Iorek Byrnison everyone! I’ve been looking forward to this!
Sorry, just a bit of fangirling, anyway, welcome to another review of a new episode of His Dark Materials.
We are introduced to Lee Scoresby and his daemon Hester in this episode. He’s an aeronaut and it doesn’t take long for one to realize that he’s Texan. At first, I wasn’t used to the way he looked because in the movie version that I’ve seen, he’s played by Sam Elliott instead. But anyway, I thought it was kind of funny how he descends on Trollesund hoping to find information about where Iorek Byrnison is. The locals don’t seem to take a liking to him. I guess that’s just what happens when you spend too much time up in the sky with only your daemon for company.
When Lyra and company arrive in the village, they are told by a messenger of the witches that Iorek would make a useful asset to their mission. Upon meeting Iorek himself, I noticed right away that he is much larger than I’ve seen him before and his eyes appear to look a lot more menacing. I remember in the movie version, he was voiced by the legendary Ian McKellen, so it took at least one more episode for his new voice to warm up to me. He’s definitely a lot more vicious looking in this series!
Lyra had to get very persuasive to get Lee to team up with her to help Iorek towards the end, who of course, refuses to come along until he reclaims his armour which he was tricked out of by the Magesterium after being exiled. When Lyra finds out where the armour is hidden, Iorek doesn’t appear to be as grateful about it yet, but he goes to get it anyway, and I must admit I like the way his armour looks in this series, a lot more badass and shapely if those are the right words to use. I was actually hoping he would kill that one jerky cop but no.
Mrs. Coulter on the other hand shows how manipulative is when she blackmails the Magisterium to retain her title as head of G.O.B and its experiments. We also learn that a priest is in possession of his own alethiometer.
Lyra and Iorek aren’t friends yet, but I did see something start to develop by the next episode. There is nothing revealed how Asriel became a prisoner to Iofur Rakinson but Mrs. Coulter sure does know how to negotiate an agreement with the bear king.
Now that was a great episode with bears and blackmailing: A+.
See you next week.
👽Emily
Monsterlady's Diary 