Girls Gone Canon Cast - His Dark Materials Series 2 Episode 6 - Malice

Episode Date: December 22, 2020

In the penultimate episode, Lyra and Will must leave Cittagazze with the witches but Will's wound proves difficult for their trek. Lee and Jopari cross worlds as do Mrs. Coulter and Lord Boreal, but the journey ends for Boreal here. Mrs. Coulter does intense things.   Maya Shavzin's Artwork: Lyra and Pan as Lady with Ermine - https://twitter.com/Maya_Draws/status/1337196823509864449 Maya's His Dark Materials Artwork - https://www.maya-draws.com/his-dark-materials --- 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  

Hello, and welcome to Girls Gone Canon Watches His Dark Materials Series 2, Episode 6, Malice. I am one of your hosts, Chloe. 6 Malice. I am one of your hosts, Chloe. And I am another one of your hosts, Eliana. And this week, we only have both of us as each of your hosts. But in the coming few weeks, we are going to have a couple other other one of your hosts. So excited, we're going to have for the finale episode, which will be coming to a streaming platform near you much like the one you're currently listening on our friend cam candid 59 she is joining us she's truly a delight uh she would probably be sitting here smacking his face no no i'm not great my insights aren't great she's wrong she's wonderful she says very funny and very insightful things about his dark materials over on her Twitter account at Candid59 or over on her Tumblr, Candid59.tumblr.com.

So check her out. Give her a follow before she comes on on the next episode on the finale of Series 2, which I'm so excited about. Yeah, I'm really looking forward to having Cam on. And I think she's looking forward to giving all of you her sights as well. Sounds like she's saving up some of them for everyone, which is, I mean, I don't know if I have that kind of self control, you know, that's like Mrs. Coulter levels of self control. She usually, we've joked, but she usually spoils us on accident because we don't log off. She's how I know that I have to log off on Sundays when His Dark Materials starts. But she said that she may not live tweet. She may not spoil us.

She might be busy watching and she said taking notes. So we'll see. We'll see. But excited to have her on. And she's not it for guests this month. No, we will also be having some guests on on our Patreon special episode. Right, Eliana? Yes, and this one's going to be very exciting. I think we've told you all about it before, but we are still excited to have the Dust podcast on

to talk about the music of His Dark Materials. And we are not going to only limit it, I think, to season two. We're going to talk about a lot of things i mean they have a breadth of knowledge yes matt and holly i'm so excited to have them on you know they did share they are already looking into lauren belf's music for series two at the time of this recording it's a little bit before uh the soundtrack has come out a little bit before the finale but let me tell you that we have the hook up and we know some stuff and it's good so we'll talk about in universe but also out of universe right some kate bush some fan music if

you believe it some filk his dark materials music yes and even a fan playlist mixtape for you to listen to, a track listing, a Spotify playlist if you're on Spotify. And I think it'll be good. I think it'll be fun. Maybe I should bring in, I remember when I was looking up Isahitra and the pronunciation of it, I came across a death metal song. Yeah, the metal band. Yeah, yeah, yeah. They are in the doc. Don't worry.

They're in our notes already. Oh my god. I'm so excited then oh so glad and here's another thing that's exciting and i actually like was beating myself up for forgetting to bring this up last episode another thing in terms of artistic things in the his dark materials fandom is maya shavzin who's a artist. I really admire their recent figure drawings. She shared with us an illustration they did of Lyra and Pan that is a take on

Da Vinci's Woman with an Airmane, which inspired Philip Pullman for creating the demons. Yes, they have definitely made some beautiful artwork before that we've shared a couple times. I believe we usually put the links in our details

of the episode so check out this episode it will have a link to the photo it's beautiful artwork she does an amazing job uh and not to toot our own horn but she did call us the best literary analysis podcast which i was like oh god i love you so much maya so we convinced her to read his dark materials apparently that's pretty good that's a pretty big deal so it's your power it's your power now Chloe's convincing me to finish the secret commonwealth we've come full circle absolutely yeah I mean the series is about coming full circle in some ways so the spangled spangled circle um oh my god coming full circled on that we should talk about

our spoiler scope we're going to talk about the main trilogy of his dark materials we're going to hint at things from the companion trilogy the books of dust that's labelle sauvage in the secret commonwealth we won't do too heavy of spoilers with that and we will do a decent amount here and there of hinting at things from the novella as we see fit but they aren't too crazy right they aren't too heavy in the scope of things for the series so and honestly again the show has spoiled you all more than we could on that and yeah everything's for game from the three books we're excited to talk about all of them today but you know there's one big important warning that we need to put up top chloe this is big this is it's big i need all of you to look it covers it covers a lot a lot it would if it existed where is my blanket where is my historic materials blanket eliana got an entire

set of popcorn candies blanket she ate popcorn while pan and lyra watched paddington with will i i have nothing i have nothing i am just the queen of ashes i'm out here like i'm gonna learn to control the specters and it's over for fu app. I'm just kidding, but I do want my blanket. Yeah, you got your thing. I still think you should contact them. The strange little platform that we don't know. I forgot his name. The third party platform that is organizing this.

Hello, please. I'm so desolate. I'm so sad. Where is my blanket? I'm so sad where's my blanket I'm telling you well if you've got any good tips on where my blanket is or sending me a carved demon

feel free to reach out at girlsgonecanon at gmail.com send us an email chat with us or tweet us or DM us over on twitter hit us up because I'm just saying if you were to send me a historic materials blanket could be the beginning of a special

friendship and I'm not a good enough friend to Chloe to give up mine you say that as if it's not our blanket, Eliana yeah, that's true, it could happen one day speaking of our moments

what is your favorite part of the episode this week? My favorite part? Okay. I wasn't sure for a minute, but I know. I know. It's only ever been this. When the camera pans out at the nighttime change in Chittagotzi, and Marisa Coulter sits at a table in the nighttime with four empty wine bottles working on her fifth while charles latrone is dead across right it was just so beautiful it was the wine bottles

specifically like the empty wine bottles the four empty wine but the time changes and she's gone from two wine bottles to four wine bottles and it's just honestly it's impressive that she's yeah drank that much on her own do you think the monkey drinks some of it oh i hope so i don't know well pan didn't drink well there you go it reminds me the the scholar wine the possible tokai do they really like this? Yes, and so do I! Later they hurled. Oh, it's my favorite that they just drank a bunch of fancy wine and just hurled it for hours.

How could old people drink this? I love it. Okay, what about yours? I think I'm predictable. It's easy to tell what my favorite scenes are going to be every week. Because I'm a big fucking softie. It's Will and Lyra sitting on that ledge overlooking the rest of Chittagatse. Which, honestly, I don't know how they didn't get a nosebleed sitting there, right?

Freaking out. But they're sitting there, they're having a heart-to-heart. Again, unpredictable. But also Pan is right next to them. Just not really interacting. He's just there being fluffy and I think his ears just twitch every now and then

and he's fluffy sitting there and that's it it's a really cinematic shot and it's really grown on me the entire out, like whole entire layout of Chittagatsy and the island, how it's like this little Mediterranean island.

We'll talk about it later with some of the Lord of the Flies kind of things going on, but it does remind me of just an island, a little desolate island you can get shipwrecked between worlds. Yeah, and we talked about it a bit with the trailers and the whole no man is an island and that responsibility

people have with one another. I mean, I was always bought in. I was like, yes, love it. But, I mean, you know, that was the trailers where we discussed this, right? This is episode six, Malice. And we start off the episode with Serafina and Ruta Scotti staring at the lighted flyers passing in the sky realizing angels are joining asriel's cause the last time angels were seen it was to intervene for vengeance to make war ruda follows the angels plotting to bring asriel back and destroy the magisterium

seraphina commands to the rest that they must find Lyra. So this episode and last episode, the Scholar kind of throw a wrench in our perfect book to show timeline, right? Because some things in this episode are a little filler, but some are still pretty killer. It covers a little bit of this, a little bit of that from a handful of chapters, specifically chapter 10, 10 the shaman at least as far as the backstory that lee and joffrey are discussing some of chapter 11 the belvedere with the children attacking seraphina will lyra none of 12 screen language that was covered last episode in the scholar with that majestic ending right that mary's story where she walks into this new world this is a new territory a little bit chapter 13 isa hater with will and the witches the beginning of chapter 14 alamo

gulch is covered in this the second half is not please don't touch me i don't want to talk about it i'm very upset i'm not ready for the. So we're going to talk about what this means for the speculation of what's to come next week, right? Because obviously the end of Alamo Gulch and Blood Moss, whatever clever little fun things they want to invent and throw at us and surprise us, because let's face it, we know they will, that is to come. A lot of people I know that have not read the books that are watching this online they are they're gonna be so mad because they're all out there right now eliana and they're like is will ever gonna meet his dad there isn't gonna be i hope there's no cliffhanger and i'm like oh

it's worse than that it's a bigger cliffhanger than just as will meet his dad it's like stab you in the stomach and then a cliffhanger uh but they're building up to it and it feels really obvious i like the build that they're doing they're there you can see the due diligence right like where the details are coming in and this was a great scene seraphina and ruda really obviously respect each other as leaders of their respective tribes they've expanded ruda's role in a likable way jada nuka is the biggest part of that right like she is warm she's confident she's inspiring it's a great performance i've been happy to watch it and it's so great to see ruda take the power dynamic right it's not like i'm gonna go find asriel and join his cause because i think it's a good cause it's i'm gonna

