the consequences if she betrays them but if they have doubts express them now and King Ogunwe expresses his doubts I doubt you not her why said Lord Asriel if she tempted you you, not her. Why, said Lord Asriel. If she tempted you, you would not resist.

It was right to capture her, but wrong to invite her to this council. Treat her with every courtesy, give her the greatest comfort, but place her somewhere else and stay away from her. He's not wrong, like at all. He's not wrong like at all he's not wrong and asriel admits he's like you know i do value your input much more than hers so i'll have her take it away but then coulter speaks up and she's like no please let me explain myself and she's like i'm the closest thing to the magisterium you'll find uh you should trust me because the magisterium wants to kill my daughter. And I had to leave the church as soon as I heard the prophecy because I knew. And the commanders

all listened to her intently, right? She gives this performance and says, I had to set myself against the church once I had heard. She says, and specifically the next part of her speech, she turns to Asriel to deliver and says, I've been the worst mother in the world. I let my only child be taken away from me when she was a tiny infant because I didn't care about her. I was concerned with only my advancement. I didn't think of her for years, and if I did, it was only to regret the embarrassment of her birth. But then the church began to take an interest in dust and in children and something stirred in my heart.

And I remembered I was a mother and Lyra was my child. She continues on saying she saved Lyra three times-ish. And claiming she's conflicted with her role as servant to the church until she heard the witch's prophecy and now that the church knows that she says they'll kill her too and that is why she declares she took lyra to keep her safe for a third time and king of gunways like rate was was that the time you drugged her to sleep for like a month no comment no comment no comment greg you don't have to say no comment i am glad a gunway interrupts and like says something because i was buying it i was buying this nickelodeon teen choice award speech this bafta winning speech this emmy winning speech but there is something vulnerable about this right like she turns and stares at asriel in the eye to

deliver this to him and even though this is kind of part of that back and forth game that they're having in this chapter it's a lot of this is truly honest whether asriel pretends to understand it or not like this is kind of some honesty from marisa yeah i i do think so and i i don't know like why asriel disbelieves so much of it but and yeah for sure perhaps some of it is lying and also lying to herself. Like, you know, the parts about saving Lyra. But a lot of it is very true. And, you know, it's, that's what makes the lies work, right?

The story is told that some of the best lies have a bit of truth in them. And here we have Marisa admitting her mistakes. And that vulnerability, I think, serves as a great follow-up to the last chapter where Will has opened up about his own doubts, and especially Yorick did, and you really get these moments of adults finally admitting that, you know, maybe they didn't always have it right. And that feels really meaningful for a coming-of-age story, and for a story that's that young people are reading right to see that adulthood is often about making mistakes and then learning how to move forward from them and and if you can atone is atonement possible that's a question for later

in this book as yorick and marisa are doing well mrs coulter justifies her actions saying that she had to do it because lara hated her and i'm like there might have been reasons for that anyways her voice trembles into a sob and she asked them to try to think of what this means to a mother that this was the only way to keep lara out of harm's way and as you said i mean like ish in terms of the saving because i'm like me wasn't all almost all the harm that almost befell lyra in terms of like the gobblers and then the stuff at ball vanger because of you like this you girlfriend yeah i was like this you the oblation board that's your project ball vanger also your project? You said all of these emotions? And I'm like, why

are your personal projects like this? Why can't you just start a podcast like the rest of us, alright? Like, that's a normal person thing to do, but I guess someone didn't want to be an ordinary English girl. God. Look, the pandemic's been hard on all of us, especially Marisa.

She's not ready to start her podcast yet. Oh my God. But she should have because it's all literally her fault. And that is, I think, I mean, like you're saying, atonement is such a big part of this chapter here and this absolution that she is looking for. She's looking to be absolved of her sins as rejecting her motherhood. And throughout all this this she's speaking really

quietly right she's muffling her sobs and like swallowing them into hiccups which asriel thinks really sells the lie he also notices that she has started directing her words elsewhere without showing it so king agunwe the only other human in the room, and her chief accuser, she's starting to kind of quietly address things toward him. But the Galavespian is actually the one that's being the most moved by her, Lord Roke. He thinks that she's kind of like a scorpion. She has a powerful sting beneath her gentle tone. Better to keep scorpions where you can see them, he thought. I like this.

