Dune: Part Two

Welcome! My name is Nithya, and this is my first ever blog. I just happened to watch Dune: Part Two last weekend after many months of waiting, and I have a lot to say about it! This blog does have some spoilers for the movie, so if you haven’t watched it and are interested in doing so, I do go into a lot of specifics. So besides that, let’s get started!

As a sequel, Dune: Part Two is a very different experience when compared to the first part. Personally, I thought Dune was amazing! The story was so intriguing with all of its conflicts about the spice trade, interplanetary politics, and the barren ecosystem nearly devoid of water. Paul Atreides was very convincingly played, and it had a solid storyline that was easy to follow. And of course, every scene with the sand worms was simply iconic and awing. I don’t think I will ever forget the electrifying evacuation of the spice harvesting machine right before the worm swallows it whole. Having read the first couple of the original Dune books, I thought the movie did an amazing job of bringing the magnitude to life.

This also happens with part two, but in the more recent film, the story almost unravels. It follows the books in the sense that after reading, you don’t think, “that was a nice science fiction space epic!”, but rather, “what in tarnation did I just read?”. This movie was hazy fever dream in the most entertaining way possible, just like the books. Even though there were definitely flaws with the movie, there were enough things it does right that makes it worth watching.

What sets Dune apart from other science fiction movies for me is that it achieves true uniqueness. There are so many examples in media, like superhero movies, where the concept of ‘beyond what is possible’ is starting to get old. Nothing is surprising because of the overuse of graphics, colors, and special effects in every second of a movie to impress the audience. It is like saying a tentacle monster with twelve heads is cooler than one with eight heads. More and more wacky additions on top of each other makes viewers immune to what makes it unexpected in the first place. However, Dune: Part Two is new. It is stunning, and that is because it is smart about how it presents its weirdness. First, the environment is set with rules and boundaries, unlike a multiverse where you can just pull anything out for plot (I’m talking about you Marvel haha). Arrakis is a desert planet with a drug/fuel trade, there are ancient royal families, religious rebels, and high tech spaceships, but there is a limit. The world is built around rules, and those rules are similar enough to our own world. There are mundane activities, conversations, and enough realism so that when something like a sandworm appears, it is breathtaking in comparison to the normalcy that was there just before.

The specific things that made the world of Dune so intriguing were also very well thought out. Instead of trying to be a chimera of various ideas, it is a simple but well-thought out concept, like the smooth way the Harkonnens defied gravity climbing up the mountain in the very first scene, or the wrestling with the baby sandworm to retrieve the Water of Life. All these things set Dune: Part Two apart from other science fiction or fantasy stories, because watching it was surprising and unexpected at every turn.

For this sequel, I really like what the movie did with the main leads. But, I have a bit of a problem with the main lead. In the first movie, Timmy (I’m just going to call him that) played a really convincing heir, naive but determined to do his best in the face of trouble. I thought the role suited him very well, but in this movie, I don’t think Paul Atreides was portrayed as well as he could have been. I just couldn’t see his character arc, where Paul is supposed to go from a hopeful boy to a cruel dictator. His change could have been shown more clearly through Timmy’s character, but the reason that wasn’t a huge problem is because that change is reflected in Chani’s attidudes: or Zendaya’s character.

I feel like Chani has a massive improvement from the books to the movie. She was amazing to watch on screen! I remember that in the books, Arrakis was meant to have a unique culture but it still felt very Eurocentric in its ideals. In a desert, where every man, woman, and child must fight to get even a drop of water or survive the attacks of the Harkonnens, it doesn’t make sense that women would lack a judgement of their own. Book Chani was a literal NPC, and she blindly followed whatever Paul said without questioning him, something that doesn’t feel very Fremen at all. Old European norms would not in any way exist in Arrakis, and the I feel that the books messed that up. However, Movie Chani is strong and she speaks up for what she believes in, whether that is for or against Paul. She is also not afraid to show emotion, and Zendaya’s acting made every scene with Chani in it realistic and convincing. This was especially true during her reaction to Paul’s betrayal where he decided to marry the emperor’s daughter instead of being with her.

But, in the end, I was the most surprised by a character I wasn’t paying much attention to in the trailer, and that is Feyd-Rautha Harkonnen. The Baron Harkonnen’s nephew, who I shall call ‘Baldy’ for the purposes of this blog. This guy is actually psychotic, and that was very apparent while watching. Every facial expression and glance communicate sociopath, and I loved it. The performance was creepy, erratic, and unexpected right until the very end, and the only complaint I have is that we didn’t get to see more of him.
What I find really interesting about this movie are the scenes. Nearly every single one was amazing to view, and though I have problems with how they were strung together, there were a couple that I’m sure I won’t be forgetting anytime soon.

Watching the trailer, I thought I was going to love the moment where Paul finally rides a worm, but I did not expect to like Baldy’s birthday party even more. The popping dark fireworks and the black and white triangular arena was so cool, and I love the idea of a black sun; There is no need for the yellow sunlight to ruin the unique color scheme. The way everyone was watching the psychotic Baldy murder people for funsies was haunting, especially the way he just toyed around with the last one before finishing him off. The acting by Austin Butler came together perfectly for me and really drove the point home that Baldy is a sociopath that needs serious help and probably won’t get it. He was literally a hyena, biting at the guards who were trying to finish off his prey for him! This was the perfect amount of weird and different. The colors, vibes, and acting combined to create a unique viewing experience.

And of course, I really liked pretty much every single sandworm scene. Seriously, Herbert’s mind is brilliant to think of something so simple yet so awing. The movie does a really good job of communicating the scale of these creatures by putting them into perspective. When compared to a human, these massive things actually feel massive. This also makes the audience fully realize the power of the desert, and how no human can even hope to defeat it. The Fremen riding multiple worms into battle destroying the Harkonnens conveys how even though the Harkonnens have tech and interstellar support, they don’t have the knowledge of the desert. And that is what everything they depend on comes down to. These scenes are also matched by an amazing soundtrack, which only adds to the wonder of Arrakis and makes the dramatic scenes even more dramatic.

Even though there aren’t many problems with each individual scene, it is the way that they are strung together that I personally didn’t understand. The first movie was straightforward and clear with its storytelling, but this move felt more half-baked when it came to putting the individual ideas together to form a cohesive plot line, leading to the feeling like I’m in a weird dream. The spice trade, inter-house politics, and the growth of the messiah didn’t intertwine for me perfectly and with detail like in the books, and that was pretty unfortunate. These ideas and conflicts could have been expanded more as well, like the rivalry between Baldy and Timmy. I wish I got to see more of that. Other important aspects like the Bene Gesserit and their role in literally everything, and Paul’s change over time needed more explanation and expansion. It does make sense that the director is constrained by the time limits of a film though, and it can be very hard to bring such a complex story to life perfectly.

I don’t think that it is entirely clear from this post whether or not I thought Dune: Part Two was a good movie, but I just want to say that it was very much worth viewing in the theater, and the flaws that I mentioned were a very small part of my viewing experience. Most of it was getting goosebumps from the iconic book being brought to life in the same weird vibe and fashion. This is unlike any fantasy or science fiction movie I have ever seen, and for that reason alone, Dune: Part Two is an definitely a worthwhile watch!