HBO debuted a new trailer for His Dark Materials during the show`s Hall H panel at San Diego Comic-Con 2019--a panel that included executive producer Jane Tranter, writer Jack Thorne, Dafne Keen (Lyra Belacqua), Ruth Wilson (Marisa Coulter), Lin-Manuel Miranda (Lee Scoresby), and James McAvoy (Lord Asriel).The His Dark Materials books, beginning with The Golden Compass (Northern Lights outside of North America) in 1995 and concluding with book 3, 2000`s The Amber Spyglass, are a fantasy series set in a world in which humans` souls are embodied in companion animals that live outside their bodies. The series follows Lyra Belacqua, a young girl whose journey goes to some very surprising places by the end.Tranter discussed why she chose to tackle this adaptation--one that`s been attempted more than once in the past. `I thought it was time for the books to be liberated in a space which could do them justice,` she said. `I think that all of those different adaptations have all been brilliant in their own ways, but the real estate of contemporary television--being able to stretch those books out and sound every note that Philip Pullman sounded in the novels--I just thought it was time.`She said the show starts the same way as the Philip Pullman books on which they`re based--with the attempted murder of Lord Asriel, which Lyra thwarts.Thorne, who handled writing the adaptation itself, said when he starts an adaptation (he wrote the stage play for Harry Potter and the Cursed Child previously), he learns as much as possible about the original work`s author first. `I think that`s what we`ve tried to do, is just try and capture the important notes, and tell them to the best of our ability,` the writer said.Thorne revealed that he and Tranter worked on 46 drafts of the first episode. Getting the daemons--an integral part of the series` lore--right was particularly important. `You do sometimes get lost in other stuff, but the thing about the daemons is that they are character ...
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