I’m type 4 – read it once and really liked it; liked the movie too; didn’t like it enough to read it again or any of the sequels.
You can often hear one of them say during a fight scene: “I WILL kill HIM.” Stings awkward line reading.
Heinlein snuck in people of color all the time, often very subtly (and often NOT). For example there’s a valiant soldier in The Puppet Masters named “Booker T. W. Johnson” - what color do you think he was in 1952? BTWJ only gets mentioned once, as the gunner of a heroic tank crew that sacrifice themselves to jams a Titanian flying saucer’s airlock open, but he’s the only common soldier mentioned by name that I remember.
Dune is my favorite Sci-Fi hands down.
I’ve read all 6 books 3 times. If you haven’t read all 6 you are missing out on some very cool stuff that makes the whole story much bigger than you can imagine. The first book is but a seed, and there is another character that might be more significant that you imagine.
The Lynch film is great and cheesy and everything, also know that Frank Herbert was alive and involved with the films design. There is actually another cut of the film they put on TV that DeLaurentis did that has an extra hour of footage. I call it the “Tediosity Enhanced” version. Not sure if it actually helps the story or just confuses it, but it’s my favorite. Oh, and that Toto soundtrack!
When you are handed a glossary (they did this) when you go see a movie, you know you are in trouble.
At first watch I didn’t like the Sci-Fi channel’s version, mainly because I liked the design of the older movie. Then I realized that it was actually more faithful to the book than the other, and they did actually complete all of the first 3 books. And no Weirding Modules
He who controls the spice controls the universe
Fear is the mind killer…
The water of life… "they’ve tried and failed? “They’ve tried and Died”
We have wormsign
A column of smoke by day, a pillar of fire by night
The slow blade penetrates the shield
The sleeper must awaken.
One who can destroy a thing, controls the thing.
The toooth… the toooth…
Another major problem for the series becoming a mainstream success is that there’s a lot vocab and background universe knowledge required to understand the story. As such, it just doesn’t lend itself to film. Also, the sheer grandeur and scale of the of story requires a lot of SFX and that gets expensive.
That is true - Dune is very much an imperial narrative.
by white you mean japanese??? what you are calling “white” is what most Japanese people look like in anime.
But what about furries? Sorry, off topic. What about Bene Tleilaxu?
A kitten would be a crap Base of the Pillar. They don’t stay still long enough…
Actually, they’re neither white nor Japanese. They’re mukokuseki - nationless. There are exceptions, but that’s very common.
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Read it because it is my favorite book about Egyptian Sunni Muslims.
Did this really not come up in 109 responses or BB or the New Yorker articles?
How is that.
“Tell them, Stilgar”
“Must I?”
“We are the people of Misr,” the old woman rasped. “Since our Sunni ancestors fled from Nilotic al-Ourouba, we have known flight and death. The young go on that our people shall not die.”
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The problem is that you film this incredible expansive White Saviour film set in space-Arabia with space-Muslims fighting over Totally-Not-Oil while excising out all the arabic mystic concepts and skipping over the hero literally declaring jihad on the occupying forces and it’s a huge success.
Now you get to make a sequel where the hero has instigated a religious war leading to the death of billions, has internal conflicts about owning a zombie computer man, allows himself to be blinded by nuclear weapons, and ends with him walking into the desert to die because he cannot take the Golden Path - a destiny where he becomes literally inhuman and plunges humanity into thousands of years of brutal despotism in order to prevent them inventing Skynet.
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“Beer is the mind-killer.”
I thought the syfy series was very good. The first one. Much more comprehensible than lynch, for anyone who had not read the book (I liked the Lynch movie, but I don’t think I would have if I had not read the book). Didn’t have the FX budget of a summer blockbuster, but it also wasn’t condensed down to 90 minutes plus a 30 minute long final fight scene.
The second one, ugh. But IMO the books after the first are also ugh. I tried to read them decades ago… but despite the sex they failed to keep the interest of a 14 year old boy. Herbert was just getting to weird. Possibly i was too young, however.
I have found Dune references to be a thing among reading science fiction fans, but not among the general public.
I have heard, or used and been understood by others (though not necessarily everyone present) references to the gom jabbar, wormsign, and “the spice must flow”.
I’d agree that the lack of really sympathetic characters by the end of the book is a problem for widespread acceptance.
For Lord of the Rings one should also recall the circa 1980 animated versions which surely put that seed into a lot of what are today highly valued customer demographics.
Also: maybe Lawrence of Arabia is just occupying the spot for desert peoples rise up cultural icon? I can’t say that “the people” have made the wrong choice, if so. If you ever get the chance to see that movie on a really big screen do it. Ideally sit near toward the front on the left and await the arrival of Omar Sharif.
Odd vocab didn’t seem to be much of a hurdle for Kubrick bringing Clockwork Orange to the screen. Scifi just isn’t very profitable on the big screen unless there’s a lot of lasers and a really simple plotline. Dune has one, but not the other. Add the slightest bit of intrigue to a plot and it’s suddenly “art house,” and thus, unprofitable.
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Once you realize that Star Wars is based on Dune, many things become clear.
Once you realize that Dune is based on Hamlet…
I actually have my doubts that Frank Herbert wrote Chapterhouse Dune. Too much of it reminds me of the Kevin Anderson/Brian Herbert stuff.
I heard a speaker at an SF convention (probably Philcon 1999) say, “Most readers agree that the quality of the Dune series decreases over time. They just disagree on which book is the last one worth reading.”
Personally, my opinion changes. For many years I felt that only the first book was worth reading. Then, I decided that God Emperor of Dune was the true resolution of the story begun in the first book. Later, I decided that Heretics of Dune makes a pretty good epilogue.
Just so y’all know, I hate you all. Not really, that is sarcastic, but flipping heck, Dune is MINE and I don’t like sharing. At all.
My favorite line is “Remember the tooth. The tooth Leto, the tooth!” David Lynch’s movie only grazed the spirit of the books, the SciFi min-series caught a different aspect.
Duncan Idaho is the true heir of the Atreides’ line of course, which you learn in reading the whole of the books, and of course he is Paul’s soul-mate more then Chani ever was. I tried to read the books in junior high, and failed, I was 16 when I could finally start to grasp them and I have re-read them every five years since. Which means it is time to read them again.
Throughout all of the Dune books written by Frank Herbert, House Atreides can rely on one thing: Duncan Idaho will eventually betray them. It starts in the first book when Idaho leads the Harkonnen forces to Paul and Jessica, and continues thousands of years under the Tyrant. Duncan may be Paul’s soul mate, but only as his nemesis.