We don't get a lot of his little POV, which is kind of like etching in, but we do get this from Lord Roque. And the use of scorpion here for Marisa, I love it. It reminds me of something from Luke 10, 17 to 20. And in this from Luke, the 72 returned with joy and said, Lord, even the demons submit to us in your name. He replied, I saw Satan fall like lightning from heaven. I've given you authority to trample on snakes and scorpions and to overcome all power of the enemy. Nothing will harm you. However, do not rejoice that the spirits submit to you, but rejoice that your names are written in heaven. I just reminded me of the scorpions in it. I was thinking about scorpions in the Bible and that

specifically. Marisa being described as a scorpion is perfect because they are so dangerous, but also like soft underneath that shell. And it also kind of reminds me of the egyptian goddess circat fertility magic healing and she is shown as wearing a scorpion in her headdress or sometimes shown as a scorpion and this comes a little bit from the death stalker scorpion that lives in north africa and it has a sting that can kill pharaohs would pray to circat for her protection against poisons and death she's certainlyat for her protection against poisons and death she's certainly a purveyor of poisons and death as we've seen right let alone uh not just poisoning lyra but also poisoning carlo boreal yeah that's right interesting that's a great

great connection and all these parts and and yeah, the scorpion thing is interesting. I don't know if I agree about scorpions with Lord Roke. And I do think it's a nice little world-building thing in terms of how he views her as a scorpion because of how

Lord Roke as a Galavespian might interpret things because I mean, clearly the Galavespians have close relationships with dragonflies. And so there's that sort of thing going on with like bugs. Scorpions are not insects, but they are bugs. And a scorpion is a much bigger threat, I feel, to the Galavespians than it would be to us. But also, I think that shows that there's some respect there then and perhaps he kind of sees a mirroring in mrs culture of his own spies who themselves also carry poison it's like a respect thing you're right well and it's like what he said earlier you know

that he's or sorry it's what he's gonna say in a little bit yeah that will cover of like you know well you have a demon doesn't that make you more That we'll cover of, like, you know, well, you have a demon. Doesn't that make you more powerful? You're kind of scary. Like, we had to put two people in on your ass, bitch. You're crazy. It's a game-recognized game. That's what's going on here.

That's what Lord Rook's thinking. Crazy motherfuckers recognize crazy motherfuckers. So, naturally, Lord Rook supports King Agunwe, right? And King Agunwe changes his mind and decides coulter should stay and asriel finds himself outflanked checkmate his own trap and he said agunwe's wishes are what he wants and this is what agunwe wishes asriel is certain no one else can see the glittering triumph in her eyes he commands commands her to stay quiet, and they move on to discuss a garrison being installed on the southern border and upgrading their armory from

a gunway. A disposition on the angelic forces comes next from Zephaniah. Coulter finds herself impressed by A, their leadership, and B, what they already know about the magisterium and the defenses and leaders in the church. But she is reminded this information is going to be out of date very soon since they don't have a spy in the magisterium. An idea strikes her and she exchanges a glance with her demon, which of course feels like a spark is being ignited, but they say nothing. Asriel and a gunway head to go look at the intention craft in the armory and Coulter hangs back on the way down to speak to Zephaniah as they follow them. She's impressed with the angel, not unlike Ruta Scotty was when

she met angels on the way to Asriel's. Coulter asks if she's one of the angels from the Great Rebellion, and Zephaniah says she is, and now she's pledged to Asriel to end tyranny at last. Coulter asks what happens if you fail? And Zephaniah says, basically everything will be destroyed and cruelty will reign forever. NBD. NBD. I do love this scene

between Maurice and Zephaniah and that I guess, except for that like brief moment, she's like, yeah, that'd be destruction and cruelty forever. Nothing in this conversation is really that mind blowingblowing, I think. The reveal about the cosmology in regards to the authority comes from Kinga Gunway,

so it's just us watching Mrs. Coulter chat up Zephaniah and make small talk, and I feel like it's implied that they keep talking after this, and I feel like their conversation is kind of the equivalent of, like, the weather's pretty interesting, huh? is kind of the equivalent of like the weather's pretty interesting huh like it's not it's not like that that big of a reveal in this condo like this is so awkward it's an awkward conversation but mrs culture's like i really want to talk to her well and that's what's so crazy is like for colter she's like oh so interesting you're gonna fight god cool yeah uh just because i think she's also she and we're about to see it she's in shell shock right like religious shell shock that she's just like

oh so you all are serious like you do want to kill the authority huh hmm interesting i never thought of it that way coulter says you know she's kind of a crazy thought yeah for her she's so indoctrinated not just in you know religious wise like she probably doesn't even believe any tenets of the religion but it's like a cult from just being involved in the powerful roles they're having power i mean that's the the crazy part so for her she's breaking from that cult mentality of following what the magisterium and the church want for the very first time and it's almost kind of like a naughty chapter for her she's just like giggling all the time around corners like oh that's so funny that's so quaint of you guys interesting interesting yeah it does kind of make her seem even more unhinged now that you say it like that that she's just giggling around corners like oh funny that's so funny you want to

attack a dethroned god ha who just does that what a what a quirky thing what a quirky thing to do she says right like and in regards to the answer of oh yeah destruction and cruelty is like gonna reign forever she she laughs nervously like ha what the fuck that's kind of funny and then she watches lord broke fly past them then she ends up walking next to gunway next and asks him to excuse her ignorance but she had never heard of the man on the blue hawk and his people like until yesterday and she's like so what do you know about them you know and she apologized and she's like i'm asking you because i don't like want to offend them and yeah so so king of gunway tells her you know the gallows espions are proud they have a developed

world that consists of humans and gallows espions and the humans there are the servants of the authority and they've been trying to kill the gallows espions off since forever ago but the gallows espions are fierce warriors deadly enemies and valuable spies some of the gallows espions sided with the enemy but most had been allied with Asriel. Then Marisa asks, what about the angels? And King Ogunwe interrupts and says, you know, these are exactly the kind of questions

that a spy would ask. And she reminds him, but oh, I'm just a captive. I'm so harmless now. And so King Ogunwe's like, all right, cool, just making sure. And then spills the rest like oh yeah angels are really difficult to understand some are mean some are kind some powerful some not

they have weird alliances and ancient feuds and also this authority has like suppressed them since the beginning and i will say in terms of the intentions being a big part of what's being pressed throughout these chapters i like that the term king of gunway uses and regarding the gallop best means world he says there are two types of conscious beings right he emphasizes and he uses the term beings a lot and you know then talks about when the authority came into being in just a few moments right and i think that really helps to further the argument that consciousness requires intention and that existence in in this world or as as the story frames it it's not a state it's a verb it's something that has to be done that has to

consistently like you have to be doing it to be that's interesting and i believe coming right after this don't we get a mary malone chapter yes and i may be this up so it goes right into mary malone with the mulefa after this and i think that's really well done to kind of show that in oil and lacquer in chapter 17 no spoilers but we go to mary malone uh so connecting it here to a maybe maybe a resin, as you mentioned, but also B, collecting it here with like the consciousness that they obviously have. And Mary Malone has definitely already identified that about them. Yeah. That's a really good point. Really, especially with Yorick acting as if he's also gaining consciousness.

Yeah. Yorick being like, am I peoples now? I'm people now. And this is, of course, where that religious shell shot comes in that we were just talking about. Because the way a gunway says come into being, she's like, what do you mean come into being? The authority created the worlds, didn't he? And a gunway's like, oh oh you got to sit down for this listen this shocked some of us but this is angelic knowledge the authority is not the same as the

creator they don't even know if there is a creator they just know at some point the authority took over and took charge and the angels and humans rebelled but this is going to be the last rebellion never have angels and humans made common cause i love this there's something in uh there's something in mythos for christian mythos and in judaism too about angels making the earth versus god making the earth and this is very much so commentary going on here Pullman knew what he's doing as we know and there's this whole thing that God's the creator end all be all case closed no questions right in some other tellings in the mythos God made angels that did his bidding and helped create the earth so it wasn't just him or uh one of my favorites he made three craftsmen that each had a tiny bit of his soul in them and that helped create the earth

the waters above and below and then they joined together and they become mankind because of that so kind of an embellishment of the genesis creation myth but no matter in these mythos it all boils down to the power that's coming from him the guy that owns the dark materials the his uh no matter what god's power is the main thing is that in book the argument always comes up that it was him that did it no matter even if he made angels he may have the power to make the angels uh And it's because in these secondary mythos, Christians don't usually believe because it's seen as kind of slighting his power. Right. If he had to have help to make things, then maybe he's not all powerful, question mark. And thus that decreases the blind faith people have in him and belief that they have in him, the humanity that does follow him. So putting that into context here, God is selfish, man. Like God's like, no, I did it. No one helped me. And I wouldn't tell you even if they fucking did. And that's where here a gunway is like, hey, it turns out that's a lie too, dude.

Yeah. God's a liar. too dude yeah and it is a liar it is blowing her mind right that the authority would do all that and and i mean like that's her world view yeah and what she's like lived her whole life where she's like hmm interesting so that's all a lie yeah because she asked she's like uh what does asriel intend here like what do you mean? Wait a second. What is this? And he says, we're not colonialists, Mrs. Coulter. We haven't come to conquer, but to build.

And she asks, is he going to attack the kingdom of heaven? Ogunwe looks at her and says, we aren't going to invade it. But if it invades us, they'd better be ready for war because we're prepared. Yes. We're going to get to the preparations in a second but i do appreciate this clarification and the use of the word colonialist from king which i think feels really pointed and he's pointing out that the place that they are right now and setting up essentially pandemonium was uninhabited and i think this is pretty important when you look at the history of britain

and and also how the magisterium pretty much plays allegory to all of that in in this world but i do want to say of asriel's supposed innocence right in terms of colonialism like did anyone like tell lord asriel about all this like philosophy before he went and fucked up chitigatse just just a thought just a thought yeah well that's where it's like no real person involves oh my god that's where there's that little bit of lucifer in asriel that you see like yeah it's not all for the people yeah it's not it's not some of this is for his ego too it's a dangerous thing right is the dangerous thing really like the best thing i don't know as a will points out but a gunway does feel confident in joining azrael he says it's his proudest task to set up a world where there are no

