reasons why the golden compass sucks
So I did this the other day on my phone when watching the Golden Compass. It isn’t an extensive list, just a few annoyed thoughts. It descended to rage, as it always does, the more of the film I watched.
Fra Pavel poisoning Lord Asriel instead of the Master is the most stupid thing ever. The Master knows that Asriel loves Tokay: for all Fra Pavel knows, he’s poisoning the entire staff of Jordan. It’s too expositional: Asriel was to be poisoned because the Master is trying to look after Lyra and IN A VERY DIFFICULT POSITION TRYING TO KEEP A BALANCE… not because Asriel is a heretic.
They never spell out why Lyra is left at Jordan – which is important; why would Asriel + Marisa lie to her? Because she was the product of an incredibly complex extra-marital affair between a politician’s wife and an philanthropic explorer and then once it became public the politician was killed, Marisa lost all interest and Asriel wouldn’t have Lyra grow up in a Priory hence left her with the scholars. But the film constantly underestimates its audience.
The meeting with Mrs Coulter is organized to discuss her future options – and if you remember it isn’t just Mrs C present but also the elderly scholars from St Sophia’s, who Lyra COMPARES and JUDGES to Mrs C, hence she jumps at the chance to learn from her – it means NOT GOING TO SCHOOL, she doesn’t go with mrs c because it means going north (though that is added incentive, just not the whole motivational force).
NO DISNEY VILLAIN MAGISTERIUM EXISTS IN THE BOOKS. All it is is a crazy-ass version of the church WHICH EXISTS IN OUR WORLD but is much more extreme + influential in parliamentary decisions. For example, the gyptians fear the revival of the Office of Inquisition! IMAGINE IF THAT WAS REAL. It’s not a disney villain with evil people plotting evil schemes, it’s an institution that is more like big brother…
The Master just needs to give her the alethiometer, he doesn’t need to be cryptic about it. In fact everything about that damned device pisses me off in this film.
The magisterial seat is not mentioned once in the books: why so much emphasis? Why such a huge scary building? Get away from these crazy American ideas and inject some ENGLISH HUMILITY into the story. They spent way too long on this + neglected other important things.
Similarly, Mrs C is nowhere near as decadent or rich as she is shown in the film – she just owns a 2 bedroom flat on the embankment [near Victoria from my estimations] not some great mansion. Yes, she has a commissionaire, as do many mansion blocks, but she doesn’t have her own set of servants [and she wouldn’t either – as it says in a lantern slide, she can never keep them anyway].
‘Official business’ I’ll literally kill whoever wrote the script.
Particle metaphysics what the fuck script writers do you even know what metaphysics is? She’d have said Atomcraft, if that was what Professor Docker did, rather than particle metaphysics: but they just use particle metaphysics to try and sound really academic and vague. As someone who has actually studied metaphysics, this is really annoying. Also if he WAS into particle metaphysics, wouldn’t Dust have come up at lunch with him??
The monkey attack would be more horrifying if it weren’t cued by the music and the two were doing what they were in the book – distractedly flower arranging.
THEY COULD HAVE MADE A POINT OF PAN BEING DRAGGED AWAY AS BEING PAINFUL BUT THEY DIDN’T.
AND SHE NEVER FUCKING KISSES HER RE-AFFIRMING THE POWER MRS C HAS OVER HER WHY DIDN’T THEY JUST SHOW IT
CLUMSY use of a ‘secret room’ what BOLLOCKS.
A simple ‘how?’ would have explained Lyra’s confusion as to where the Golden Monkey is, not Pan’s silly expositional [god there’s so much] ‘HER DÆMON WHERE’S HER DÆMON WHY ISN’T HE WITH HER IS HE IN OUR ROOM IS HE LOOKING AT THE ALETHIOMETER WE HAVE TO SAVE ROGER’
…
When Lyra runs away NO ONE IS EVEN SEARCHING FOR HER YET 4fs.
The gritty nature of the Fens – which any Englishman who grew up in the fens lovingly appreciates – was totally missed, and I hate them for that.
Also the gyptians are either a) traditional Roma gipsies [as per Heathcliff in Emily Bronte’s Wuthering Heights] or b) Irish travellers [such as My Big Fat Gypsy Wedding], or indeed an amalgamation of different nationalities: there are Irish, Italian AND Dutch names in the gyptians from the books. They are NOT pirates though.
Alethiometer is just too magical and I want to kill everyone ever.
THE ONLY GOOD PART is the letters scene ‘don’t they teach gyptian children to write?’ YES. KEEP THAT THAT’S GOOD.
Do the filmmakers know where Svalbard is? They know it’s as far from Norway as England is from Italy, right? Oh no maybe they don’t. They know Asriel can’t just walk there, right? THERE IS SEA BETWEE- Oh no maybe not.
When the man Asriel fights on Svalbard falls down the ravine, I always imagine his dæmon tearing away from him [as per book canon] BUT THEY DIDN’T MAKE USE OF IT.
I miss the Able Seaman and Belisaria, his seagull dæmon <3
SPY FLIES TOO MAGIC AND EVIL. They should be small and unassuming + less weird noises coming from them.
Yes Lyra, it’s all bigger and scarier than you ever thought and yet a tiny witch is able to find your tiny ship in the gigantic northern ocean like what the fuck. At least in the book Kaisa came when they were DOCKED at TROLLESUND. And it’s so clear the team thought ‘let’s just save on the special effects and have Serafina do this bit’
Hester is an arctic hare, not a fucking giant fuckoff ear easter bunny
Lee is another thing they got kind of right. Well done. Cept hester. Pricks.
Why isn’t Lyra more scared of Iorek? Anyone who’s ever seen an animal that’s just TOO BIG knows that feeling of like what the fuck – like when you jump too high on a trampoline. It’s a specific kind of fear.
Iorek isn’t as savage as he should be, he’s almost .. too… human…
WHY ARE THE MEN AT TROLLESUND RUSSIAN?? [Can someone tell me what language they’re speaking? It sounds Russian.][They should be speaking Norwegian or Sapmi]
They go on at the Magisterium about how important intercision is and how Mrs Coulter let Lyra escape and yet then she’s expected to show the improvements of the process on Lyra? They JUST explained they don’t trust her anymore. Wtf.
The slapping the monkey scene – another of the few good bits.
Need more northern forests, more of the northern horrors, more witch culture. There was a lot to work with they didn’t use ANY OF IT I COULD SLAP CHRIS WEITZ.
Lol often it looks like a video game eg the gyptian camp, when Lyra’s on Iorek’s back…
It should be symbolism, not demonstration, re: the alethiometer.
The human-dæmon bond should have simply been demonstrated visually. That’s the only way a film can deal with it. This would lead to a more tasteful [or indeed distasteful] appetite/ appreciation for what happens to the dæmons, eg tony makarios’s fate, lyra’s experience with the guillotine.
Tony needed a much more dignified death.
Dæmon deaths don’t even get me started. Yeah they look pretty but they’re a pile of wank.
FUCKING ICE BEARS IT ALL GOES TITS UP FROM HERE
Nothing is dirty or bloody everything is clean and happy and family-friendly and MAKES ME WANT TO THROW UP
DÆMON MIRROR I AM DONE
lastly, it pisses me off that the books is about disoberying authority, and here the filmmakers are trying to appease the religious nuts who were trying to boycott it. seriously, fuck the lot of them. i’ll do these stories justice. x
Hang in there mate, BBC will do us proud
It is with a heavy heart that I must retract my childish hopes. BBC did not do us proud, mate
