Inspired by the trilogy of books of the same name, His Dark Materials takes the audience into a fantasy world populated by humans with companion daemons, the elusive Dust, and the idea of travel between parallel worlds. The concepts introduced in the first season, inspired by The Golden Compass, only build in the second season, which bases its story on the novel The Subtle Knife.
Though the second season comes in at only seven episodes, the ratings, according to Internet Movie Database users, are fairly consistent. The episodes range from 8.1 to 8.7 out of 10 stars, a respectable range for a show that will see its third and final season debut sometime in 2021. Which episode comes out on top?
7 Episode 3: Theft (8.1)
There’s a lot going on in this episode, and splitting the hour amongst so many different storylines makes it feel like the season is being pulled in a lot of different directions. It’s not surprising that “Theft” ranks lower than its season two counterparts as a result.
The hour sees Lee Scoresby arrested after he kills a member of the Magisterium in self-defense, but he gets a surprising helping hand from Mrs. Coulter. She allows him to escape, despite not getting information from him, because she trusts that he’ll do everything he can to protect Lyra. Lyra, meanwhile, is in danger in another world, where she and Will make a deal to steal a knife in order to get back her own stolen alethiometer. Mary also demonstrates her exceptional intelligence in that other world as she begins to find a way to communicate with Dust itself.
6 Episode 1: The City Of Magpies (8.1)
The season two premiere not only has to serve as a reminder of the events of the previous season, including that heartbreaking ending but set in motion the story events to come. It does that by splitting its focus on Lyra in a new world and Mrs. Coulter dealing with a witch.
The witches become invaluable allies to Lyra as the season progresses, so seeing just how they operate is an important story point in the episode. It’s also vital that Lyra and Will finally cross paths after their stories taking place on separate worlds in the first season. Will comes from a world without daemons, leading Lyra not to entirely trust him at first, but they form a tentative friendship that the season explores.
5 Episode 7: Æsahættr (8.2)
Just slipping past the first episode of the season in ratings is the season finale. The season ends on a pretty big cliffhanger and events look dire. While cliffhangers aren’t uncommon in finales, it might be all the darkness that leaves fans rating this one a little lower.
For starters, Lee Scoresby ends up sacrificing himself while trying to help Lyra. Likewise, Will’s father, who he only just reunited with, ends up dead right in front of Will’s eyes. Following all of the chaos and conflict, Lyra and Will are separated as Mrs. Coulter has managed to kidnap her own daughter.
4 Episode 2: The Cave (8.3)
Lyra is a fish out of water in this hour. With Will, she travels through the gateway to his world, which she finds much different than her own. While he checks in on his mother, she pursues a scholar who can help her in her pursuit of learning more about the mysterious Dust.
What Lyra finds is someone who studies physics, Mary Malone. She is straightforward with the scientist and the two delve into discussions of Dust, or Dark Matter in Mary’s world. While Lyra finds herself with only more questions about Dust, Will nearly finds himself in serious trouble as he tries to get the money left to his family by his father, but his paternal grandparents try to turn him over to the authorities.
3 Episode 6: Malice (8.5)
It’s in “Malice” that all of the different threads of the season truly start to weave together. Everyone converges on the mysterious world between Lyra’s and Will’s on the search for the two of them or the subtle knife.
A handful of witches arrive to aid Will and Lyra just in time as the other children in the city attack them. As they begin their journey, Mary begins one of her own, crossing over into this new world at the urging of Dust itself and protected by angels against the specters that otherwise harm adults. Likewise, Mrs. Coulter and Boreal enter the city, though she quickly figures out how to control the specters, making sure she’s in no danger and rids herself of Boreal. Even Lee and Parry head for the city, though they meet an obstacle in Magisterium ships. The many storylines almost intersecting, but not quite, makes for an incredibly tense hour.
2 Episode 5: The Scholar (8.6)
Much of the action in this particular episode occurs in Will’s Oxford instead of Lyra’s. Mary begins to explore Dust without Lyra, trying to find a way to communicate that offers her the same clarity that Lyra has. When she does, the Dust tells her she has to protect Lyra and Will, leading to her journey in the sixth episode.
Of course, she’s not the only one in Oxford. Lyra and Will hatch a plan to steal her alethiometer back from Boreal instead of trading him the knife that he wants. What they don’t know is that he’s brought Mrs. Coulter back to his home with him. When Lyra works to distract Boreal while Will steals the knife, Mrs. Coulter and her daemon complicate matters, leading to a vicious fight between Lyra, her mother, and their daemons that she and Will narrowly escape.
1 Episode 4: Tower Of The Angels (8.7)
At the half-way point in the season, questions are starting to get more concrete answers, which might be part of the reason for this higher rating. Another reason might be the fact that the McGuffin of the second novel, which inspires the season, The Subtle Knife, finally comes into play.
Lyra and Will work out a way to get into the tower at the center of the city where they’ve been staying, only to find that a teenage boy has stolen the knife from the current knife bearer and is using it to keep the specters away from himself. After a struggle that leaves him with some severed fingers, Will gets the knife back and is proclaimed the new knife bearer. The knife is an object that can cut windows between worlds, which means Lyra and Will need it as much as pretty much everyone else they’re on the run from. The knife entering the story is part of what ushers in the rest of the season’s action.
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