In the previous episode of HBO’s His Dark Materials, Lyra agreed to live with Mrs. Coulter as her assistant, and Gobblers had taken Roger and Billy. In His Dark Materials Season 1 Episode 2, life with Mrs. Coulter became troubling, and the Gyptians searched for Billy in London.
Mrs. Coulter’s Assistant
Mrs. Coulter led a glamorous life, and her home was a whole floor of a fancy building. She’d prepared a room for Lyra and declared her study off limits. Mrs. Coulter insisted on dressing Lyra in beautiful but restrictive dresses and ignored Lyra’s protests for more comfortably clothing. While studying with Mrs. Coulter, Lyra explained that she knew what Dust was and that it avoided children. When asked where she learned it, Lyra lied.
Members of the Magisterium visited Mrs. Coulter. Lyra eavesdropped and got caught. Mrs. Coulter’s daemon attacked Pan, which hurt Lyra. As Mrs. Coulter yelled at her, she let slip that Lord Asriel was her father, not her uncle.
Another World
Boreal arrived at Jordan College to see the head that Asriel brought back. The Master asserted scholastic sanctuary and refused to let him see the treated skull. Boreal snuck in and found it anyway. He determined that it wasn’t Grumman.
Boreal crossed over into a modern reality where humans didn’t have daemons. He went through what appeared to be a tear in the world. He met with Thomas, who knew about Boreal’s daemon but wasn’t too familiar with them. Boreal wanted Thomas to find a man, whose daemon was an osprey. He believed that he had crossed over into the modern world.
General Oblation Board
Now suspicious of Mrs. Coulter, Lyra decided to sneak into the study while she was out. She and Pan used a small passageway in the vents. They had heard movement in the vents and realized it had been Mrs. Coulter’s daemon. Somehow, the golden monkey was able to move unnaturally far from her. On the desk, Lyra found papers referencing the General Oblation Board. Hidden in the back of a drawer were blueprints. They appeared to show a human and a daemon in separating boxes with a blade.
Mrs. Coulter hosted a party where Lyra served. Adele Starminster, a journalist, spoke to Lyra and asked for papers from Mrs. Coulter’s study. She revealed that the Gobblers were the General Oblation Board, and Mrs. Coulter was the leader. Boreal saw Adele out and killed her in the car by crushing her butterfly daemon. Lyra saw her chance to escape. She took the alethiometer with her and climbed out of the window with Pan. She wanted to find Roger. Mrs. Coulter had promised to look for him but hadn’t. Instead, the gobbler with the sinister daemon grabbed Lyra.
The Station
Roger and Billy reunited in London where he and many other children were being kept. The Gyptians had tracked them, but the Gobblers knew they were coming. Fortunately, the Gyptians found Billy’s sweater vest, which confirmed for them and Ma Costa that he’d been there.
Mrs. Coulter arrived at the warehouse with the children. She told them they were going on a trip to the Station. She had them write letters to their loved ones and burned them in the furnace on her way out.
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