Aeterna Dicta Anti-Pullman (habeus spoilerum)

First things first. I am not now, nor have I ever been (apart from a few weeks when I was eight and was convinced that there was someone watching me at night (in a benign way, you sicko) and assumed it was this God guy people were so big on) a Christian. Nor am I a wishy-washy 'maybe there is maybe there isn't I'm afraid to admit I'm an athiest' type agnostic. Based on my assessment of the implications of an omnipotent, omniscient, omnibenevolent God and my observations of the world around me, I've come to the conclusion that unless some really, really, really convincing evidence comes my way, the omni-everything God hypothesis just doesn't stack up (it also isn't falsifiable and hence unproveable. Props to ma nizzle hip-Popper, K to the A-R-L, peace be the journey).

I don't think Pullman sucks because the Ultimate Bad Guy in the Dark Materials trilogy goes by the name of Metatron, Regent of YHWH, nor because he recently trashed the Narnia books as being bigoted, anti-eggplant chauvanism or whatever. No, dear reader, Pullman sucks because he's an overrated hack who can't write for shit.

It puzzles the hell out of me that he's gotten so popular (though I didn't think Harry Potter was all that greater either. Shows what I know), and so universally admired. I'm amazed that even earnestly critical reviews in the New York Review of Books gush about his brilliant world creation and amazing ideas and fast-paced, gripping plot and touching characters. Are you all crazy? Are we reading the same book!?

First serious critique: Pullman's books are a colossal disappointment and a graveyard of missed opportunities.

Think about the ideas he brings up: dimensional travel, spirits, Dust (anyone? No? Dust. Anyone? No? Dust. Anyone...), innocence and experience, a device that always tells the truth. All great elements, all get really dull and unimaginative treatment.

Case in point: the alethiometer. A device that always tells the truth is a fantastic vehicle, with great implications. With it, an author can explore all kinds of ideas; what truth is, wether its absolute or relative, does it depend on how questions are asked, how do people deal with it when it's unpalatable, whether some questions are better left unasked, how even a true statement can be misinterpreted or misrepresented - all meaty, challenging ideas, just asking, begging, for the rollicking Speculative Fiction Romp treatment. Is Pullman having any of it? I wish.

Instead, the alethiometer (which Lyra can conveniently use with speed while the Dastardly Baddies have to wait ages to get a reading) is used as a Magic Plot Acceleration Device, a classic deus ex machina to help the author out whenever he's dumped his characters in an untenable situation with no chance of escape. Stranded you characters in this bizarre world in another dimension with no clue where they are or where to go? No problemo! With the Alethiometer MPAD your characters are seconds away from otherwise completely inaccessible information that'll solve your crappy plotting mistakes!

Now, if the alethiometer was only used like this a few times, the books wouldn't be so bad. But instead, this happens all the goddamn time, and throughout all three books it appears to be the alethiometer's sole purpose. Only once does Lyra misread it, and its a relatively minor event in the first book. The issues and implications of such a wonderful device never again rear their heads.

Similarly, with the exception of the daemons, the rest of Pullman's ideas get pretty dull treatment. We have a multiverse, with an infinitude of worlds, with a myriad of unique supernatural phenomena, interlinked and collapsing in on each other. The possibilities are endless, the implications wonderful. What happens in the final book? A big dumb battle between Good and Evil, climaxing in a war to end all wars. Great. Never read anything like that before. Where'd you think he got that idea from? The man's imagination is boundless!

Did I mention the crappy plot?

It's pretty clumsy. Witches, Armoured Bears and Texans magically turn up to help the heroes without any real explanation of why they're risking their necks by going against the combined might of the Authority all for two little tykes and then fade right out the story until they're needed again. The bad guys are ridiculously dense and do stupid things over and over again. The supposedly cunning Mrs Coulter takes Lyra under her wing and somehow never searches her room or close possessions ever, despite plenty of opportunities. The Gyptians somehow get a seaworthy boat from somewhere and somehow furnish it with provisions for a hundred men and sail to Finland and land at Helsinki all without attracting the attention of the Magisterium and its many soldiers, officials and spies. Somehow.

Mere details don't interest Pullman, even those he spends pages and pages building up. Consider the children's escape from Bolvangar in Book One. Lyra's managed to free all the still-ensouled children, and is leading them across an open icefield to freedom, while a battle rages behind them. All of a sudden, they're confronted by the compound's elite Tartar guardsmen, with rifles, facemasks and snarling wolf-daemons. Crap. These guys are nasty. Pullman's been telling us for the last chapter or so how tough, fearless and accomplished they are as elite soldiers. But they are beaten, because Lyra picks up a handful of snow and throws it in one of their faces, then all the kiddies join in and escape while the Tartars fumble, blinded.

Give me a break. The author has established these guys are hardened badarses. Yet they fall victim in seconds to a barrage of snowballs from shitscared freezing kids? All of them? Without firing a shot? Without their unblinded wolf-daemons jumping the kids daemons? Details. Mere details.

I'd ramble on about the crappy characters, but I returned the books to my cousin, and don't have access to ready examples. Suffice to say, I was thoroughly disappointed with pretty much every aspect of the trilogy, from the -1 dimensional characters to armies of deii ex machina. Much like the Matrix, there are good ideas and good scenes in the Dark Materials trilogy - the bit where Lyra and Will find a frightened, tired, chibi-YHWH in a cage and releasing him to dissolve in peace, his face beaming with gratitude was poignant, touching and a little cute all at once - but Pullman's three volume slog rarely hits anything so sublime.

10 out of 17.