kingdoms no kings no bishops no priests they intend to be free citizens of the Republic of Heaven. And Asrielus Lucifer, yes, is very much coming to frame here. There's also such a great mirror in these chapters between Lyra and Will and Yorick with their own original sin paths. But Lucifer's rebellion is also kind of depicted as an original sin in a way, right? Because it's the first and final cause of all evil and there's almost something interesting in like recontextualizing coulter as eve instead of lyra here and azrael is lucifer uh tempting her right come over to

our side marisa come on over come bite the apple and join us. With Coulter being tempted by Lucifer, by Asriel. There definitely is something there. I feel like they've always kind of been like that, right? Mrs. Coulter also kind of inhabiting that. It's very strange. I mean, them on the mountaintop in Northern Lights, you know, swooning for each other in the snow. Toxic love, but we love to see it.

Yeah, and the weird you know the the tiger and the monkey drop well king of gunway departs from her he's like you know letting her simmer with all these bombs for a moment moves on to his commander uh and she eventually catches up with them. They move quickly to the Great Hall and Mrs. Coulter notices a bracket on every pillar, presumably to give Lord Roque's hawk somewhere to rest so that he can be included in the discussion. And then

they make their way to a small closed carriage drawn by an unbarrack locomotive. The engineer bows and his brown monkey demon cowers from the chained golden monkey i thought this was interesting because it's not really specified more than that the brown monkey is hiding behind its partner its human's legs but and it could just be fear at seeing a chained demon but also like that it's a brown monkey and the golden monkey it feels like you

know seeing a demon not dissimilar to you whatsoever in chains especially with all this talk of like the galavespians have consciousness and the the mulefa in the next chapter you know like and that demons can speak to one another and actually kind of cohesively get a better understanding of pretty much everything just by whispering to each other within one minute, right? Something deeper going on than just hiding from the scary other monkey. This monkey is watching a fellow monkey demon go by in chains. They're distressed. Yeah, the engineer, I wonder if it's like an expression of empathy, right? For someone seeing someone captive

especially because the engineer doesn't really know what's up and Mrs. Colder is just like wow I feel bad for that lady I feel bad for the pretty lady he doesn't know she's a child murderer oh my god I thought we liked murderers what's the truth? I don't know I have doubts. They enter the carriage and the carriage is lit by some crystals.

It's very neat. We'll see it again in the chapter. Secret tunnel. The train glides down into the tunnel, taking them to the armory. As they descend, Coulter realizes she hasn't talked to Lord Roque yet, so she takes this time to do so. And she asks, are your spies always sent in pairs? Because they came out and put me in a stalemate immediately. She mentions she was intrigued by their skill,

and Roke takes that as a slight to his pride, and she's like, No, no, I just mean I thought I could beat you very easily, but you very much so almost beat me. He mentions she and her demon are a pair too and gives a kind of a haughty stare to her asking well did you expect us to concede the advantage she looks down and she's kind of humbled and she's like all right i'm just not going to talk anymore on this train oh i thought that was a power move because he was like looking expecting for an answer from her and

she's just like i'm leaving the conversation now oh i thought she just didn't have anything left to kind of add she's like oh okay this is weird yeah and but in in general though i do love that lord broke doesn't give marisa a straight answer of like oh we always work in pairs right but he just turns it around and gives her an answer regarding the demons because if he lets her believe that the gala vespians always work in pairs it makes it a little easier for him to sneak into the intention craft later on yes that's true that's true she totally doesn't even realize it yeah not yet he gave a semi non-. They finally reach a platform, and Asriel opens the carriage doors, and Mrs. Coulter gasps at the heat as they exit. It's a sulfur-laden place,

and the air is ringing with mighty hammers and iron on stone, and the noise doubles, and the heat breaks over them as they lead off the platform, and only Zephania seems unaffected, which, whatever, seems unfair, but since it is sulfur-laden, I will say that the whole place probably smells like rotten eggs and farts.

And besides all the machinery, I think I too would gasp at how bad it smells and maybe also gag. This is my theory. Yeah, but you'd be distracted because it's so epic. It is like a total epic proportions thing because marisa's looking around with curiosity and there are hammers the size of houses raining down right like huge a river of sulfurous molten metal is flowing it's cut off by an adamant gate and it settles over rows of molds to cool heat pound cool over and over this right next to the forge in the last chapter is great right because yorick's forge is bare and man-made and it's low budget full of nothing but hard work and

intention with yorick's armor part of his armor and soul in the anvil and just reforming the knife as you spoke about so well for us in full but here instead of yorick roaring the machines are roaring i mean the anvils here are the biggest shit in the world their biggest houses it's an enormous forge full of industrial warfare being created right a rebellion being crafted doom being crafted and where yorick and will and lyra forged hope in that knife together right right? Like, what they forged was hope and sacrificing the old and with the new. Here, this is just industrial warfare against God.

