Comic-Con Reveals 'His Dark Materials' Season Two Details

Comic-Con reveals that the second season of Jack Thorne and Phillip Pullman's fantasy epic has been (largely) unaffected by COVID and will be back all guns blazing this fall

'His Dark Materials' Season Two (CREDIT: BBC/HBO)

by Jack Linsdell

In a quick update post, due to the Coronavirus pandemic, this year's Comic-Con has moved online. Today, the cast of BBC and HBO's fantasy series His Dark Materials made a special appearance via zoom to reveal key details about the much anticipated second season. Amongst them, we were treated to several "first look" photos, key new cast reveals and a trailer that revealed a fall release date (although a specific day and date is yet to be determined). 

The killer and highly-engaging first season adapted the first book (The Golden Compass) of Phillip Pullman's much loved and controversial trilogy, that just recently celebrated it's 25th anniversary. Season two will adapt the second novel The Subtle Knife and if I'm correct, will be the "first" big or small screen adaption of it too. Anyway, joining the regular cast of (amongst others) Dafne Keen, Ruth Wilson and Lin-Manuel Miranda, will be Andrew Scott (we only saw him in photos during the first season), Terence Stamp, Simone Kirby and Jade Anouka. Stamps' involvement is particularly exciting and he's proven himself to be a valuable part of recent top-quality, fantasy-based flicks like The Adjustment Bureau and Miss Peregrine's Home For Peculiar Children. The first season was very good (read my review here) and ended on a gorgeous cliffhanger for those (me) that have never read Pullman's books. 

The trailer itself, gave nothing plot-wise away, but offered notable looks at all the significant characters like Miranda's Lee Scorsby who looks a little worse for wears since we last saw him. Anyway, the trailer beautifully incorporates Lorne Balfe's dramatic and very catchy theme which links in to his comments about trying to get more of the score into the marketing to further excite audiences. Balfe's score for season one was one of it's particular highlights, and I'm thrilled he's back for the series two. 

We also learned that due to Coronavirus-related disruptions, we are getting "only" seven episodes rather than the eight that were originally planned. Although the series finished filming in December 2019, the extensive editing, post-production and VFX work that goes into each hour-long episode, and the disruptions to artists and editors with social distancing measures and the like, have probably caused one episode to not be finished in time. How this effects the overarching story and the series' quality is yet to be seen. But, the first series was so good that I'm not worried. 

Anyway, I can't wait for season two which will come to a small screen near you on HBO (for you Americans) and weekly on the BBC (for those fellow Brits) sometime this autumn.