A Dune Megafan Explains What You Should Know Before You See the Movies

Dune has been one of cinema’s white whales for decades. The first book in the massively popular, wonderfully heady, and deeply weird sci-fi saga arrived in 1965, under the aegis of author Frank Herbert. The novel would go on to sell more than 20 million copies, and Herbert spent the rest of his career expanding the universe across five sequels until his death in 1986.

The franchise has stayed mostly inert in the decades since, with one poorly received attempt at adaptation by David Lynch in 1984, until Denis Villeneuve was entrusted with bringing this dormant space epic to theaters in 2021. It worked: Dune made almost half a billion dollars at the box office, and its newly released and widely acclaimed sequel Dune: Part Two, which opened on Friday, is poised to do even better. For the first time since the late 1960s, the world has gone Dune crazy. But if you’re new to the series, much of its cultural resonance, bizarre lore, and specific place in American history might be lost on you. That’s why I called up Derek Robertson, a journalist at Politico and the biggest Dune fan I know—to the point that he’s currently working on his third reread of the entire series—and asked him to walk me through what makes this franchise special. Our conversation has been edited and condensed for clarity.

If you had to sum up the broad strokes of Dune to someone who is about to go watch the movies, what would you say to them? How would you ground them in the universe?

First of all, don’t see this new movie if you haven’t seen the first one. It’s a direct sequel. But more to the point, Dune is a science-fiction story set 20,000 years in the future, when space travel is enabled by the use of a drug called “the spice.” The conflict centers around House Atreides, which is a dynastic house in a galactic congress, and its heir, Paul Atreides. Atreides was just given control of Arrakis, the desert planet, where all spice production goes on. Shortly afterwards, they are betrayed by the emperor, who is in cahoots with their rivals, House Harkonnen. Paul Atreides goes into exile and must ally with the native people of Arrakis—the Fremen—to take back what is rightfully theirs.

Dune has always had a reputation for being the thinking man’s sci-fi series, especially compared to Star Wars and Star Trek. Why is that?

It has a lot to do with the context in which it was originally published. The novels came out in a pre–Star Wars era—this is when sci-fi was basically just pulp fiction or some of the out-there conceptual stuff like Isaac Asimov and the other greats. The books are essentially pulpy treatises on political philosophy, like authoritarianism and democracy. Dune and the sequel Dune Messiah comprise this dyad of books that try to implode the hero myth that’s at the core of less ambitious sci-fi, like the Orson Scott Card stuff from this era, which has very straightforward themes of heroism—the genius boy who saves the day. Dune acts as a counterweight to that. Especially with some of the later books, where many hundreds of pages are given over to ponderous lecturing on the nature of power and how people become fit to rule themselves. It gives you a lot to chew on.

You mentioned the spice, and that a lot of people in this book are doing mind-expanding drugs in the desert. This thing was written in the ’60s, which was the dawn of the psychedelic revolution in America, so what does Dune have to say about the drug culture of its time?

Frank Herbert … used psilocybin and has written at length about how that experience influenced his perception of space and time. Herbert was also really interested in the then-nascent field of ecology, which is the term for how all the distinct components of an environment work together. He wrote an article about the sand dunes of Oregon, and learning about how that environment replenished itself despite being so arid inspired him to write a story that deals very explicitly with the balance of the environment.

How does the experience of watching the film adaptation of Dune line up with its reading experience? From what you’re telling me, I get the sense that the book isn’t structured like a space-opera action movie in the way the novel is.

There is a reason why, for many years, people thought Dune was unfilmable. David Lynch made an adaptation in the mid-1980s, which is kind of interesting but very flawed and didactic—basically reiterating the stuff from the book, word for word. What makes it hard to adapt, and what makes Villeneuve’s version an achievement, is that the books are extremely internal. Long passages are given over to inner monologue and philosophical pondering and the angst of Paul Atreides as he attempts to reconcile his place in the universe and these jarring psychic powers he develops. The novel leaves you with the impression of this lush alien world and this deep mythology, but it’s also very diaristic and impressionistic. But Villeneuve is such a skilled visual artist. He knows how to say more with less, visually, which is what you need to adapt a book like Dune. His worlds have texture and history, and when you as a viewer are immersed in that, Timothée Chalamet can convey a lot with just a look.

I’m not asking you to speak for everyone here, but are those in the greater Dune community happy with these movies? Or are they threatening to riot in the streets?

I think it’s extremely positive. I have not heard a discouraging comment. The Dune community is a little more under the radar than the Star Wars community, so you don’t have the same outcry about a certain actor being cast as a certain character, or unfaithful adaptations of certain parts of the lore. If this discourse is going on, I am not aware of it.

There is a lot of talk about Villeneuve adapting some of the weirder Dune books, particularly God Emperor of Dune, which has almost become something of a meme among sci-fi fans. What is God Emperor of Dune, and why is it so weird?

I think people are clamoring for a God Emperor adaptation in a very perverse way. It takes place many millennia into the future after the first Dune sequel, Dune Messiah. It stars Paul Atreides’ son, Leto, who has morphed into a giant sandworm person. He is the titular God emperor. He is a nigh-omnipotent being who has completely reshaped the planet, and the galaxy, to his own ends. He has a psychic experience that leads him to believe that there is one golden path forward for humanity and all of those events must be followed, or life in the universe will perish. So he effectively rules humanity as a tyrant.

It’s not a very good book. Leto is just sitting in his sandworm hole and thinking about ways to follow the golden path, or whether he can be truly justified in wielding such a heavy hand in the future of humanity.

Would you be excited if Villeneuve adapted it?

I’d be there with bells on. If you’re a Dune freak, this is the shit you live for. You don’t need it to be great literature. You love Dune because it’s Dune. There’s nothing else like it in mass-market pulp sci-fi.