go get Asriel, bring him back and hold him accountable for this goddamn hole in the world and the Magisterium being awful. She's seeking to bring him to accountability, which I don't think a lot of people do with Asriel. And I like the way they've translated it. I think that they've done a great job with Ruta, what you're talking about expanding it and making sure as you said, that accountability and getting back at the Magisterium which i think works really well with the rest of how this episode is structured because we are going to come back to that magisterium stuff and i'm not sure if you're supposed to read uh ruda's desire for this to be as like this is

still too small piece in the context of attack and dethrone god but but I'm going to just say it's not, unless you've read the books and know that's what it's leading to. Like, this makes sense, right? She's on the right side. And I do think it's interesting that they actually have said here that the angels haven't revealed themselves until now, which makes me think that they're saving some of the more in-depth parts of Lighted Flyers

and where Ruta actually meets the angels, speaks with them, and you get a lot of that information about their structure for next episode. As you said, Jaden Nuka is just killing it, and I think that I'm hoping that that means that they're going to give her a bigger role, write more for her next season,

build out more for her. I think that there's room for that to happen. And everything that they've done with ruda scotty in general this season is everything that i like pretty much hoped for that the show would correct in her portrayal right like she as you said comes off really strong confident but she also comes off as sensitive and caring for her people like she's driven by by a purpose right um and values and not asriel's dick and that's important to me yeah i'm glad and i do want to assess it as a whole and see the effect once we've kind of had a chance to reflect on the season i do find it interesting how seraphina's character has been balanced in kind of contrast to her yeah and i'm excited to finally see as we get into it in a bit here how she's affecting meeting

lyra you know and how what it means for her to finally really spend time with lyra especially with some of these kind of lessons that ruda scotty has said to her like yeah she she's taught her a lot it feels like like obviously seraphina's experienced as a tribe leader but it does feel like ruda scotty has kind of said to her hey this is bad stuff that's gonna happen and then the bad stuff happened and she's like hey i told you the bad stuff was gonna happen yeah and i mean they're both young right for witches so it makes sense and uh as you said there's been a lot of i think forcing one another to grow and as you said it'll be interesting to see how she does that with lyra because we see that seraphina in in the show portrayal isn't

always knowing in the way that she kind of is that that pillar for lyra in the books all in all you know i agree with this episode feeling a little bit fillerish it works though in showing how everything is coming together all the different parts right all the different moving parts that are going along in the story especially setting things up right for the last episode it's a good display of the forces that are at play here and I think there's a lot of great emotional groundwork that's done for everyone but to me it does feel like a little less tight or cohesive than the previous episodes have been but like you know in an album they can't all be bangers speaking of music no and that's the other thing is i think that some of these are gonna get better right with time like once you watch them as a whole i think there's a certain

charm after binging series one as an overarching story you know i think uh watching it week to week is fun and different you know now we're in the the different world where streaming comes out at once and time's not real anymore but watching it week to week has given me something to be excited about again and i think that once i watch it all together i might judge it less harshly as an overarching like this is a thing we're missing story-wise i mean it's fine you know um and as you said when on rewatch and everything as a whole could hold together like way better right again everything can't be like as high energy or climactic as the past few episodes. And also, there are gems, like that Paddington bear outfit that Lyra was wearing

that someone caught. Like, holy shit, dude. I'd still also say it's more intelligent than most things on television right now. Oh, sure. So I'm not ever going to complain. I mean, it's a great adaptation. Yeah, I'm not about to look a gift horse in the mouth

or whatever the saying is. I'm actually really bad at idioms, so. Everyone say thank you bbc well back in chitagatse things are getting quite out of hand out of will's hand that is because it is worsening sweaty he's dreaming of his dad his dad saying that he has a task ahead of him fingering the ring i love the usage of the visions again that motif of someone being called to in their sleep kind of builds up the roger reveal later i think in my head i'm just saying evidence towards a roger reveal he hears his dad say will it's revisited right it's lightly echoed when lyra goes to get water for his fever and the lord of the flies kids show up angelica and paula show up and angelica is calling after her eerily from the foggy alleyway she's like lyra yeah and then of

course lyra runs getting into the house and shutting and locking the door it's it feels sort of zombie like which is interesting in this context lyra rouses will and they pack up to run they get to the top of the city and have a confrontation with the children but then seraphina swoops in to save them at the last second and lyra apologizes about tulio and seraphina tells them to leave it's very sweet that lyra of course still apologized right like that's her good heart she feels bad about it because it is a really shitty situation visually this isn't how i expected uh with how everything went down but it works it works out the belvedere is supposed to be a building with a beautiful view with arches looking out on the city and the top of their love shack isn't quite doing it for me right it's fine i'm

intrigued it's still a beautiful view i agree it's still a beautiful view but it's not what i expected especially as far as the stairs go and as we'll talk about in a bit will didn't cut the stairs yeah i kind of forgot about that i kind of forgot how the whole layout i remember being like i don't understand architecturally what i'm looking at like when we were discussing the chapter and I think people can re-listen to my confusion there I do like that the way they get to the roof

is they crawl upwards through a window it almost feels like maybe this is tying into not a window, that little crawl space that we keep saying that they're looking at one another through maybe it has to do with that and also the window coming from the underworld and in general i do like the way that they framed and shot the children as the threat here i kind of wish that as i've said before they

had built this up a little bit earlier in some of the earlier episodes you know with them attacking the cat um i understand the goal of what they were going for and that build up and this being like the uh things are getting bad now um i get it i get it um and the way that they filmed this is a horror like slasher film which i guess is kind of ironic because will's the one with the knife and i think that i want to say that someone talked about this before i want to say it was maybe her dark materials but i don't remember like in the trailer episodes or something like that and it is really interesting how it juxtaposes the threat against the two children versus the threat to the adults uh in chitigatse right because adults are of course a threat from the specters the children turns out are really the big danger towards one another

especially lyra and will and i think with that you know seraphine of course swoops in to save lyra and will and i think that's kind of important when we look at the events later on in the episode right like the next adult that the children see after a long long while you know and they're looking for stability is someone who's very antagonistic towards them and is defending someone who has taken their shot at life away from them, or so they think. And so the way that they react to Mary later on is really interesting. That's a great thought. It's a very different, you know, they, especially them watching her carefully, which we'll get into. Yeah. Well, cruising past past the introduction which is a banger as always seraphina surveys will's wound and of course the subtle knife lyra tells him he has to trust

seraphina and tell her the truth seraphina thinks that they can create a spell to help will's hand but the plants in this world are weaker than the plants in their world they set to foraging lichens i really liked this one part where seraphina was like what is this edge of the knife cut and lyra and will simultaneously lyra goes everything and will goes nothing my parents did that once i asked them if i could move back home, and my mom was like, yeah, so my dad was like, no. At the same time. Mood. What a mood. It's them. They're in love.

Lee and Joppery cruise toward the spirits in the sky. Then they pass through the veil and into a new world. Lee is woohooing the whole way through the new world in true lee scoresby style i thought that was fun and i'm gonna miss them yeah they're gonna come back i know briefly but it's not the same and i know that there are some people that may not have loved lynn manuel as lee scores. I think he's a fun pick. I think Lee Scoresby is supposed to be a cheesy kind of character in a really good way. A cheesy old guy with a heart of gold.

Yeah, Lin's a little younger, but I think he played him earnest and I liked that. And I liked his acting in the episode three scene. I didn't like the scene, but I liked his acting. And I think three scene i didn't like the scene but i liked his acting and i think he did a great job honestly like i didn't love that but i liked his acting and i think he did a great job so i'm trying to embrace all these fun little moments like him woohooing through the other world because you know what what a fun time he was a fun character on this show he was and i think both he and andrew scott have done a great job they this show. He was, and I think both he and Andrew Scott have done a great job. They have a great dynamic together.

And someone else pointed out that we can call Andrew Scott whatever we want, but to them, he'll always be Moriarty, and I forgot that. I could never forget that. I did. I just, like, Fleabag was really fresh in my mind, okay? And yeah, I liked Lin-Manuel's performance, and I think he's done a wonderful and really captured the Once Upon a Time in the Northly, so. Yeah.

I don't know. I like his swagger. I think he's supposed to be a little cheesy. He's going into bars, getting people drunk, trying to get info out of them and starting fights. He's from the country of Texas. Goddamn. How much how serious am I supposed to take that?

I mean if you met this man at a bar you would not take him seriously. That's the point. I'm just saying. Well goddamn. Now that we're such good friends pours more liquor. Speaking of good friends. That's my kind of friend.

It's my kind of friend. Actually, that is your kind of friend. So, speaking of good friends, Miri's communing with Dust, right, by casting the Iijing in Shittagatse. Yeah. She's reading from the Book of Changes, right, as she sits on the steps in Shittagatse. Yeah, she's reading from the Book of Changes, right? As she sits on the steps of Shittagatse.

