Golden Compass Spoiled (in more ways than one)

Dear New Line,

You have broken my heart. I'm not trying to be dramatic, I'm just trying to best summarize my body's physical, my mind's chemical, reaction to the movie you have just served me. I loved this book for nearly ten years, and I will go on to love it for many more. You took this beloved, genius book and you turned it into slop. Here's how ('why' is for you to answer, not me).

Let me start by reminding you that I am not dumb. Nor am I stupid, slow on the uptake, or in need of painful exposition to make me understand a world where people's souls manifest themselves as the creatures they best represent. There is no person in the world who has not asked herself or himself, "If I were an animal, what would I be?" Such is the genius of Phillip Pullman that he brings a simple aspect of our imagination to life. A recurring question I have for you is, why mess with genius?

Secondly, you have a fantastic main character, Lyra. I will give you credit where credit is due- you cast this role superbly, as you did with most of the others. Dakota Blue Richards is Lyra, feral and clever and selfish and sparkling. Why did you feel the need to dumb her down? When, in movie-goer history, have we balked at a child showing her smarts as well as her dimples? Mrs. Coulter (portrayed seriously and admirably by Nicole Kidman) spells out how Lyra can defeat Iofur, excuse me, Ragnur- king of the ice bears- when in the book, Lyra pieces together what she knows and comes up with a dazzlingly Occam's Razor of a plan.

Speaking of the ice bears, they were visually stunning. They roared and we shook with fear and admiration (the first six or seven times. After that, not so much, thanks). However! Pullman didn't just invent the concept of talking bears who live to war and leave it there, the way you did. No, he created a complex society of sentient animals who are, in fact, animals. And he invented Iorek Byrnison; gritty, flawed, gruff, loyal, with a killer's past and a strange group of friends. To humanize Iorek, you removed his controversial history (he lost his temper and KILLED a fellow bear, and this is part of who he is- unforgiven), gave him Ian McKellan's Shakespearean tones, and over-ripened his relationship to Lyra with unnecessary expressions of devotion till it stank. Iorek is not human, and does not strive to be. This is how he defeats his enemy- by being true to himself. Also, if Iorek lost in a fair fight, why should we root against Ragnur? Why should Iorek get a second chance? He may not deserve one, and we don't really undersand why Ragnur doesn't deserve a Daemon, even one as cute and helpful as Lyra .

Which brings us back to Daemons.. Or rather, the lack thereof. Nothing is so disgusting, so disturbing and awful as to be without a Daemon. It can't even be taboo, because it is a horror to great to even mention in their world. So please, feel free to replace Tony Markarios with Billy Costa, to make us care more. I have no beef with you there. You had the power, however, to show us just how wrong it was, what the Magisterium was doing. There should have been nothing so terrifying as a boy without his soul. Yet you blew it, watched it sail by. It would have been so easy- his mother should have been afraid to touch him. Lyra should have had to force herself to save him.

Where was the outrage, the fear and revulsion that you could have engendered in us? To answer poetically; lost in the howling Arctic winds of bad screenwriting, right along with all the scenes that contained action instead of exposition. With a curious, resourceful protagonist, these could have been in abundance. Instead, we watched the answers march up to Lyra and recite their lines.

Now we come to the subject I've avoided. All of these discrepancies and annoyances, I could have tolerated. I would've walked out of the theater and said, "Hmmm, yes, I suppose they did remove the soul of this movie, and I suppose creative aspects could have been better, but I still found a level of enjoyment in its base entertainment value and wondrous visuals." Except of course, for the end. Or, I repeat, the lack thereof.

In all the stories that I've been told, on the page or on the screen, few are as well-done as finale of The Golden Compass. The end is devastating, inevitable, tragic, sexy, and hopeful. It's as powerful an ending as any movie could dream of, especially a film designed to pack theaters for two more installments. In her passion and resolve, Lyra makes a mistake huger than the reckoning of her imagination. The man she believed in, that she forced we readers to believe in despite all evidence to the contrary, puts Mrs. Coulter and the Magisterium to shame with his wrongdoing. And it is, on a very real level, Lyra's fault. As she stands there weeping over her best friend's body, sacrificed in Asriel's quest through the looking glass, we see at last where she began- between the greatest powers she knows- her father Asriel and her mother Mrs. Coulter. Then Lyra takes the biggest step ever taken- into a new world and beyond.

What an ending!! Too bad it was cut for... time? No, I don't think so, the movie clocked in at under two hours. This is the studio that produced Lord of the Rings, for heaven's sake. For ratings then, perhaps? No, wait, this already carried a PG-13 rating (for no other reason that I could spot other than some vaguely gory bear-on-bear violence). That can't be it. To make us see the sequel? Ha! There's no way the original ending wouldn't have brought us back. Betrayal! The beginning of a new journey! Lyra's epiphany about Dust- could it be good? What if it's good!?

No, New Line, I must close with the most accurate description I have of what you have done. You have shot yourselves in the foot. My heart was just in the way.