Yeah, it's almost replicating the same systems, right? Mm-hmm. And I think there's an aspect of hope to it, too, for all of them. But it's just not as beautiful as yorick and villain lyra so i don't like that i mean it's impressive just not as impressive as our heroes right it's impossible

to hear over the din and so no one even tries they are gestured towards a walkway by Asriel, passing over it to a rocky corridor, and stalactites gleam in strange colors, and crystals are scattered loosely on the floor for light. The air cools and they leave the mountain into the night. Outside, men haul out the intention craft. It looks like a massive cabin slash drilling apparatus, a glass canopy over a seat with dozens of levers and handles sprouting in front of it. Six legs are attached at different angles, and the body is made of pipework, cylinders, pistons, coiled cables. Most of it is hidden in gloom, making it hard to discern what was part of its structure and what wasn't.

Asriel and Zephaniah speak closely with the engineers, and Mrs. Coulter tries to memorize every part of the craft, watching Asriel jump into the seat and harness himself and his demon in. And it's the fact that this is called the intention craft, maybe it's a little on the nose, but I also do like, again, the way that it ties into the previous few chapters regarding weapons and their intentions, and this idea that, oh, you can't really tell what's part of it or not, making it, you know, a little bit about, like, it's difficult to glean what others'

intentions are, but because it is a machine that is made by a machine and you can mostly see it, it's purely dependent on the person's intentions and requires a demon. It's a little, I think, less like the knife, which kind of gets that mystical aspect by having its own intentions, whereas this is not that.

I also like that it has six legs and makes me think of insects because I think it kind of creates a nice connection with the Galavespians and the dragonflies that they ride and share intentions with as well. and the dragonflies that they ride and share intentions with as well. It also caught my eye that Coulter is studying it so intently. Intently? Yes, intently. And the last chapter you brought up, Will and his sharp eye, right? How he is very fast to get things. And she has that same kind of mind.

That is why there's a little bit of that tension with those two there when they met because they have similar minds you know they're distrusting they are very smart and they catch on to things quickly great point great point the craft moves and coulter's not really sure how she washes parts of it revolve in the air azrael moves levers and dials until it hovers high as a tree turning no sound no gravity pulls it down. Ogunwe tells her to listen to the sound, so she does, and he says, Watch, we have decoys flying a mission to tempt our enemy to follow. The enemy does that. Six gyroctors fly past, and a raiding party follows.

Just as the enemy is about to get one of their wounded ships, a crack explodes in mid-air from the intention craft, and battle occurs quickly, difficult to make out. Silence comes, and the gyropters disappear around the mountain, and the intention craft hovers, shimmering as it comes slowly to the ground. Kanga Gunway and other commanders hurry forward while Coulter and her demon discuss it. Why is he showing it to us? Her demon said quietly. Surely he can't have read our mind, she replied in the same tone. Oh, wow.

Coulter's demon talked. Yeah, Coulter's demon. I didn't catch that until you pointed it out. And I thought, that is really interesting. He does talk another time in this book, I think, but it's very rare. It is very rare, but it's interesting that he does. And obviously, I think it's a good creative choice that the show both times doesn't have the monkey demon speak. It doesn't feel...

It's out of character. It does feel out of character. It works here. It works with the power of my imagination right um which can do a lot you know the power of your imagination is part of how will is like yeah i'm gonna make the knife come back together but oh my god um yeah anyway so i mean like literally that's what it says uh but yeah so i anyway and here i will say interesting interesting that you would think that Asriel kind of did read your mind, but maybe you're just really obvious. Asriel they're gonna propose going to the CCD spying for him and manipulating them just like he manipulated the craft

but now after seeing the flying machine there's a new idea on the rise she gets over there and she's like Asriel won't you tell me how your new toy works and Asriel's like I would love to Marisa which I have to say is this specific Rim

Eliana? I mean she did bring up earlier like why do things have to happen in pairs so it's possible not it's canon it's canon asriel tells her if you intend it to go forward it will go forward she pushes harder and he's like fine i'll tell you and he shows her a cable with a leather grip marked by Stalmaria's teeth. Your demon must hold the handle, and the pilot must wear the helmet. Ugh, kind of like the boxes that he puts Roger and his demon in. Yeah, it's similar. The current flows between them and reads your intentions.