And this is straight from the book. What she says, she says as she reads, turning to the summit for provision of nourishment brings good fortune. Spying about with sharp eyes like a tiger with insatiable craving. Keeping still as the mountain, it is a bypath it means little stones doors and openings and then she reads further which says signs are coming that

will steal you on your path mary in the show of course says thank god something i can understand finally which i thought was adorable and really funny considering who she is like oh these are actual words that mean things not just a fucking angel speaking through a computer uh even if this is slightly adapted other than that i mean obviously meeting the children and the children spying on her uh this is what happens she does go to chitigatse. It's very mildly explained. She sees lemon trees. She smells the scent on the breeze. She goes up the mountain and she finds another window, one that was opened during the American Revolutionary War. And interestingly enough, she steps through it to the Mulefa world. So maybe we'll see that window in the coming week. see that window in the coming week but she is under the protection of angels in this scene and i love that once more we see that imprint on those uh cement stone walls it looks like angel wings i think it was you and i both pointed that out that it looks like these beautiful just swoosh of angel wings in the wall next to her and of course directly behind her in the beautiful open space

you see the angel statue that flanks the tower and it looks like it's protecting her as well. Really good framework. Huh. I didn't even notice that. I think that's those are great call outs. And I mean, we know that they've been very intentional with a lot of the framing throughout the season. so yeah especially when it comes to these angels watching over her yeah or watching over will and lyra for example as we've seen kind of the male angel statues as a substitute until we get baruch and balthamos in the story my god they're so funny um until they're very sad oh yeah until one dies and then everything's awful so well another thing that's noticeable here is that mary's outfit is now echoing lyra's you pointed out lyra's floral belt last week but now mary has a headband similar

colors with a similar floral pattern and she's wearing denim blues under her green parka which later it's just her denim blues huh interesting. I will say that it feels like everyone has decided that a headband is their fashion accessory this episode, except for Lyra. And by that, I just mean like Mary and Mrs. Coulter. They're both like, hmm, headbands are in now. And regarding the parallels with Lyra's outfit, I think that was a really astute call, right?

Because like Lyra's also wearing a denim shirt slash jacket now this week and or something kind of like that and later mary will of course remove part of her jacket to just be wearing that denim shirt yes yes i love it i uh i love that as their journeys continue and they're journeying on for knowledge. Yes. Another thing that's pointed out is that in this, Mary goes to that tree and Chidigatsy takes fruit from it. Yeah. And sort of touches it and just sort of enjoying things.

Especially after talking last week about Chambers and the tree of illusion and the tree of science. It really makes you think, really makes you think about that movable garden. It does. And of course, you know, she's admiring this little tree, I guess, that's been cultivated in this kind of square. And you were talking about the bonsai tree.

It's like a bigger bonsai tree, which I guess all trees are in a way. Maybe it's like, I don't know. I mean, maybe the bonsai tree is everything. Wow. You know, while we think about that, Serafina and Lyra do some more bonding, right? Lyra tells Serafina that her father gave her a book about witches when she was younger. And she's like, they all had raven hair. Serafina's like, yeah, those books were pretty irritating.

And then mutters that Asriel should know better he knows what a witch looks like interesting so they keep making these clever jokes dancing around ruda asriel it makes me wonder like so okay so the first thing is i think this is a great line because the first significant witch we meet besides ruda and seraphina this season is that blonde witch that was being tortured right so the very first prominent big witch that we don't know uh is blonde she's not raven haired so again yeah stupid that's stupid asriel you're an idiot but on a visual level that's great it does have a little bit of those like i'm not like other girls thing going on and i'm like all right settle down but it's okay because fuck Asriel go off you know what I mean I'm fine with that I do wonder if the Ruta reveal

might have been in the bottle episode I say that because in Jada Nuka's Q&A that she did on the Dark Materials account this week she said that most of her time was spent with Ruta Gedmintas Remy Milner and Sasha Frost and three other better witches that we're not going to meet. Yeah. And Jade says three better witches. That is not our wording. And yes, that is interesting. That's pretty sad.

There's so much that I want from the bottle episode. One day, I believe we can get those one day. I think we can get that script. I mean we i mean collectively as all of us the fandom yes jack doran please do this for us um but besides that lyra asked seraphina you know what powers you have she's like i know that you can like the cold doesn't really bother you can fly also killing that you hear whispers on the wind and she wants to know if seraphina can keep will safe that's really important to her and seraphina says well we're gonna have to travel back to the witch's lands because the flora is more powerful there and i can hide the both of

you and she's like i guess and keep you both safe and she's like i guess mostly just lyra i love that she's so sweet she's immediately just like what about will i know lyra's so good about that this episode you know coming back to that book i it's a lot of that witch world building that i think we got in book one where seraphina basically tells lyra yeah being a witch is fucking awesome and there's this great comparison i think being drawn here as you said right with uh lyra being like please protect will and the fervor that seraphina shows towards her responsibility mostly just to keeping lyra safe she's like i guess will's there too and i think that's kind of compared with and maybe even very much likened to jobbery's single-mindedness in terms of protecting

the knife bearer and that goal yeah and i think it's really sad because like you see will looking over and he's like i can kind of hear you and i think that's part of why he would distrust the witches of course right like his fear that they're going to take lyra from him and abandon him but i mean turns out it's someone else who's very like into the witches who takes Lyra from him instead. Yeah, I didn't think about that, that that's a very apt parallel of that kind of tunnel vision and single-mindedness both of them have had all season when hysterically it turns out what they need is right there in front of them, both of them, right? The bearer and the girl. It's a mistake everyone makes. In the books, it's, I think, also prominent and highlighted highlighted that irony of everyone doesn't understand they go together until they don't and then there's the irony of asriel also being narrow-minded right yeah you have to kill god and i'm also going to make this

beautiful kingdom where we can create all our war machines to do so and then not use them for bad ever again after killing god and you know war war not bad asriel says um i digress but like it's those two extremes right absolute two extremes and there's even something here and i'm not going to go into detail but and obviously flora and lichens are needed for spells and potions and herbalism in general but like there's even something here that reminds me of flora in the secret commonwealth for example interesting makes me think about the strength of floral power i don't know even in the malefa world actually now that you mention it oh yes eliana oh yes welcome aboard eliana now that you're uh aboard the malefa thinking yeah aboard the

malefa god i would only be so lucky and so honored i would say the seed pods are completely one-to-one parallel with something we learned about in the secret commonwealth but that's just me um yes but before then way way way before then right mary sits at a beach of chittagatse angelica and paula watch her realizing she's unfrightened paula eating berries off of a branch interesting interesting with that fruit imagery there and mary's protected by angels which is made evident of course by the swoosh of wings in the air for us to see she realizes she's being watched but the girl's stuck. And it's more of that guardian angel thing that you were saying.

Yeah, I love that. That she thinks she's being watched and she thinks it's just the kids. But it turns out she's actually also being watched by the angels. I think that's really brilliant. Double watched. It's sad, though. This is a sad scene. double watched it's sad though this is a sad scene i'm pretty sure this is where we see that one little flashback of angelica and paula uh with their parents dying

here at this area with that archway i want to say it's in the previews and that one flashback scene so uh for them to see an adult sitting at this beach where they previously had seen their family be taken by the specters it's really sad yeah and i mean like based on the fact that there are boats there right and looks like it's unfinished maybe a lot of adults died here uh trying to escape hey i we never quite got that one scene that one-to-one scene where seraphina you know watches the adults and the lake and everything and there's the woman and the man that are helping the children. We never get that scene explaining that kind of whole situation.

So I'm wondering if that's still to be remixed in the finale episode somehow with the witches, or if we likely just saw it through that little quick flashback. Maybe that was the bottle episode with the three better witches, right? It wasn't Serafina and Ruta, right? And three other witches went in first. Itaphina i wonder and ruda right and

three other witches went in first it's not that they were with asriel but it was part of that which would make sense because that'd be like in the immediate aftermath right of him going through yeah and i think you'd see a ton of like they said tulio was going to be heavily featured so i think it'd be heavily drawn from that we're gonna we're gonna reconstruct this bottle somehow in our heads oh i i've already started in our google docs i'm one step ahead of you yeah hmm interesting did someone say february we don't know well lyra and will trail behind the witches lyra explains that she feels safer with these witches they're connected to the earth they understand more things will's like i just need you to check the alethiometer lyra and he's in

pain he's faltering she's really worried about him and he kind of misinterprets that worry that their communication's out of whack because you know he's only in shock from blood draining out of his body and she's also anxious so uh he he's like you're afraid that i can't go on and he's like just ask the alethiometer where my father is so she does she's a little shaken she walks off asks it and he's cringing holding it together and she says your dad's close he's in our world dude lara doing that is so big i was feeling a lot of anxiety right now and i appreciate anyone doing any dumb shit to alleviate my anxiety all the time. Thank you, Chloe, for dealing with me.

