There isn’t much to look forward to on TV these days. Now and then, something like a Dune series pops up and it offers a little hope. Set long before the events of the Dune movie, Dune: Prophecy is about the Bene Gesserit sisterhood.
This new series stars Emily Watson, Olivia Williams, Travis Fimmel, Jodhi May, Mark Strong, Sarah-Sofie Boussnina, Josh Heuston, Jade Anouka, and Chris Mason.
The Story
The series starts with a young Valya Harkonnen, who had lies told about her during the machine wars. The then Reverend Mother dies, and she takes over the Sisterhood. She does this by using the Voice, which is very disappointing.
30 years on, she is still in control of the sisterhood and she’s politically moving events against the Atreides, because of their lies.
The rest of the story is, umm, complex. There is a marriage to a 9-year-old boy, a trip to a nightclub and someone who can control his worms. However, herein lies the first big problem.
Too Much Going On
There really is a lot going on with this. I felt like a lot of the characters were introduced by another cast member like they were the narrator or something.
“Oh look, here comes Dave, the leader of the sand dunes, the hero of Batten Bridge, defeater of the Saxon, and an all-round nice guy”.
In the first 20 minutes there is a lot of narration, a lot of plot that unfolds, and an awful lot to take in. I honestly got a little lost. It seemed all of this was crammed in, only to have everything slow right down in other places.
When I first saw Dune in 1984, there was a lot to unpack, but it does it well enough for you to follow and understand. You were introduced to Paul Atreides and, in the first few minutes, got his character. This is down to good writing.
In Dune: Prophecy, there are too many characters to unpack in one go and I found myself getting lost. They aren’t all complicated, but there’s just too many of them. And, to be honest, some of them are just not that interesting.
The one who gets married, Princess Ynez (Boussenina), is just kind of a bitch. I always had the impression that the Bene Gesserit were cool, calm, and collected. This one wasn’t.
The Writing
This was another major issue. For me, the first episode was more about style over substance. Everything in this first one looks amazing, the sets, the ships, the planets. It’s the same standard as the remake movie by Villeneuve.
It seems like they spent more time on the visuals than they did on the script. This bitchy princess tells her 9-year-old husband to be that she disapproves of his outlawed thinking machine by threatening him:
“If you try anything like that when we’re married, I’ll get you, you little shit!”
“You little shit”? I can’t see Frank Herbert writing that. There is also a scene with the princess going to a nightclub for one last blowout before she’s married. She takes some drugs, has some sex, and generally has a good time. This was written by someone modern, not Herbert.
Based On…
While looking up details, I found this on the IMDb:
This series may be based on the novel Sisterhood of Dune, by Brian Herbert and Kevin J. Anderson. A prequel to the original Dune, it is the first of the Great Schools of Dune trilogy, and tells how the Sisterhood of Rossak evolved into the Bene Gesserit.
“This series MAY be based…”. After watching episode 1, I reminded me of the end of Game of Thrones. The last series of GoT when off script and it really showed. Characters were deconstructed, they didn’t behave like they should, and it all went downhill.
I knew that I knew the name Kevin Anderson, he has written some of the Star Wars EU. He has also worked on novels for Predator, Batman and Superman and loads of other things. He’s a great writer.
He worked with Brian Herbert, Frank’s eldest son, on a series of Dune books. From the quote from IMDb, it seems that the writers of this series have based it on the books. I’m going to say, it very loosely based on the books. I don’t see the expression ‘You little shit’ popping up anywhere else in Dune.
Overall
This first episode of Dune: Prophecy was not good. There was too much crammed in, the characters aren’t all that interesting yet and it’s all about the looks at the moment.
Will the series pick up? I don’t know. Will I keep watching it? I don’t know that either. I might spare an hour every week to watch it. It will most likely be while I’m at work and doing something else.
Did you see it? What did you make of it?
