Whilst I enjoyed the first one (as a Frank Herbert fanboy) it felt like - and was in fact the case - a lot of material was left on the proverbial cutting room floor. The spice must flow however, so back we go to finish what we started.
Liked the nod to all the chapter prefaces from the books Irulan published after the events of the book. There’s such an integral part of the series, little Frank musings disguised as his characters. Also like what appears to be a ‘cone of greyscale’ in the gladiator arena making everything black and white.
Alas I already know Denis is too shy to do the water of life it’s molecular-bodily-control psychedelic justice, but he can’t duck Alia!
Greig Fraser must get equal props too. Following on from Deakins work on Sicario and BR 2049… huge boots to fill, but fill them he has (also behind the camera for The Batman and Rogue One).
EDIT - he’s doing the sequel to The Batman as well. Visual continuity ftw.
God Emperor is my favourite of the 6, but it’s just Frank inhabiting one of the characters and lecturing the reader about his thoughts on religion, politics and philosophy for most of the book. I can’t see how it would work even as a mini-series, let alone a film.
Also Denis seems allergenic to getting too esoteric/colourful with Prescience and I have a feeling there won’t be any psychedelic, internally observing chemical interactions at the molecular level ancestral memory visuals stuff in Part 2, with Messiah then being written more as a trilogy to close the story out in a way that feels complete but doesn’t preclude Children of Dune in the future. The more fantastic stuff has been left at the door for a someone grounded, stripped to the bare essentials approach (which was the wrong move IMO - but perhaps he just didn’t vibe with that side of the series).
Loved the visuals but it didn’t sound like Dune. I hope the visuals are a truer representation of the plot and the trailer has been dumbed down. Cos otherwise I’d be worried.
A few things omitted I would have loved to have seen but all the big changes worked fairly well given the condensing of the material. The cinematography is just obnoxiously good in places. Wasn’t sure if he’d go the way of the book and have the abrupt ending… but Messiah is surely nailed on at this point. I’m a big fan of all 6 in the series and I suppose it’s better I’m annoyed at wanting more than annoyed at what’s been delivered (damn you Denis for being so ruthless in the editing room), although if they decide to push on with someone different for Children of Dune… it’ll probably be a bad idea. Enjoyed.
Glad you managed to enjoy it this time around. Like you can't wait for the next installment. I picked up a lot more 2nd time around and it was no less epic with some great acting. As someone said the cast was great. Christopher Walken was a little out of place but it was fine.
Is the original books out in audio? How many books are there?
I wasn't a massive fan of Part One (don't know why, maybe too slow?) but I thought they nailed Part Two. Everything from the scenery, the world building, the action was absolutely spot on. When I was watching the trailers I thought 99% of them looked absolute trash, I was genuinely groaning about the next couple of years of cinema, but this was a real 'cinematic experience' that restored a bit of faith.
I know a few posters here have mentioned about the pacing but I really didn't have any complaints about that, I thought it was just right.
Austin Butler was really great in his scenes. I thought it was Michael Rosenbaum (Lex from Smallville ) at first. They made Florence Pugh look hot AF in the final scenes.
Only minor gripes (major spoilers so don't click if you haven't watched):
- The line "You chose the wrong side!" from Jessica was one of the daftest lines in cinema history. If she's a Harkonnen and so is Paul then she "won" regardless of who became Emperor out of Paul and Feyd-Rautha,
- Related, the Bene Gesserit seem to be on all of the sides in the film and created the 'good' and 'bad' sides (probably missing something from the books that's not explained here),
- Thought Dave Bautista's character was pretty rubbish, a bit too much like Drax,
- Wouldn't Paul have questioned Gurney a bit more initially (before drinking the Waters of Life)? How did he survive the massacre of the rest of House Atreides?
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May well go and see it again in the next couple of weeks before Ghostbusters arrives.
The Bene Gesserit’s goal was the survival and continuation of the human race. Their failure is that up until the worm’s reign they were just as culpable as the three main powers in the imperium for its 10k year stagnation and inevitable future collapse, failing to understand creating prescient rulers locked in pre-determined futures for all humankind. They could only see in the sandbox they were playing in. It takes Leto II 3000 years to undo this via the Golden Path.
It’s alluded to in the last 2 books but part of Frank’s plan for book 7 was exploring how the BG would rule the Old Empire region with a novel form of governance not yet tried in either real life or in-universe. Alas we never got to see what that was.
My feeling is Denis held back the Guild in part 2 to bring them forward more in Messiah in the absence of any antagonists from the first two parts (with the exception of Mohaim still representing the BG interests). I expect he’ll relegate the Tleilaxu to some degree since while they’re introduced in Messiah and are responsible for ‘the gift’, it’s the Guild that present Paul with it and it isn’t until Heretics and Chapterhouse that Frank really developed them properly. Denis has also shown that he’s quite willing to economise and only make nods to certain things or cut them completely if it doesn’t directly serve the Paul/Chani story focus.
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) at first. They made Florence Pugh look hot AF in the final scenes.