Only a human with a demon can fly it. Marisa says, I see. a human with a demon can fly it. Marisa says, I see. Okay, but things that I haven't seen yet, but cannot wait for cinematic adaptation. I want to see Stalmaria grasp

the little handle with her, like, little big cat jaws. I think that's what I'm most looking forward to. Like, just imagine it. Series 3. Yeah, right? Like, her, like, just opening the- just grasping the handle. Amazing. I hope we see it. I do. I can't wait to

see how they do the intention craft, actually. Yeah. Maybe they'll just give them, like, little, I don't know, helmets or something, which is not as fun. Adorable, though. Adorable. Well, as Marisa's being shown the intention craft and says i see she then shows asriel out of

the out of it and then steals his ship asriel stops a good way from going after her and orders lord rogue go with her and then watches the intention craft go up up up in a way pretty quickly and asriel admits like yeah I probably should have listened to you King Ogunwe that Coulter, Lyra's mother I should have expected this sort of behavior but at least Asriel

knows where she's going she's flying to the CCD to give them the intention craft and then also to spy for Asriel so like things are going okay and then Ogunwe asks whenriel. So things are going okay. And then Ogunwe asks when Lord Rook will reveal his presence, and Asriel

laughs and says, I think that will keep that one a surprise. And so they both head back to the workshop, laughing heartily, gonna go throw back some beers as they go look at a more advanced model of the intention craft awaiting them.

Goddam it. It's such a classic. Like the entire dynamic between Asriel and Risa is amazing in these chapters. Seeing how they act together and respond to one another. And how they're totally each other's Achilles heel. It's like the Mr. and Mrs. Smith kind of story. The, ah, no, I gotcha now. You have to try to kill me.

They're just constantly gotcha-ing each other and shooting finger guns and it's like a very on-brand, very sexy, very rad. I really like it. Good for them. Good for y'all. Good for them. Yeah, they were just like fucking in front of everyone, basically.

Yeah, I mean, Keiha Gunway basically was saying like, you've been eye-fucking her for an hour dude, we've gotten nothing done. Yeah. Pretty much. And I think it's maybe that's why everyone didn't want her there.

They're like, this is really awkward for us. She's a witch. Well, they're like, we didn't consent to be part of this as real. Part of this asriel part of this thruffle quadruple quintuple yeah it's inappropriate at best

well things don't get much happier after this so they get tense very intense we're gonna have lots of intense moments in the next couple months yeah we are we're going to have lots of intense moments in the next couple months. Yeah, we are. We are going to have a lot of intense moments. Yeah, I'm already, like, sad just thinking about it.

And I was like, wow, if I already cried this episode, I don't usually do that. What's going to happen to me? Buckle up. I don't usually do that. What's going to happen to me? Anyway. Buckle up. Anyway, but like speaking about the next few months,

that brings us to the end of this episode and to our discussion. And I'm sorry, everyone. I did a bad job this episode, but it's fine. Yeah, you really sucked. You were really bad this episode. I feel like I didn't really reveal anything, though. I feel like I skirted the line. Well, this brings us to the end of our episode and into our dust-cussion, as you've said. And this is the time, if you have not finished The Amber Spyglass, if you have not read novellas or the books of dust, log off, take a breather, go hang out, sip some tea, come back next month and we'll talk to you then.

That said, if you're here and you're ready to get dusty, dive in with us and let's talk about some dusty things happening at the end of the series and outside the series. The first thing I want to point out, I do have a couple of Amber Spyglass things I want to point out I do have a couple Amber Spyglass things I want to point out today I loved Will, there's this line in this chapter where Lyra thought that Will would have a demon that took the form of a tigress great foreshadowing because it's a cat, like you said

big cat, but not big cat it's a medium cat a medium cat or just a medium cat a little or a medium cat more just a medium cat little big cat i don't know a decent size a decent size cat yeah but i love that foreshadowing i love those demon foreshadowing and more will foreshadowing okay can we talk about quantum entanglement now that we have our spoiler film? What the fuck? Quantum entanglement is literally just them, Eliana. It's just them.

It's them. It's also being separated from their demons. And it's also being separated from each other through worlds and their demons. Hold on. Let me just... Let's just go back, though. In our world, there's a way of taking a common lodestone and entangling all its particles, and then splitting it in two so that both parts resonate together. The counterpart to do this is with Lord Roke, our commander. When I play on this one with my bow, the other one reproduces the sounds exactly, and so we communicate.

bow the other one reproduces the sounds exactly and so we communicate i'm just saying that that's really oddly specific for two people that are separated between worlds and can never get back together again because you know they would die and i think it's kind of super asshole-ish that they didn't give them one. So they could just text. I mean, teenagers love to text. I mean, the books are still young, right? The books are still young. There's one more. They could still get a lodestone resonator. Get a lodestone of this guy.

