Executive producer Jane Tranter discusses the process of adapting these gentle critters for the screen.
Let’s talk about the elephant in the room… or, rather, the zalif.
(Zalif is the singular form of mulefa, according to the source material.)
Mary Malone (Simone Kirby) meets a zalif, one of the mulefa, in ‘His Dark Materials’ season 3.Framestore
EW exclusively presents the first look at these majestic (and adorable!)
characters, rendered by the folks at visual effects company Framestore.
Executive producer Jane Tranter discusses how the crew adapted them from book to screen for the first time.
The mulefa debut in ‘His Dark Materials’ season 3.Framestore
“We would address the mulefa in the room, if you like, constantly.”
Pullman describes them inThe Amber Spyglassas spineless creatures with trunks, and spurs for feet.
They move about by inserting those spurs into disc-shaped seedpods and roll along tracks dug into the ground.
The mulefa ofHis Dark Materialsare slightly different.
We will see them move both with and without their seedpod wheels.
“His narrating voice would supply that information, and we have to dramatize it in some way.
But every now and again, he’s clear about what a red line is.”
The red line with the mulefa was that theyhaveto travel on seedpods.
“I thought, ‘Is that gonna look a bit rubbish [on screen]?’
And he was like, ‘Yes, they do!'”
Then came the language.
Mulefa have their own means of communication, through sounds and sign language with their trunks.
That entailed enlisting a language expert to create the mulefa’s means of communication.
“They’re strange for sure.
His Dark Materialsseason 3 will premiere this Dec. 26 on HBO and HBO Max.
