His Dark Materials: Season 3 (Blu-ray Review) (HBO)

His Dark Materials: The Complete Third Season [Blu-Ray]

Cast: Dafne Keen, Amir Wilson, Ruth Wilson

Release Date: April 25, 2023

A Review By: Kevin Lovell

Disc Rating: 7/10

Synopsis:

In the third season of His Dark Materials, based on “The Amber Spyglass,” the final novel in Philip Pullman’s award-winning trilogy, Lyra, the prophesied child, and Will, the bearer of The Subtle Knife, must journey to a dark place from which no one has ever returned. As her father’s great war against the Authority edges closer, they will learn that saving the worlds comes at a terrible price.

Please Note: Warner Bros. Discovery Home Entertainment provided me with a free copy of the Blu-ray I reviewed in this Post. The opinions I share are my own.

Newcomers to ‘His Dark Materials’ will want to strongly consider starting at the beginning due to the show’s serialized nature and various continuing story elements within. You can find our reviews of the previous Blu-ray Season releases below!

His Dark Materials: The Complete First Season (Blu-ray Review)

His Dark Materials: The Complete Second Season (Blu-ray Review)

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The third and final season of ‘His Dark Materials’ rejoins Will, the bearer of The Subtle Knife as he searches the worlds for Lyra following her abduction by Mrs. Coulter, enlisting some unlikely assistance along the way including an Angel and the powerful King of the Bears Iorek. As Will finds his way to Lyra prior to the two embarking on perhaps their most terrifying and challenging mission yet, Lord Asriel begins taking the final steps in preparation for his war against the Authority, gathering his army for the battle on the horizon. But even with each of them ready to dedicate everything to the movement, it soon becomes clear that even a possible victory will still come at a difficult price.

The final season of ‘His Dark Materials’ concludes the epic fantasy tale and delivers an unforgettable conclusion that’s thrilling, action-packed and intense as well as moving, occasionally heartbreaking and perhaps not quite what you’d expect (at least for those such as me who haven’t yet had the pleasure of reading Pullman’s novels on which the series is based). Featuring some utterly gorgeous visuals that bring these unique worlds to life splendidly and serving up a definitive ending for the story that leaves nearly all of the key storylines concluded, while also delivering a quite breathtaking depiction of the final battle that should have you grinning, cheering and emotionally affected by its conclusion. It additionally brings back some fan favorite characters with a few granted a much more fulfilling end to their story than we had previously expected to be the case.

Season 3 of ‘His Dark Materials’ delivers a solid final season altogether that never wastes any time and gets straight into the endgame on the horizon. It fully delves into the various tense storylines of these characters while keeping you glued to the screen nearly every step of the way. If you enjoyed the previous two seasons of ‘His Dark Materials’ but haven’t yet had the opportunity to check out the final eight episodes of the series, I would strongly encourage you to do so whenever possible; it’s a well-crafted and emotional finale that fans surely won’t want to even consider missing out on.

Warner Bros. Discovery Home Entertainment brings home the third and final season of ‘His Dark Materials’ in a 2-disc Blu-ray release that features gorgeous high definition video presentations along with hard hitting and immersive DTS-HD MA multichannel soundtracks on all eight episodes that look and sound fantastic and never disappoint; split between two Blu-ray discs for optimal quality. Unfortunately, their Blu-ray release of ‘His Dark Materials: The Complete Third Season’ does drop the ball somewhat in a few other areas that the previous two season releases stood out. While both previous season releases included a notable offering of bonus material, this final season set is entirely absent of extras, nor does it include a Digital Code like the others. The packaging this time around also forgoes the previous trend of alternate artwork on the slip and interior case and just replicates the same image for both this time around. While some may be understandably disappointed by at least some of these factors, if you own the previous two seasons on Blu-ray and are content with just the episodes in outstanding quality, then this one will probably still be well worth picking up and is recommended, especially if you can find it at the right price.

VIDEO:

The Blu-ray release of ‘His Dark Materials: The Complete Third Season’ features a full 1080p High Definition presentation with a 2.00:1 Aspect Ratio on all of the final season’s episodes. The video presentations look spectacular and provide clean, sharp and richly detailed presentations from start to finish on every episode. Everything within from the gorgeous backgrounds and landscapes to character specifics and clothing look clean and smooth; holding up impressively even during the various darkly lit sequences that never result in anything that’s occurring onscreen becoming problematic or negatively affected. Overall, these are great high definition video presentations that should leave fans of the series very satisfied.

AUDIO:

The Blu-ray release features a 5.1 channel DTS-HD Master Audio soundtrack on all 8 Season Three episodes. These multichannel soundtracks are a definite treat themselves and serve up clean, crisp and notably immersive audio presentations on each episode. They repeatedly take full advantage of all five available channels in order to send characters, creatures and flying craft swooping throughout the various speakers quite regularly, along with action and nature effects, bits of dialogue and plenty more; while always making certain that any dialogue or other audio elements that might be occurring simultaneously remain clean and fully audible at all times. Overall, these are fantastic 5.1 DTS-HD MA soundtracks that make a wonderful complement to the onscreen excitement and shouldn’t disappoint in the slightest.

SPECIAL FEATURES:

Unlike the previous season releases on Blu-ray which featured a nice helping of extras, the Blu-ray release of ‘His Dark Materials: The Complete Third Season’ somewhat surprisingly does not include any bonus content whatsoever.