Feeling a little chaotic today, so I’m going to break all the rules I created for Thirst Trap last week (i.e., every adult with a speaking role) and do a new less-thirst, more-BDE-based rubric based on the dynamics specific to this episode, “The Spies”:
Mrs. Coulter: Whatever is going on with Bad Mommy this week—the spy-flies, the bedding, the tightrope walk of death, the attempted murder—it ain’t cute!
The Master: My dude. I understand that Mrs. Coulter brought the Gestapo with her to tear his college apart, but even Ma Costa was able to successfully keep Lyra from discovery, and she’s on a boat. Could he not have put that alethiometry book somewhere a bit safer? Also could he not have at least acknowledged how ironic it was for Coulter to talk about bloated privilege and “tired, old men” in academia, given one of her own bosses literally hunches over like he can’t decide whether to invite children into his gingerbread house in the woods or to lie down and take a nap? Anyway, he rates a bit higher because his resignation over Coulter’s anti-intellectualism—in this economy!—is a big mood.
Thomas: When he’s not violating civil liberties and putting the lives of innocent children at risk at the behest of an extra-dimensional fascist, he’s probably an alt-right 8chan troll to boot, but he did get up a little courage to confront said fascist about the fact that he’s probably using this information not for a righteous cause but for personal gain, pure and simple, and he admitted that he’s too afraid to cross into Boreal’s universe, despite multiple opportunities to do so. Points for…I don’t know, resisting toxic masculinity?
Whoever Booted Boreal’s Tesla: I’m sorry your work was so understated and we didn’t actually get to see Mr. Cool struggling through the process of figuring out what you have to do to un-boot a car. You deserved better.
Sophonax: The preeeettiest caaaaat (dæmon) in the wooooorld.
Benjamin: Red: the blood of angry men! Black: the dark of Coulters past! +10,000 for the dramatic one-man trust fall to your death rather than reveal precious intel, the way Coulter’s faceless Gobbler so easily gave it up when the Gyptians caught (and tortured? unclear) him. I guess that’s the difference between the two sides, though, huh? Rule No. 1 when you’re pursuing nefarious ends: die-hards only—no mercenaries.
I’ll leave you with a couple final points, all of which came up over brunch with my freshman college roommate (!) this weekend. I pointedly avoid forums and subreddits while shows I’m covering are in progress (the one exception was maybe Westworld), but these things she mentioned are worth considering:
The journalist’s butterfly dæmon didn’t disappear when Boreal crushed it. (Both she and her dæmon were twitching in the final shot.) Hilary posited that it’s because she’s not actually dead and will inevitably be used further by the Church. I shudder to think how, considering what horrifying state a human must be in if their dæmon is gravely incapacitated but not dead, but if the usual rule is “you’re not dead until we see a body,” maybe that translates in this universe as “you’re not dead until we see your dæmon disappear in a puff of Dust”?
An (white) actress named Cath Whitefield has allegedly been cast in an “unspecified role” on the show. MARY MALONE, IS THAT YOU?
Finally: I might have to just stop writing recaps altogether because this woman named Chrys K is doing these Tumblresque screenshot recaps on her blog and they’re better than anything I’m doing with 10 times the word count. I mean, look: