His Dark Materials "The Clouded Mountain" and "The Botanic Garden" Series Finale Reviews (Spoilers)

[matt_zimmer]

His Dark Materials "The Clouded Mountain"

They were able to do a hell of a lot of good on a TV budget. They pulled a similar trick George Lucas used in the original Star Wars. Make a lot of the battles seem a bit visually ill-defined and allowing the action and motion to carry the audience the rest of the way. And even in HD that's just fine.

I feel like as I love the show and this is the penultimate episode, and two major characters died, I owe it to the show to do a longer review. And yet I can't really think of anything I could add to that. I felt satisfied and thought it was good. Hopefully I'll have more to say about the series finale, but really that sort of spoke for itself. ****1/2.

His Dark Materials "The Botanic Garden"

Beautiful. A perfect rare example of the fabled Good Hurt I am always chasing in fiction, but seldom finding. I actually cried. Those tears were wonderful. I thank the show for them. I feel again.

I love that Mary was allowed to see her daemon at the end. I don't think that was in the book, but I don't remember for sure.

The written tag teases The Book Of Dust, but I don't want to get ahead of ourselves. I just want Philip Pullman to finish the third damn book before I think about any sort of adaptation.

I absolutely loved it. TV has gotten so cold as an experience to me. To make me feel is a rare joy I cherish. Magnificent finale of a phenomenal series. *****.