Always. But you were talking about this earlier and the way that Lyra is just so committed to Will I think is really important for setting stuff up in both this episode and the next. You know, she's showing a lot of really great loyalty in protecting Will because he, of course, demonstrated incredible loyalty and even grace to her when retrieving the lithiometer. That was like a fucking ordeal. And perhaps she even feels that Will like meeting his destiny and losing his fingers, right, is somewhat partially her fault because they had to even like go get the knife because of the part where the lith was stolen and he kind of got beat up because of lord boreal too and you know as you're saying about how will feels right he's terrified of demonstrating weakness throughout this episode and we can see a little bit of that why uh because when he shows vulnerability to lyra and what is my favorite scene this episode uh when he talks about his mother and how the bullies among the children would latch on to that and like torture her uh you know because they saw she was vulnerable and

different and to hurt to that week and will doesn't want that to happen to him along with not wanting to hold back lyra or be a burden to her he feels two things a fear that she will leave him because of that weakness uh and maybe be whisked off by the witches and a fear of maybe slowing down whatever quest she has which is i mean his dad so i don't know anxiety's weird but it's important to show in contrast you know their relationship um to contrast mrs coulter and what she does to lord boreal at the end of this episode because mrs coulter doesn't believe that um they are equals and believes that lord boreal would hold her back so she gets rid of him right and what she perceives as his own weakness and as

for the next episode i think that the anxiety that will feels and the commitment he and lyra show one another that really highlights uh what's going to be the emotional crux of that cliffhanger next episode especially if baltamos and Baruch have been cast. I think we're likely going to see that scene then of Lyra being gone and Will being like, shit! And taken by her mother, who is doing what the witches want to do, hide Lyra away and keep

her safe, but if the witches had done it at least Lyra would have been conscious, so you know, fuck. Man, just as Will loses his father, Lyra gains a nightmare yeah a long one a really long nightmare it seems joppery and lee soar along they discuss chitigatse where they're heading it was once a great city as we know and has fallen on hard times is what joppery says okay joppery lee says that right i'm like understatement of the world lee says that in

another life he'd probably be scavenging it but he's no longer that man and they start to discuss shamanism lee is surprised that joppery cannot fly or use powers, but Joppery's like, obviously I can. I needed to fly and you showed up, didn't you? He's like, I've spent time with witches, spirits, academicians. He's found folly everywhere he's gone, but this journey, he's not sure if it's folly or wisdom. wisdom they talk about the bearer of the knife and what the bearer is going to have to do to protect lyra and everyone else as well great mention of the witches in there also the way he discussed his magic and different things with witches it was good setup for next episode saying that he knows witches and academicians yeah i mean i wonder how they're gonna do that i don't know if they're gonna do it the same i don't know if they're going to do it the same. I don't know. It'll be interesting. The comparison, though, about him being able to fly is taken from the book.

And I do, I actually really love that moment. It's such a fun, like, little thought experiment. And watching Jopri talk about how, like, long ago he lost hope of ever finding that window to find his way back to his family um i think that's really interesting because when the anomaly appears right we don't see jopri like showing any sign of hope of finding his family right right it being a window back into his own world that just shows how incredibly hopeless he thinks it is to see will and elaine again he's just like given up on that and i think that's part of why he's so intent on finding the bear and helping the bearer you know earlier it kind of seemed like he felt like

it was just this magic quest right and talking about his son till he made a felt at first a little bit like a well he'll be protected to um justification but i think it really really truly is the way that jopry feels is the one way he can impact his son's life for the better from so far away, not knowing that the knife bearer is his son. He's like, I can do this one thing, even if I never see them again. Yeah, I think they're really hitting the emotional notes with that as well, just by bringing it up in the way they focus specifically on that dialogue. That makes me kind of uh i don't know really focus it on it i i'm i'm happier to pay attention to this plot in the show just because that and i am curious to see how i'm curious to see how the witches are going to affect it now

you know what i mean like yeah how is it going to be smooth flowing that some witch suddenly realizes that's the man i love i i hope that one of the witches says like in the beginning of the episode maybe while climbing with lyra and will says i was in love i was in love with the shame at once or something you know i don't know just something because i just feel like it's so disconnected or they don't do it or it's like a misunderstanding in a different way um i don't know like i i'm almost like thinking what if it's not a witch next episode but also you know as you were saying they really hit the emotional beats and they've done a good job of fleshing out those emotional motivations for job reads it's his son and for lyra roger being brought up again and again as

a driving factor has i think both of those have been smart yeah will and lyra confront the pain that will's feeling finally and the pain that's kind of causing him to be a little abrasive right lyra's like maybe we should stop to rest will you're not feeling great and he's like no no you're using me as an excuse to stop because that makes sense william and he apologizes he's like i'm sorry i was vulnerable i let it get the better of me and she's like yeah we need to rest and she tells seraphina as such oh she's a leader and then lord boreal and Mrs. Coulter enter Chittagatse. Amazing lens flare here. It reminds me a little bit, and no spoilers, of the non-migraine auras that get introduced in the Books of Dust.

It's also very clear from the way she's holding herself, presenting herself, the confidence, the strut as they go through here. The power dynamic has definitely changed. Oh yeah, definitely. He's like, reluctant to go anywhere. Yeah, understandably. It's a pretty dangerous world. And speaking of fashion hour, it's interesting that Mrs. Coulter's outfit in general, right, feels very like she's going on, don't know a fucking safari which is weird or something um maybe that's just in my head uh the interpretation of her outfit as such

but it is interesting in the context of some other things we're going to talk about the mrs coulter in control later but also i don't know if you noticed her we talked about a few episodes ago her heels looked like they might have been snake skin and her uh what is this ascot handkerchief around her is a snake skin pattern it's amazing as though she's trying to signal something she's like signaling like oh we're on the same page but really she's just pretending it's like when you're supposed to match as a couple thing and he's like he's like oh you're wearing snake skin to match me honey but she's like no i'm wearing snake skin because i'm gonna peel your skin off yeah and it's like that's what it is this is the least kept i've seen

lord at lord boreal's outfit well that's the thing is he has a literal this episode you can see him weaken you can physically see he's weak he's nervous he's like a nervous nelly he's like when you watch horses on tv and they're nervous he's like that right now he's like oh i'm skittish i'm running from confrontation maurice is out here just like here i am i'm gonna do what i want But he looks unkempt. He looks nervous. He doesn't want to go through with this. It's very obvious that he's scared and she is mad. Which is very interesting.

People who are not scared also is Mary, who, again, is still being watched by Angelica and Paola. Yes, she calls for them to come out. She offers them another new asleep bar, saying won't tell your parents which is like bad news of course you won't Mary they're dead too soon Mary far too soon they tell Mary about the specters and how the adults fled up the mountain once the specters came and the other kids too

they then tell her about trying to murder Lyra and they're like was that wrong and she's like yes? the fuck? well Lyra's with the witch so and then Paula asks if Mary will hug her if she can have a hug from Mary which Mary does give her yeah so they're doing multiple things in this episode and multiple things with this scene specifically some of it works for me and some of it doesn't to be honest like I think that the

duality and the tragedy of the children of Chittagatse is one of the things that they're trying to drive home here. And I really appreciate it. I think it's ambitious and it's, I respect the intent. I really do. And I, it just doesn't actually land for me is, is the thing, right? And that's, of course, my subjective opinion uh part of it might be whether i think it needed to like contrast more right to their behavior and again set that up even earlier of them as this really sort of um malicious force in shittagatse and then kind of turn that on its head um because i think they're only really, truly terrifying for this brief moment, right? Before becoming these watchers of Mary.

And I think part of it is that, like, I understand the point that Angelica and Paula, despite everything, right? They're still both supposed to be very young. They are, of course, adolescent, but they are both still children not adults and need care and i get that but there's something about the scene and it's delivery that didn't work for me and i don't know if it's like and this is obviously the fault of no one because no one can help this but like i don't know if they're just both too tall for me in the way that the scene goes like and and like kind of undercuts how some of it's supposed to be and like i don't know there's something it just doesn't land for me right yeah there's

something off tonally and we talked a lot about this in our subtle knife episode his dark materials episode 14 chapters 11 and 12. In total depth, so we'll keep it shorter here, but there's a lot being played on in the book that's missing here in the subtle knife that Pullman uses. They're a bit tamer in the show, as you mentioned. In the books, Angelica is leading a crowd jeering through the city with guns, with weapons that they've made themselves cocked ready loaded to go and it's surreal because you're like this child militia has joined up and that is a microcosm right of the war we're about to see being fought against god but they've already become broken child soldiers they've watched their parents be consumed in front of them and a lot of these kids in the book end up hurting themselves the guns fire off stairs collapse on them and

will cuts the stairs away to save him and lyra so it's their fault the stairs collapse on these kids that's right and kids die several kids die during this in the books it's like a very emotionally charged scene it It echoes the climax of Lord of the Flies really well, we've discussed, because kids are just dying everywhere. The way the writing team framed this with Angelica and Pala is softer. In Lord of the Flies, the group think evolves and it becomes more violent over time, and there are two paths of thinking. There are two boys that are symbolic of that. There ralph who represents social order and jack who represents savagery they're seeking to kill a beast who keeps talking to them from a cave but it turns out the beast isn't the beast

the actual beast is the dark side of human nature which you can't kill motherfucker it turns out you can't do it one of the boys simon has this revelation where he understands that the beast is human nature and he's caring for an ostracized member of the group piggy he ends up murdered he's chased through the forest and the children are screaming kill the beast spill his blood and that's what these kids are doing in the books with lyra and will they're saying get them kill them spill their their blood. And while Simon was really just trying to help maintain balance as Will and Lyra are doing here, they saw Simon as the beast instead of confronting that same revelation. So they kill him. And of course, later, Ralph is

fleeing the savage boys running through the woods when he finds a naval officer who rescues them. And they start telling the officer what happened and these kids are transformed right they turn from being these wild children that have started this game of war where they've murdered each other into children they're crying and in this it feels rushed uh it feels like there's no stakes and the emotion feels off the last passage of the lord of the flies at the end is is really emotional it goes the tears began to flow and sobs shook him he gave himself up to them now for the first time on the island great shuddering spasms of grief that seemed to wrench his whole body his voice rose under the black smoke before the burning wreckage of the island,

and infected by that emotion, the other little boys began to shake and sob too. And in the middle of them, with filthy body, matted hair, unwiped nose, Ralph wept for the end of innocence, the darkness of man's heart, the fall through the air of the true wise friend called piggy it's still a really sweet scene but without that that loss of innocence right like seeing these these children that have become warriors on accident because they've had to to survive uh where they just are brought to nothing and brought to be like can i just have a hug that is something that i would have loved to

see but these kids did not quite get that background i don't feel absolutely and you know the scene ends with angelica asking if mary would stay with them take care of them for a little asking mary to remind them to take showers because as we know that's a thing that i guess the kids don't do with lyra being like no I smell fine. And. Me camp fifth grade I'm just saying. Been there. I'm not saying things haven't gotten awry for me this. COVID times but.