Get a lodestone of this guy. Hired. Well, and thank you, thank you. And on top of that, though, you have the idea of how lyra doesn't know her mom was poisoning her right and like yeah she still loves her mom in a fucked up toxic way but then you have the opposite the end of the series and that like will and lyra staying in each other's worlds would be dying slowly of like world poison

right even though it's also love yeah so so there's just all this like foreshadowing and feelings going on about distance and quantum entanglement and having your uh soul ripped from you yeah i just and and they learn to give one another up right to yes for each other's best benefit so they can live a full life and i think that's a and that this ends up being a more healthy form of love versus marisa learning that lesson i guess at the end of her life right and i think it's a that's a great connection that you've drawn between the way marisa showed her love for lyra versus non-toxic forms and needing to let go because marisa couldn't understand like you need to let her go yeah and that's exactly what they had to do that's what will had to do right letting

go his mom so that's hard because that's also what has to happen here and marisa has to let lyra go yeah and he does she kind of does but not really i mean she dies she doesn't she does yeah i mean she does by jumping you know like that's letting her go and by not putting that on her like not you know lyra will always wonder what happened but like she didn't say mommy's gonna sacrifice herself now sweetie like she just did it and that kind of sacrifice is what love is right like the compromises you make to yourself to ensure the safety of your loved ones and yeah i i don't know that's gonna be sad you're right fuck off eliana we're gonna cry so much more god and you know speaking of marisa and the end of the book a lot of this chapter i think is giving

us like the elements to set up her actions at that point like in regards to like i mean showing us the intention craft that she's going to use to find metatron but also i mean it it literally shows us marisa's intentions through that monologue right like yeah and and also i mean she says she saved lyra three times and again many of those were her fault but really i think only two of those times count in my opinion which is in terms of maybe the gobblers and ablation board and then also saving her from being severed i don't think that the third one counts uh you made that up and i i she will though save lara three times right when you consider like the lodestone bomb maybe even four when we talk about again like this part with metatron yes oh and that is the other thing right

like quantum entanglement the whole time i was thinking oh this is literally the bomb the bomb is quantum entanglement yeah the bomb yeah it is well yeah the bomb is the atoms the actual atoms being joined and like and once you join her atoms with her hair those similar atoms then bloop yeah so that that's really this chapter is really heavy and thick for those that's really great these three god and you know i there is something religious about that three times right uh you were saying that earlier on you had the reference to m Mary Magdalene a little bit in the beginning of how, you know, Will washing Lyra's feet, basically. And there's even some kind of like martyrdom coming from Coulter throughout this end here as she's obviously having these revelations. She's the sinner martyr of the story, right?

Like, complex. Did she atone? No, not truly, but kind of slash of slash you know like it's very complex and she was devoted by the end to baby lyra jesus even if it wasn't in the healthiest manner and even if she didn't do things a hundred percent right all the time like she was still devoted by the end as a disciple uh and i think that counts for a lot and i think something about what we're seeing now like it's like you said Azrael is so against it and he's like oh the shit she's saying is bullshit it's bullshit it's

bullshit it's derivative but I actually think this is some of the very first times she's ever been honest in the story I agree I agree I it's funny like he can see some of her intentions but he can't really see I I guess, all of it. And I don't know if we're supposed to be reading it as, like, Asriel has just had such a terrible time with his ex-girlfriend that he, like, can't believe that she could truly care about their daughter in that way. Or if it's just, like, I'm not sure I completely get it obviously some of it is her lying to herself and putting on a show but a lot of it feels very true

to what we see and even if it's not yet at the time it becomes true by the end exactly speaking of things at the end and also weapons we have that moment where the knife is very confusingly described to Lyra. And one of the lines there I thought was fun was that the knife would be the death of dust, but only the way to keep dust alive.

And obviously that would be very confusing for anyone. I think if I didn't like anyone i'd be i think like if i didn't understand i'd be like what the fuck and i i just like that the knife is portrayed as a contradiction in and of itself and i think that we have that a lot in these characters in the story i mean obviously like mrs coulter's one there's a there's another one you brought up at this episode at the beginning of this episode of like these ideas of contradictions and also lyra herself right she's also a bit of a contradiction and seen to some extent as being maybe a weapon against the authority um you know lyra she's described as being eve the mother but

so much of her story isn't about her being the mother. It's about being a daughter and the way her parents have completely failed her. And the knife just like has a lot going on, obviously, in these chapters, right? Like the knife and its intentions are about protection for dust, but also destruction, and it protects through destruction. for dust but also destruction and it protects through destruction and i think that's probably ultimately part of why it has to be destroyed i wonder if like in the knife's intentions of its of destruction maybe destroying its own self might be part of that right because it's also dependent on will's intentions as they talk about and i think they they have this aspect of like will i think you know that question of maybe the dangerous choice isn't the good choice. I guess that speaks back to what you were talking about also, right? Like how they choose not to stay together. Because I think that is pretty, very definitively dangerous, dying within 10 years.

