The BBC has released a new trailer for its upcoming fantasy series His Dark Materials, based on the book series by Philip Pullman. It shows off a bit more of the story’s central heroine, Lyra (Dafne Keen), as she looks for her missing friend and goes up against a powerful organization.
The trailer highlights the main part of the story that drives the series’ first installment, The Golden Compass. In an alternate Oxford, children have gone missing in the city, including Lyra’s friend Roger. His disappearance leads her on a journey into the frozen arctic to try and rescue him from a malevolent religious organization, The Church.
We follow Lyra as she gathers up allies to help her in her search, as well as the people she’s going up against — Mrs. Coulter (Ruth Wilson), a Church agent who’s been leading experiments on children as she tries to ascertain the nature of a particle known as Dust.
Along the way, we see some fantastic cinematography, the characters’ dæmons (the shapeshifting manifestations of one’s soul in this particular universe), the bear king Iorek Byrnison, and bit more of Lin-Manuel Miranda as Lee Scoresby.
The project is a collaboration between the BBC and HBO, and it’s already been renewed for another season. There’s no release date just yet for the series, but it’s expected to premiere sometime this fall.