His Dark Materials Part 2: The Subtle Knife (Radio Full-Cast Dramatisation) recap

After accidentally killing an intruder, twelve-year-old Will Parry flees through a hidden window into Cittagazze, where he meets Lyra. They move between the deserted city and Will's Oxford, where physicist Mary Malone discovers that her dark-matter particles are the conscious Dust Lyra knows. Sir Charles Latrom steals Lyra's alethiometer, prompting the children to seek the subtle knife, a blade that can cut windows between worlds. Will wins it but loses two fingers, becoming its bearer, and uses it to recover the instrument. Meanwhile Lee Scoresby finds the shaman Jopari and escorts him toward Will as Magisterium forces pursue them. Lee dies defending him. Jopari reaches Will and is revealed as his missing father, John Parry, but is killed moments after their reunion. Mrs Coulter, now able to control Spectres, attacks Lyra's protectors and abducts her. Two rebel angels ask Will to take the knife to Lord Asriel; Will agrees to travel with them only after they help him rescue Lyra.

Previously: Lyra Belacqua learned that the mysterious Dust feared by her world's religious authorities is connected to consciousness and that adults can sever children from their daemons in experiments. With her daemon Pantalaimon and allies including the witch Serafina Pekkala and aeronaut Lee Scoresby, she travelled north to rescue captive children. Her father, Lord Asriel, used the death of Lyra's friend Roger to open a bridge into another world. Lyra followed him across, determined to understand Dust, while her mother, Mrs Coulter, remained behind as a powerful agent of the Magisterium.

In Oxford, twelve-year-old Will Parry hides his mother's mental distress from officials and searches for letters left by his missing father, the explorer John Parry. Men break into the house looking for the same papers, and Will accidentally kills one while escaping. After placing his mother with a trusted former teacher, he finds a barely visible window in the air and passes through it into Cittagazze, a beautiful city empty of adults. There he meets Lyra and Pantalaimon, who have arrived from their own world. The two wary children decide to help one another. Other children explain that invisible Spectres consume adults but ignore the young. Using a window back to Will's Oxford, Lyra follows the alethiometer's guidance to physicist Mary Malone. Mary's detector studies dark matter, and Lyra realizes that the particles Mary calls Shadows are the same conscious substance her people call Dust. Elsewhere, Serafina Pekkala and Lee Scoresby investigate the rupture between worlds and the prophecy surrounding Lyra.

Lyra continues visiting Mary and demonstrates that the alethiometer can answer questions through her intuitive reading of its symbols. She also meets the elegant Sir Charles Latrom, who is secretly Lord Boreal, a man able to move between her world and Will's. Boreal steals the alethiometer and offers to return it only if Lyra and Will obtain a special knife held in Cittagazze. Lee Scoresby seeks the explorer Stanislaus Grumman, believing he can help Lyra, while the witches learn that Lord Asriel is gathering forces for a war against the Authority. Mrs Coulter captures a witch and extracts part of the prophecy: Lyra has a destiny resembling Eve's, though Lyra herself must not know it. Crossing into Cittagazze, Mrs Coulter discovers that the Spectres will obey her, giving her a weapon against adults from every world.

Will and Lyra try to steal back the alethiometer from Boreal's guarded house but conclude that they first need the knife he demanded. In Cittagazze they climb the Torre degli Angeli and confront Tullio, who is fighting for the weapon. During the struggle, the knife severs two fingers from Will's left hand. Its guardian, Giacomo Paradisi, says the injury marks Will as the new bearer and teaches him to use one edge to cut any material and the other to open windows between worlds. Will uses the knife to enter Boreal's house through a hidden opening while Lyra distracts him, and they recover the alethiometer. Tullio is seized by Spectres, and the younger children who once befriended Will and Lyra blame them for his fate. Will, Lyra, and Pantalaimon leave the city as enemies close in.

Lee Scoresby finds the shaman Jopari, whom scholars know as Stanislaus Grumman. Jopari says the subtle knife must be brought to Lord Asriel and asks Lee to carry him toward its bearer. Will wants the alethiometer to guide him to his missing father; its answer sends him and Lyra into the mountains, where Serafina's witches rescue them from vengeful children and take them under protection. In Oxford, Mary learns to communicate directly with the Shadows through her computer and then through an adapted form of divination. They identify themselves as conscious beings, tell her to leave her world, and instruct her to act as the serpent in a future choice. She crosses through a window into Cittagazze and begins travelling onward. Will's hand remains painfully unhealed as the children and witches climb toward the place where his father may be found.

The forces converging on the knife bearer collide in the mountains. Lee Scoresby and Jopari are attacked by Magisterium soldiers; Lee remains behind and dies defending the pass so that Jopari can go on. Jopari reaches Will, uses a healing moss on his wounded hand, and explains the knife bearer's part in the coming war. They then recognize each other as father and son: Jopari is John Parry, the explorer Will has sought for years. Their reunion lasts only moments before a witch kills John in revenge for rejecting her, and she is immediately killed by another witch. While Will is away, Mrs Coulter's forces attack the camp. He returns to find the witches dead or scattered and Lyra missing, though her alethiometer remains. Mrs Coulter has taken Lyra and keeps her unconscious in a chest. The rebel angels Balthamos and Baruch ask Will to carry the knife to Lord Asriel. Will refuses to abandon Lyra and sets out with them only after making her rescue his first purpose.

Lee Scoresby dies holding off Magisterium soldiers so that Jopari can continue toward the knife bearer. Jopari finds Will in the mountains, treats the wound that will not heal, and reveals that he is John Parry, Will's missing father. Father and son recognize each other only moments before a witch whom John once rejected kills him; she is then killed in turn. During Will's absence, Mrs Coulter's forces attack the witches guarding Lyra. Will returns to find the camp devastated, Lyra gone, and her alethiometer left behind. Mrs Coulter has abducted Lyra and keeps her drugged inside a travelling chest. The angels Balthamos and Baruch ask Will to take the subtle knife to Lord Asriel, but Will insists that he must rescue Lyra first. He leaves with the knife and the angels, while the coming war now spans multiple worlds.