The third episode of His Dark Materials expands upon the source material with Mrs. Coulter and the Magisterium desperate to find Lyra.
At the end of “The Idea of North” Lyra (Dafne Keen) has been taken hostage by The Gobblers. Fortunately, she’s rescued immediately by the Gyptians and they take her with them to their meeting at The Fens. Mrs. Coulter (Ruth Wilson) leads the search to find Lyra and she uses everything in her arsenal: from police raids to dark magical items. In our world Lord Boreal (Ariyon Bakare) and Thomas (Robert Emms) make a huge discovery about Stanislaus Grumman.
Following the previous episode which made some big divisions from the source material, “The Spies” was more faithful to events of the novel. The main focus of the episode was Lyra’s time with the Gyptians and getting to know Farder Coram (James Cosmo) and Ma Costa (Anne-Marie Duff). They act as surrogate parents to Lyra because they are kind and caring and act as teachers.
Farder Coram is the wise old man that gives Lyra some sage old advice. He takes the role of Jerry who tells Lyra why it’s important for a dæmon to settle and states they reveal a person’s true personality. He even has the dialogue from the book stating that people want a lion for a dæmon and end up with a poodle. Farder Coram’s most important role was to teach Lyra how to use the Alethiometer and it was a moment of horror when Lyra made her first reading. Ma Costa becomes the first positive female influence in her life and allows Lyra to acts freer than she did with Mrs. Coulter or at Jordan College. Plus Ma Costa reveals more information about Lyra’s past. Although Lyra ends up dressing like a mini version of Ma Costa by wearing her clothes.
The opening of the episode does contradict some information from the opening episode. In “Lyra’s Jordan” Lyra reveals Roger is her only friend. In the pre-title sequence of “The Spies” Lyra acts like she knows her saviour Tony Costa (Daniel Frogson). The 2007 film adaptation had a lot of issues but it did establish that Lyra had a friendship with the Gyptian children and played with them.
Like the previous episodes there were expansions and alterations from the novels. A scene added to the Lyra’s time with the Gyptians was a police raid. This was a way for the showrunners to extend the episode’s runtime, add more tensions, and be a cheaper alternative to what happened in the books where there were police raids across England. The raid itself was like the Gestapo searching for ‘undesirables’ with Lyra hiding in the walls.
Another addition was when Tony Costa and Benjamin (Simon Manyonda) break into Mrs. Coulter’s apartment in an attempt to find clues. This scene gave Tony Costa more to do and show he wants to do everything he can to find his brother. Within this sequence was the show’s first on-screen death and we get to see what happens to a dæmon when someone dies. The dæmon turns to dust which floats in the air. It was exactly how I pictured a dæmon would disappear when I read the novels and better than the film version where dæmons burst into flames.
Mrs. Coulter also has an expanded role in this part of the story because in the novel the reader only sees the events through Lyra’s eyes. In this episode Mrs. Coulter falls into a deep depression where she drinks, acts like Lyra and becomes a woman of pure rage. She literally acts like a wild animal.
The final expansion involved Lord Boreal’s travels into our world. These scenes were a double edge sword. These scenes have blown one of the big twists in the novels because it reveals Stanislaus Grumman’s true identity, but Lord Boreal’s actions will tie into the opening of Season Two. Lord Boreal went to Thomas to do his research and Thomas states that the government did a secret expedition to the Arctic. However, in the novels Lord Boreal had been travelling between worlds for years, had a fake identity in our world and a retired government official who spied on the Russians: surely he could have used his connects to do his research.
Lord Boreal and Thomas also get philosophical with each other. Lord Boreal questions Thomas has never attempted to cross worlds despite knowing where the portal is and Thomas comes up with a theory about dæmons existing beyond Lord Boreal’s world.
The aim of “The Spies” was to be a character-driven episode and to expand on the source material. But the show has been treading water because it is having to extend scenes to make them fit an eight-episode series. Hopefully the series can pick up now that Lyra and the Gyptian are going North.
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