Yeah. You're 100% right. And that's like, you could choose that. That's the passionate could choose that that's the passionate choice but it's not the safe choice and it's not the healthy choice and it's not the right choice it's not the right choice no it's not the choice that savors and values life yeah it's not and and that therefore is very counter to like what the story is about and you know in the context of the knife being about heartbreak and reforging i i mean like that's where it doesn't work it kind of falls apart in many ways uh not i mean the metaphor though but like the real sad hours

thinking about how it breaks as you know will thinks of lyra and like here is setting the stage for all of that but i think there's a little hint right not just with the lodestone resonator but of how maybe they can reach each other again because if will if your own like intentions right and and the role that he plays in reforging the knife can be so powerful like again it literally says like he sent his imagination to the tip of the knife, right, in order to reforge it. We're told at the end that perhaps through the power of imagination, Lyra and Will can see each other again. I feel like we're getting some, like,

some of the little clues in there. But then again, oh, now she feels like it. Oh, now she feels like there's hints. I i mean i'm just like at the same time i'm like how much of it is because at the same time i'm like when did pullman come up with this stuff because it took him like a bazillion years to give us like what he fucking gave us in the secret commonwealth and i'm like i still hate it even though i haven't finished it i'm like i hate it why is this what i got why is this what I got? Why is this what the imagination gave me? Well, to close out with a couple books of dust,

you know, speaking of, speaking of our favorite books by Philip Pullman that made us so happy. There's two things that I thought of in this episode. The first thing is the Galavaspians eating the human food kind of reminds me of La Belle Sauvage when they eat the fairy food. Ah, yes. So it's kind of funny that they become more humanized in the eyes of our protagonists as we move along after eating their food.

I thought that was interesting. Yeah, the same food. And that's kind of, we see the reverse of that, because you were talking about how Mary's chapters come after this one. The reverse of that when, I mean, the... Oh, the oil pods. Yeah, well, one of the first things the Malefa do, right? They're like, here, Mary, eat some of our food.

And they're like, let me squirt from my trunk into your mouth. And I'm like, this is a lot and very intimate and very fast, unlike this meal. In a post-COVID society? No, I'm just right the other thing that i had to i have to put this out there because i'm very upset i can't believe pullman would write such slander because then he went and wrote la belle sauvage pullman's up there like mrs lonsdale didn't hug me ever Mrs. Lonsdale never cuddled me ever. You ungrateful beast. Mrs. Lonsdale did everything for you.

She held you through a flood, through a storm. She made sure you were safe, and she cleaned all your butt all the time. Because Malcolm wasn't doing that. Malcolm sure wasn't cleaning your ass. So I'd like some respect on Mrs. Lonsdale's name. Put some respect on Alice Lonsdale. She endured a lot. And I guess Lyra doesn't remember those parts because she was a baby.

But at least I think that does get a little corrected. That is a good thing in the secret commonwealth slightly. Mrs. Lonsdale gets more respect in terms of her emotional role in Lyra's life yep and then she gets sent to jail for it so yeah anyways but those are the books to dust things kids are fucking ungrateful all right especially pre-teen pre-teen girls pre-teen kids in general i was fucking ungrateful i'm still ungrateful fuck well i'm just calling lyra a lie or uh you know she is telling lies telling motherfucking lies your only parent isn't the bear isn't your only parent okay yes malcolm and alice are your other wait a second so that being said thanks so much for tuning in this month to his dark materials the amber spyglass our 20th his

dark materials episode wow we've got nine chapters left in the book so next next month we'll be back with two to three chapters we'll see what we do we'll see where we get and this train is uh it's heading down heading to the underworld yeah which is wild that is wild that they they cover so much in those last nine chapters holy shit a lot happens yeah yeah and and i will be frank with everyone at home listening still we probably will uh go down to two chapters as we get to the last couple they're packed episodes i think they're packed they're packed and i i want to do them right i wouldn't i wouldn't have like begrudged them being like even like more chapters you know but yeah it's actually surprising how it how fast it ends in my opinion it is a criticism many have

of these of this book specifically it does feel like a roller coaster like that and then you're like all of a sudden oh wow my stomach fell out of my butthole how did that happen i don't mind at all like being there and and i didn't really mind it on a reread but i know that like it is a criticism many have well i didn't mind it but maybe this time we can watch it we'll and i think it's got yeah it's got merit yeah yeah i i minded when i was 13 anyway um now we're at chapters 14 and 16 not 13 and yes so thanks everyone for tuning in and if you know you want more historic materials this month's patreon episode is going to be historic materials yeah check that out patreon.com slash girls gone canon and make sure you're subscribed to us on a podcast platform near you if it's not through your patron

rss feed you can check us out at spotify itunes google play stitcher a cast you name it we're on it yeah and of course if you have thoughts about this episode or anything else please feel free to send us an email at girls gone canon at gmail.com or you can shoot us a tweet at twitter where we are still at girls gone canon c C-A-N-O-N. Yeah, send us pictures of your demons, you know? Yeah. Yes. A lot of people send us pictures of their animals, and it brings us great joy.

Like, for example, someone showed us again Blueberry the bird. Blueberry return. That was, I think, our friend Robin. Yes. Thanks so much for listening, and we'll see you next month. I've been one of your hosts, Chloe. And I've been another one of your hosts, Eliana. Bye, guys.