Mary says no. But then she agrees to take them to the adults. On top of the mountain. And. I think that the second thing right that this scene does that is well demonstrated by mary's scenes throughout the episode in general is establishing her character and i think again should be seen in contrast to mrs coulter's own approach to especially understanding in new places both are scientists and experimental theologians and as we discussed last episode,

have different motivations, with Mary seeking to learn, to understand, for the sake of it, and Marisa kind of seeking to understand in order to exert control. When Mary first enters Chittagatse, what she does is take it all in with this sense of wonder, right? She wanders Chittagatse to appreciate and marvel at it despite what's happened and she also has the luxury of doing so because she's protected but whatever um and as you said right she doesn't notice the angels uh but the children and later on sees them and i think it harkens back to mary and her uh scenes with her niece and nephew it's established that she has rapport with children understands them and she does the exact same thing in offering them this kind of candy, not really candy.

And maybe that's also preparing us a bit for her role as the serpent, right? As she offers food, this tempting, this offering of fruit, sugar, sweetness, that taste. But it also really shows her, again, in contrast to Mrs. Coulter's approach. Mrs. Coulter's approach. Mrs. Coulter enters and then masters the specters, right? She changes and affects this place immensely just by being there. And that's how she approaches everything. It's really highlighting why Mary's encounters with the Malefa, I think, are just so pleasant in the Amber Spyglass in that she goes in there.

And what she does is she seeks to communicate and understand them she learns their language and becomes a part of their society helping build things and and uh contribute she shows them kindness uh in the same way she's showing the children the kindness and to be honest everyone else that she encounters as long as she doesn't think that they're from the department of the defense right uh for example where she's like oh mrs coulter i'll make you some coffee then she's like fuck all i got are these dirty cups and mary's just doing the best she can mary just comes at it with respect and i now like think of like imagine if mrs coulter had been the one right to find and enter the world of

the malefo like holy shit what a mess going there in her, like, fucking colonizer outfit, right? She would have likely tried to subjugate them or gain power amongst the Malayphal, like, immediately, and it would have all gone pretty horribly. In general, and I think that has to do with just who she is, right?

And there's, I think, an irony with the end of her story, right? As we're reminded this episode, she's been on a quest for knowledge for this prophecy about Lyra, Lyra's name for years, maybe in a hope to finally control or master her own daughter, as we'll see in the next few scenes. And when she finally does get that name of Lyra and learns it and understands her daughter's destiny is when she finally is like, I will let go now. I will surrender and show weakness weakness but it's not bad yeah it's very complex and i think there's definitely something in that that uh the way that coulter learns and the way that she manipulates matter and we see it further in this episode as we go along but before we get to that we'll see joppery and lee once more moving along making good time and joppery tells lee that

he doesn't think he could ever get back right he had never known about his demon even until he had gone to another world nice foreshadowing there i thought i was like oh thanks for calling that out loudly and boldly just in case you wonder where will and lyra are going and what's going to happen people keep asking me, they're like, is Will ever going to see his demon? I'm like, I don't know. I don't know. I don't know.

Interesting question. Listen to my pocket. It's funny you say that because I keep hearing people ask me, hey, are Will and Lyra ever going to, you know, like kiss and then have to walk away from each other forever and ruin each other's lives by never seeing each other again. Who the fuck is asking you that very pointed question?

Me. Myself. I was like, who's asking hurtful things? No one. Just you. Just us. Of ourselves. It's just me and you and our DMs. We get a really cute bit of the episode. I loved this.

This might have been my second favorite scene because lee is like i'll make some coffee mr. joffrey yeah with some clean cups and joffrey's like i can help and lee's like what are you gonna no what are you gonna do magic us some fire and joffrey's like yeah i will and then he pulls out matches and throws them at him and i was like oh that's great cute banterter. A plus banter. Good chemistry. Yeah. I kind of wish we had gotten the one-liner about him learning about it in Boy Scouts.

It's not like a big deal. It's only for my own personal pleasure. But I love the way they did that. It was perfectly delivered. Yeah. I like their chemistry a lot. I'm not going to lie. I didn't think I would.

I was surprised. No, they do. They do do it's there to build on but i'm really glad that lynn manuel and andrew scott i'm glad they have good chemistry for sure it's kind of very quaint right you have lee and i think this is like you said in the books it's it's meant to be juxtaposed this way that lee is a little too much a little too earnest right lived a little too much life too earnestly and he's eager and he's honest and chopper is kind of reserved quiet and like you'll see in due time lee scores being lee's like i want results now mr choppery and i like those characters being pressed together and made to work together all for one common cause i think that's like pullman does really well,

and it's well done with these actors as well. I think that makes sense, right? Based on which prophesied child they are tied with, right? Like, these earnest, like Lyra, and Jopri's had to hide a lot of secrets because he's like, I can't really just tell people I'm from a whole other alternate dimension. The way that Will's had to live with his secrets of like oh

my god um i'm taking care of my mom like father like son yeah secrets yeah secrets seraphina worries about the knife she tells lyra she doesn't trust the knife and asks if will is actually seriously worthy of the knife and Lyra's like well, my role is to help Will find his father and tells her about losing the alethiometer and how important it is to her and how it's a part of her and Seraphina's heard actually great things of

Lyra's alethiometer reading but she thinks that Lyra's obstinance is actually her better gift it's interesting that she's heard things about the alethiometer reading and is it from Fardercorum that she's heard things about the alethiometer reading i'm like is it from farder quorum that she's heard these things i don't know interesting but something to think about this is really good foreshadowing build-up uh for lyra losing that ability to read the alethiometer as well as separating from pan right because lyra says this is a part of me like i

can't lose it this is who i am reading the alethiometer feels right and in this seraphina is hinting that life goes on right that that the alethiometer doesn't define how extraordinary how special lyra is i really liked that yeah that fucking kills me um everyone's special oh yeah the witches begin their spell because they must stop Will's bleeding before finding his father or else Will's gonna fucking just bleed out and die so what was the point and they're like

they lay their hands on Will and they grind up flora and apply it they whisper some phrases yeah the spell is actually in Lithuanian Ruda Gabinta's Seraphina was whispering the spell in Lithuanian uh rudy gabintas serafina was whispering spell lithuanian it's her home language her father actually helped give them lessons on the spell i thought that was great it was a gorgeously done scene beautiful just even the symmetry of how things are laid and uh the the lichen being laid on will and it was a very nice scene. Yeah, it was, it was.

Lyra also asked the alethiometer for a Will's dad update, and then tells her to keep going up, and she's like, interesting, I don't think we have that movie in my world, and Serafina tells her to stay close to Will and keep him warm. Oh.

Oh. Oh. That's a little... I mean, even the way Pan is, Pan curls up in Will's neck, in the crook of his neck, and he says to Lyra, he turns to Lyra and he's like, we feel safe here,

don't we? No. That one I considered if that would be my favorite scene or not because again i'm very predictable um i like the way that they did this spell scene uh and instead you know how they wove it in with that with the language the lithuanian language and the witches throughout the show right by changing the opening credits to be more inspired by the spell that we actually get in the book that is hearkening speaking to the subtle knife directly but in latin i love that little yeah at the end of the opening credits it's a

fantastic great touch that always makes it feel kind of witchy to me um it's fascinating we didn't get kill a rabbit and bring it back to life though though. I don't know why, I kind of wanted that, um, but maybe I'm a little messed up, and, you know, again, I like the- I did too because I think it symbolizes, like, the story moving forward. Ah, ah! Of life,

rebirth, uh, Lyra saving the people stuck in the underworld. The sacrifice and things like that. Yeah, the sacrifice, the bomb that as a savior figures yep yep especially because they're calling lyra's sacrifice in this episode interesting that's true i just wanted it for i don't know shock shits and giggles um and also i will say i'm fine with it not being in the show but if you wanted the original spell in the books is very much

written as a poem Philip Pullman's first love when it came to English was poetry this entire story is inspired by a poem and if I feel like an overachiever maybe I'll like take that part out for all of you to listen to but go check out our analysis of this poem and how it works as a spell

in that Subtle Knife episode Fra Pavel has found Marisa Coulter finally in another our analysis of this poem and how it works as a spell in that Subtle Knife episode. Fra Pavel has found Marisa Coulter finally in another world. Father MacPhail once more asks for Pavel to find out who is Lyra and it turns out she's a little important. Only a little.

What's also important is how many fucking buttons Fra Pavel has. He's not the only one. I'm just like, oh my god, that must take so long. I know. Imagine sewing that. Oh, that's true too. But at least you only have to sew it all on there once, right? Imagine having to wear this all the time

and having to take it all off and then put it back. It sounds like an ordeal. Maybe they like that. Maybe that's part of their fucking self-punishment um talk about the hand in the flame yeah i mean he uh pavel alludes to that when he's like i need to be punished before i say what i'm about to say right kind of insinuating that and in terms of what he's going to say with this prophecy i like that they kind of laid on thick here as to what

lyra's name would be they don't say the name right away, you know, so that those who might not have read the books can start piecing it together. But he gets cut off right before the big reveal, which is a technique that they use again a little bit later on in this episode. But before then, Mrs. Coulter and Boreal descend into Chittagatse. They come across a man who has been attacked by the specters, and Marisa examines him. Boreal thinks it's similar to severing, but Marisa explains that it's much more powerful. It's interesting comparing the two situations, right? When Lyra had the same exact situation, she tried to help the man get water and tried to guide him toward a better place where he could be. and get water and tried to guide him toward a better place where he could be and here what does marisa do but immediately exploit his position and try to learn and understand dust

due to him just like you were mentioning with mary and the mulefa earlier of how when she got into the mulefa world she didn't immediately exploit their entire situation she learned she tried to understand uh so you have this great contrast between marisa lyra and mary going on in this episode yeah the first thing mrs culture do does is like oh i like the snarl the uh the yeah i do that too uh i was outside at night once in a park in the city there were a lot of rats and that works if you hiss at them i was like maybe i'm a cat or they're just like that person's a lunatic yeah they probably think you're a lunatic that's probably it speaking of lunatics the magisterium plans to attack mcphail rallies

up troops to get lyra sending them through the anomaly. He calls it a great sacrifice that Lyra will be the first to uptake it. Oh god, he's gonna make fail at this bomb. That is... I wonder how many dad jokes he makes to Lyra. Sorry, he makes it to Daphne. Apparently, they actually

and he's probably like, you're da bomb dot com, girl. I would do that if I had a child. Yeah. They have worked in other shows together. And he has killed her before on a show. So this is nothing new. Yeah, at least this time he doesn't succeed. So yeah, she gets one over on him finally in her career. Good for you, Daphne.

Finally, yeah. There's again that great framing of Father Macphail with the insignia of the magisterium behind him they've been doing some interesting framing with his head and light behind him in general Seraphina and Will have their own little chat it's not really like reassuring for Will

I think she tells him that a wound opened by magic must be closed by magic so I've been thinking about the amber spyglass. Mm-hmm. And it's because my brain won't shut the fuck up ever, right? For once in its life. But a wound opened by magic must be closed by magic.

Makes me think about the amber spyglass and how the windows have to be closed with him on the other side and her on the other side yeah i'm doing this right now again i'm so sorry you guys just have to get sad with me everyone just get tucked in get a little morose uh we're turning the mood down for a minute but you know they have to close the windows on the other side of each other. They have to close the wound, but if you've read the Books of Dust, it seems that that wound might still be open, at least in Lyra's heart, right? How do you get over your first love ever? I'm just, what if we're going to close the wound someday? Close it with magic.

Closure? Closure? I do think it's about closure, right? Even when you're in will. To be fair to everyone, like, you know, it wasn't that hard. It was difficult, right? But of course I eventually got over my first love because they were not like super awesome at that time. But what do you do

if you've gone to the fucking underworld with your first love? Not everyone has had that experience. When you've been through so much fucking trauma with that person and so much insane shit that like there's only one other person that could ever understand you in any of the worlds

and you can't ever see them again. The worst. So yeah, so that's what I thought about. And immediately I was sad. We're gonna cry so hard. Dude, next week alone. I don't even. Yeah, close the wound.

Close it. Let's talk about a different wound and the closure for that. Coming back to Will's actual wound, right? This one seems a little easier still sad but like i think it makes sense why it's will's father who's the one who's able to heal him besides like you know we do a good job of establishing how powerful jopri is in terms of magic this episode because that's important for that but i mean it's also like a deeper wound than that right because the Because the knife can cut through anything. And as you're saying about closure, right? Can even cut through spirit.

And I think Will's wound is definitely, it seems like they've been building it up that his wound as a whole left by his father's disappearance. They allude to it here in this episode as well. And he kind of gets a bit of closure for that. Yeah, I mean, even here with what he says to her right in the episode of it not just here but also last episode at the end of the episode when he was like i've never had to worry about my mom in that way like it doesn't matter that will is a responsible child caregiver like it doesn't matter that he's able to do it or that he has done it it matters that like no matter what if you've had a parent if you've lost a

parent if you've had a parent leave you or abandon you you're always going to wonder why wasn't i good enough you're always gonna want to know and you'll it doesn't matter how shitty the person was if you've never really gotten to meet them in your conscious life you're always gonna wonder it doesn't matter you will always wonder so the fact that he at least got to meet him got to i mean he'll he'll have years to wrap his head around it right like he'll have decades to think about it and try to understand it and try to put the pieces together of who his father was and what his father experienced uh but he just he at least gets the chance to see him he gets some yeah i mean that is like a closure that people like it's the best you can get dream of no but it is like in real life so many people

don't get that and he gets some answers and has like a starting point i kind of wonder if they're gonna have droppery mention his son right um as he's healing the knife bearer being like this is good this is for my son etc and the world that he wants to happen and then they look at each other and like that's part of the closure i i don't know it's just such a beautiful passage too so i hope it it i think it's gonna have that perfect emotion i think they'll do it fine i'm not even gonna worry right now as we go through this because I just know them. I feel like I know them. I think we're pretty intimate, us and his dark materials,

you know, at this point. And I don't think they're going to do me wrong. I don't. No, I don't think that they will. Maybe this is some Christmas miracle, but I think they're going to make me cry. That language of the blue eyes finding his eyes and the shock. I think it's gonna be amazing

and i think it's gonna be heartaching and i just can't wait i mean i think that they're gonna do fine i'm just spectroulating you know oh my god okay speaking of the specters the next scene is badass right this is the killer we talked about the filler but this is the killer coulter controls the specters she examines things in a medicine cabinet in one of the houses in chitigatse while boreal watches the specters kind of begin to flood he's like oh they're coming soon i can feel them he takes refuge within the doors of a building and when he sees marisa coulter and the monkey are not responding and taking refuge, he locks the door. He's like, fuck you, good luck, girl. Like, I may have

played Lighthouse Family last week, but this week, it is all you. You are on your own. Coulter puts herself in a state of negative capability and is able to control the specters. They whirl around her, responding to her, and it's an epic shot. I mean,

just throw it at her. Just give her the fucking Emmy at this point. What's the point? What's the point in giving the Emmy to anyone else. In any of the categories. When you could just hand it to Ruth Wilson. It's already happening. Even just her portrayal of that negative capability.

The same thing we see Lyra do. On her alethiometer. It's very obvious they're relating that same state to coulter controlling the specters we've seen it play out on screen in the cave with the dust coming to life uh just like the cave so i find that interesting and another thing speaking of the cave coulter grabs the poison in this scene right that she plans to use on Boreal as she shuffles around in this kind of medicine cabinet did she grab any

other drugs while she was in this medicine cabinet? that's interesting you were talking about that earlier to me we'll come back to that I love the windows on this house I just want to point that out.

They're really nice windows. I don't know if they're like irises or lilies. I also like that scene, right? You were talking about Lord Boreal closing himself in when he's like, oh, Maurice is not doing shit. Shrimp. And he closes the windows, though, right? And to protect himself, and you see him through it i think we saw that in the trailers but we didn't know what it was referring to

and since season one we've been talking about lord boreal and how he's framed through these windows so i thought that there was something wonderfully significant about this action as he closed it as though he's the windows are going to close on him forever and I thought it was just lovely and also something fascinating to me as Mrs. Coulter tames the specters, right, is it looks as though for a moment as she reaches her hand out one of the specters splits into

two based on the motion of her hand and it now looks like there are two fucking specters where before there was only one which is worse because I guess they're like earthworms and she's just made two fucking specters where before there was only one which is worse uh cause I guess they're like earthworms and she's just made now two specters uh

I love it it was a very beautiful rendition I mean again just put her in whatever outfit and have her make faces at me and I'll pay her you know like fucking Ruth Wilson ladies and worms ladies inspectors but ladies and earthworms oh worms no uh the splitting was interesting because

you're splitting matter right like that's the thing is it's all matter it's all or anti-matter yeah it's all just matter though right, it's all the building blocks, the fundamental building blocks, and as she said, if you can understand it, you can control it. So I know that she's the one that teaches them to fly off page-ish in the books, right? Like, we kind of see it, kind of don't. I like this. I think this was fine. It works. I think it makes sense. Yeah, I think it was executed well. Jabri and Lee fly over the city. They see Spectre swarming the city and worse behind them is following the Magisterium Zeppelins and Jabri tells him to keep flying. The wind's going to be on their side. And, you know, speaking of the scene that we just saw regarding specters they couldn't fly until now I guess but I think that

I am fearing my understanding of them flying as they swirled up the tower alright and that I have done nothing wrong like yeah that's my question is how what do you mean they couldn't fly I think they could fly they looked like they were flying

for every reason you were i yeah as a person who cannot levitate off the ground more than eight feet those bitches were in the fucking air okay they were flying i don't know that's just how i feel about it was it like they just couldn't go far real fast or something they had to swirl around marisa coulter taught them cardio i mean marisa coulter taught the specters pilates i think she should teach me anyways i heard marisa coulter does foreign car commercials when she got say i hear her hair is insured for a hundred thousand whatever's wherever world you're in a hundred thousand dollars I don't know Marisa Coulter punched me in the face once it was awesome actually that one does sound real it sounds real so Lord Boreal examines this new power that Marisa has brought over the specters while if you peek you'll see Joppery and Lee flying overhead for a hot frame.

Yep, just watch that one frame. Yes, you'll see the balloon right over Chidigatse. Very exciting. Brilliant. Yes. Coulter explains her secret at controlling the specters to Boreal, and then they sit down for their celebratory meal of fruit. Fermented fruit. It's wine good um interesting i like that mrs coulter gives us though a bit more explanation on how she controls the specters here and partially because she has a sounding board off of

boreal i don't know if she had that in the books if i'm not mistaken because like in the books i'm still i was still confused i'm like i believe she did it but my understanding is she did it through like sheer force of will i'm like i don't get it through negative capability i mean i think that the way she explained it and did it here right she stepped away from the demon and had him go into that naked negative capability state that like made sense in the books i'm just like alright, she was just like... It was definitely a better explanation. That's just my personal

opinion. Um, and... Anyway. Will and Lyra come as right over Kintagaze. He tells her he's seen children act like this before. He talks about children who had violently harassed his mother he tells her he

thought one day his dad might come back and change everything right things would get better he would have friends his mom would get better but the older he got he knew it would never happen and that he couldn't trust anyone well lyra chimes in till met me, and he smiles and says, yeah, till I met you. They continue on their path up the mountain with the witches. It's just cute, and she's a demanding little shit. She is. She looks so proud of herself. She's like,

till you met me. You didn't trust anyone either, Eliana, till you met me. It's a cute- what? What? Who said that who said that oh i don't know interesting um must have been an angel anyway it's so poofy again in the scene you gotta call it out so poof he's so cute little panda it's gonna be real sad when he settles and and is no longer a panda he's just gonna

be like a sleeker version of what he is listen you know what maybe the show wants tony mccurious not to exist but the best they could do is change pan from settling to a pine martin and just be like actually we decided he's a panda would i be mad like i don't think i'd even be mad i think i would be i think i'd just be like interesting adaptation i liked it i'd be like well as long as i get like a lot of fan service of red pandas fine i mean i'm a bad fan just keep going fan girl no you're a Fanda. Oh my god. So we get this wonderful- This is the scene. I love this scene. This is your favorite.

Colter bartends. She bartends for Boreal. She's like, we're gonna celebrate! And she explains how she was able to control the specters and he's like, wow, wifey, this is such great news! Now we're immortal and Chidagatse wifey equals hashtag! And she's like, wifey this is such great news now we're immortal and chita god say wifey equals hashtag and she's like lol hubby you think you're working for equal really hubs you think for equal

interesting and uh it's a trick question right because they're not equals and she kisses him and she's like well let's drink to that darling and he drinks and she giggles all girlishly right very manipulatively encouraging him as he talks about chitagatse of course he's very interested and he's telling her these like oh these facts like oh did you know that they don't even know this they say this about chitagatse but mid boring fact about chitagatse that anyone who's read the books would know, Boreal. Mid-fact, the poison sets in and he starts to choke. His demon is

writhing on the ground and Coulter monologues to him about how they've never been equals. And he dies, leaned into a chair with this beautiful single tear streaming down his face. What a death. What a swan song. Good for you, Ariane69 on Twitter.

Good for you. Why? He wasn't even born then. Thanks. Shout out. Hashtag at Candid59. I love the femme fatale Coulter classic trope here, right? The you're already dead speech.

She's the woman to die for with her girlish giggles and her manipulations and she's disconnected quite literally right like she doesn't feel remorse for these actions she's doing what she wants and has to do to achieve her goal that is my baby and i love her i will be accepting no constructive criticism thank you i mean yes my baby and i love her i think everyone is like whoa intense and like she's just such an incredible character and my partner stands her hard um you know in the scene lord boreal dying is just so sad to me that single tear he's like shit but turns out i didn't and i don't know again arian becare has done a miracle in regards to how i feel about lord boreal but coming back to what the scene is doing in this episode, again, we have a contrast with Will and Lyra's dynamic. But remember what we said about Fra Pavel getting cut off right before revealing Lyra's name?

Those of us who read the books know that Lyra's name, of course, is Eve, and that has to do with the prophecy. But the same thing right happens here as lord boreal dies right mrs coulter thinks that she knows everything that boreal can tell her and therefore he's no longer useful to her uh but she doesn't get one of the most important things out of boreal of what the knife's true capabilities are as she taunts him as he's dying that last thing that he doesn't get out right he's saying it cuts through everything like matter air and that last thing is going to be spirit because the knife's saying it cuts through everything like matter air and that last thing is going to be spirit because the knife's name right as we know from the cliff gas

that i imagine is gremlins is isahitra god killer and she just finishes her drink um and so that doesn't get revealed to her either but then as the scene ends she's just finishing her drink right with a dead body next to her which is really really ends she's just finishing her drink right with a dead body next to her which is really really something she's just like whatever done with that couldn't drink with this corpse yeah completely disconnected doesn't even care uh i don't know i just wouldn't want to drink with a corpse personally but that's the thing is disconnected she's yeah she doesn't feel it yeah specters attack the witch group just in time will is able to brandish his knife at them until they leave mrs coulter tells her demon that strength is salvation placing her hand over the flame of a candle yes of course this is a beautiful moment it reminds us of earlier in the series

with father mcphail or cardinal mcphail now i had to remember his name too many white men you're right i have not been saying his proper title cardinal mcphail yes heretic heretic get her off the podcast i'll just have candid 59 sorry no i'm just kidding uh but yes we get the hand in the flame totally a callback right to earlier in that series and the best part of this scene as i said earlier were the four wine bottles that she goes through in between the time that she has the two it becomes four and i also wonder interestingly enough if balthamos and will will come back through here in the next episode of episodes end because in the books we have the passage where they walk past boreal's

body in the canvas chair they see his body uh and he thinks sir charles had been smooth dishonest and powerful and now he was dead his face was distorted unpleasantly and Will didn't want to look at it, but a glance inside the tent showed that there were plenty of things to steal, so he stepped over the body to look more closely. Of course, Will in that turn becomes the magpie, finally. Ah, very, very great. Very interesting. I didn't think about that, but yes, I think he's gonna find that Sir Charles's face is gonna still be pretty smooth. I didn't think about that. But yes, I think he's going to find that Sir Charles' face is going to still be pretty smooth. It wasn't distorted unpleasantly. It was a very aesthetic death.

You know, people long for that. He deserved it. So, coming back to Mrs. Coulter, as many things in this series do, the title of this episode is, of course course a nod towards those who have probably read too much shit that philip pullman has said in some of the meta materials um in regards to how it centers mrs coulter and her power as the title of the episode is a name that philip pullman says the golden monkey would maybe be named if it had a name malice i like the idea of it not having a name though that's a personal preference like i think that the lack of name actually adds to its mystery and allure and power and i think

jack thorne right said that in the script he's only ever referred to it as the golden monkey it's only the golden monkey and to call it anything else felt wrong to him which i agree with that absolutely the scene is of course a visual reminder of the moment where father mcphail as you said was doing the same but i think there's a difference there right where mcphail when he's doing it with the candle his demon and he are aligned it's his demon who prompts him to punish himself by putting his hand over the flame and they see pain as sort of a necessary penance whereas mrs coulter sees it and is sealing herself to whip to not feel the pain right it's not punishment it's

weakness and her monkey looks on like what the fuck why are you doing this to us in its expression as opposed to uh the little lizard telling mcphail to do it and that line of strength of salvation when everything else right in this episode all of the scenes are actually arguing the opposite, as we see from Lyra's scenes and even Mary's. And the idea that it's actually this compassion that they have that saves us all, the vulnerability that Will and Lyra show one another, that saves each of us. and another that saves each of us yeah it seems that the negative capability and using it to be able to interpret matter in general is one skill but when you shut yourself off and maybe this is a vampire diaries thing because we're re-watching the vampire diaries but you can flip a switch within yourself where you disconnect yourself from all humanity and you start to lose yourself. And it makes things that would otherwise be heroic actions like trying to save your daughter from a bomb look pretty shitty when it turns out that you're drugging your daughter to save your daughter from a bomb.

Yeah. I mean, YOLO, but yeah. YOLO. But yeah, like it literally like it's interesting to think about that that vulnerability might, and the vulnerability of falling in love with someone and being your most authentic, true, and free self with them might be more powerful than negative capability to control a specter or negative capability to read things from an alethiometer that maybe your gut could have told you most of the time.

you read things from an alethiometer that maybe your gut could have told you most of the time uh like it's like maybe that's not all there is to life right is reading signs and interpreting them maybe sometimes life is more important to live and to be vulnerable yeah it's like that song by what was it ariana oroko or something there's got to be more to life than chasing down every temporary high to satisfy me cause then I'm chasing down every temporary high a storm is

brewing Joppery conjures it taking out an airship with combustion bullets whiz toward them and then Joppery summons a swarm of Avengers it, taking out an airship with combustion. Bullets whiz toward them, and then Jopper summons a swarm of ravens, which are Philip Pullman's favorite animals, by the way. His demon is a raven or a crow. But yes, a swarm of ravens come, take out another airship, but they're shot again, and their balloon spirals them into a crash landing which is the end of the episode i wonder if philip pullman's heard of this book called a feast for

crows um that man though who shoots at the balloon and hits the gas that man is an incredible shot i just want to say and we have i think that the scene of Jabri summoning the birds is meant to sort of mirror Mrs. Coulter controlling the specters oh yeah that's a great point I didn't even think about that them being parallels in the episode she's like a witch adjacent

witch adjacent wow we're adjacent to the finale yeah we are adjacent to the finale yeah we are adjacent to the finale oh my god so this is penultimate and then next week that's it we come back with the finale what are we gonna see

I know we're gonna see Alamo Gulch part 2 we're helping Lyra oh god I'm gonna scream I hate my life I'm not ready you're gonna cry so hard I don't think that's a very fair assessment next week what what i'm gonna have to piece her back together what are you gonna do when the witch fucking comes down and it's like sorry joppery you're dead i don't know negative capability

push down my humanity feel nothing strength of salvation I think we're gonna see angels in humanoid form. Yes. Yes. I do think that. Speaking of those angels in humanoid form, I'm hoping that, like, we see them, like, in terms of that scene with Ruta and the angels. And again, getting more depth on them.

I hope we see them also not in humanoid form. I think we're gonna see... I think we're gonna see more Ruta. I think we're going to see I think we're going to see more Ruta. I think that you're on to something with Ruta and I wonder if we're even going to see Asriel. I don't know. I just think you can't not have Asriel and they might not

have been able to film much of them but they did get some stuff and I just think we're going to see Ruta's journey to Asriel's kingdom. If we don't see Asriel, at least we're going to see the kingdom from the outside being built. That's what I'm wondering. Were they even able to film anything with James McAvoy? They filmed four hours before they were shut down.

They literally filmed four hours. Also, I mean, I think we might see some of it. I'm just saying that I think it might've been reworked. I think that they have surprises for us. That's the biggest thing like i i think they have so many surprises for us that we don't even know um i expect there's going to be a culture and witch showdown right while will is doing the whole dad thing and okay calling it now lyra kidnapped in the cave. We're going to end on Roger's voice going, Lyra and Lyra. Black screen going, Roger?

And that's it. That's got to be the end. I could see that. I could see that being the case, especially because they've been doing, again, a great job of threading Roger's death throughout this episode. Not episode, this season. Yeah. And all of the little, little like calls while people are asleep will his dad saying will while he's asleep lyra dreaming and hearing voices i don't know

i'm just saying along with that you know a little before that in terms of angels like i feel like so again I think that we're just going to see angels I think we might see Zephaniah finally in person but not person because we've been hearing Zephaniah's voice throughout but also before Baltimus and Baruch appear at the end right I think that they're gonna

appear because they've been cast and I'm just really excited for the moment that they show up and it's just like a go on do nothing moment and I'm just really excited for the moment that they show up and it's just like a go on do nothing moment and I love them for it right they're just like oh yeah well whatever they were there

and we did nothing to help them hello yeah because that's not what they do it wasn't in their interest like it's gonna be really interesting to see their morality which is kind of this weird even keel morality in the middle of the road where they're like oh that doesn't interest us we're not gonna do it are you saying baltamos and baruch start off as centrist i think they do i would say they are self-interested right like they are out here for a reason because they're

like well we were told we have to watch over this kid, but we want this thing to happen with the war. Like, they're not, they don't want exactly what's going on right now. They have their own thoughts, but they're just doing their job and they grow just like the Galavestians, right? Like, Baruch and Balthamos and the Galavestians, I mean mean they all grow to become in love with these children just like all of us are just like Lise Goresby was and just like Serafina is I mean they grow to really adore these children

and want to watch after them and I'm really excited to see that but I think they start off in my opinion with a lot of indifference that's true and also you forgot that Yorick also comes to love them. And if you didn't get Yorick this episode, I,

okay, I'm going to say it. I think we will get Yorick next one, Crossing Worlds, because he does, right? He has to find, he has to find Lee's body.

That's true. But we might also see that beginning of series three. Okay, but who's going to pay Yorick? What are we paying Joel? Everyone, please PayPal Joe Tannenberg. i'm really worried about that boy yeah what how are we gonna pay joe you know if we don't give him speaking roles speaking of joe maybe he could play a new character right like an invent a new voice like a like a mulefa or or like a heron from the moolafa world. I don't know. I'm just spitballing because what I really want to say is, are we going to get Moolafa?

Have they kept it under wraps? Have they just coyly kept it under wraps? Are we going to get Moolafa? What if we get a glimpse, even just a glimpse into the M world? Are we going to see it? I have been looking for so much like any hints for Moolafa this whole time. Every time in the intro no matter what every episode I stare at it

no matter what and it never changes I kind of wonder like I really want to see it I wouldn't be surprised if we didn't because like maybe in terms of production and how many ideas everyone has like obviously this whole season has been a lot of work and maybe they're

like we do not have it in us we are so tired right now we've done a lot this season and cannot like visualize what they think that the malefa should work like look like yet right that concept art or whatever so i wouldn't be surprised if we didn't yet yeah i'm 50 50 i'm not gonna place any money on it my money's gonna go on ruda and Asriel before it goes on Mulefa. But. I mean, I'm going to hope. I'm hoping with every hope inside my body. If we see Mulefa, even if we just see the beautiful world, I'll be contented.

Give me a seed pod. She has to step through the world. I mean, that's for certain. They could do it as a parallel to the end of last season in which she steps through the world and we don't see the other world right we get the same way that lyra was walking through the the i keep calling it the anomaly but lyra is walking through the tear uh and the way that will first step through uh that window and i think they could do that with mary maybe it would be Mary and Colter

instead. Maybe we'll see something in the intro this time around. If we see Mulefa in the intro, I scream. Well, it's not too far off. It's in a handful of days. I'm excited to see it.

I'm nervous. I'm excited. I'm sad because this is it until next year what the hell and we have a lot going on so we are not going to stop with His Dark Materials you're going to hear from us constantly we're going to make sure to keep putting out La Belle Sauvage Book of Dust episodes

and hopefully we'll have some news soon on where we'll be going after La Belle Sauvage yes indeed and have some news soon on where we'll be going after La Belle Sauvage. Yes, indeed. And yeah, I don't know. I'm sad that it's over. Like, this has been a tiring past few weeks, but also like

an incredibly exciting one. It's fun to have something to look forward to. Yeah, it's fun to have happiness. What's that? I've been very happy. It's been a really it's been an enjoyable tv experience a really good adaptation they're kicking ass so we love our his dark materials fam there keep it up out there at bad wolf studio indeed indeed and also i mean as you said the fans uh all the

sraphies are pretty good. Yeah, all the SRAFies. Yes, that is the term that they use at Twitagaze for fans of historic materials. And SRAFies are pretty pleased and it's pleasant. It's nice. Well, I'm excited to have a couple SRAFies on our show in the next few weeks. Gonna hang out with the Dusk Podcast and Candid59. Again, please check out the Dusk Podcast on a platform near you or Candid59 as well on Twitter or on Tumblr at Candid59.

And thank you so much for listening. We had a blast this week. We will be back with the finale with Candid59 and we can't wait to chat about Isahedra yes and I'm sure it's going to be a killer episode I was trying to play a god killer and then I realized actually that was way more morbid than I

meant and I'm going to keep it well you know what Elia a man gets lucky every once in a while and every once in a while he doesn't well thanks for listening make sure you check us out at our social media on twitter at girls gone canon or you can send us an email at girls gone canon at gmail.com that's c-a-n-o-n we would love to hear from you hear your thoughts on the episode hear what kind of food you've been making lately if you have a demon

do you have pets? we love pets feel free to send us your pets photos we love that too yeah people have been sending us their someone sent us an axolotl that was pretty cool amazing

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acast pandora amazon podcast you're gonna run out of them eventually Pandora. Amazon Podcast. You're gonna run out of them eventually. Yeah. Hey, later this month, we're doing an episode with the Dust Podcast about the music in and out of his dark materials from the show to fan made music to us thoughts music. So just come check it out. Patreon.com slash girls gone canon that will be up for

everyone in the stranger tier and above by the end of the year as always I have been one of your hosts Chloe and I have been another one of your hosts Eliana thanks and we'll talk to you soon

goodbye