WARNING: SPOILERS ahead for the Season 1 finale of Dune: Prophecy.
HBO prequel series Dune: Prophecy confirms that Denis Villeneuve accomplished an extraordinary feat with his two Dune films. After the end of season 1 of Dune: ProphecyThe series received mixed reviews and was divisive in terms of reception from the general public. Dune: Prophecy has already been renewed for a second season on HBO, which is a huge relief considering almost nothing was resolved in the six-episode limited first season, leaving many viewers questioning what went wrong in Dune: Prophecy. That being said, the first season established a lot of possible directions for Dune: Prophecy 2nd season.
Although Villeneuve had nothing to do with Dune: Prophecythe series cannot escape the impact that the acclaimed director's two films had. In fact, Villeneuve's success with both films and, hopefully, the eventual Dune: Part Threebased on Frank Herbert Dune: Messiah novel, is the main reason the HBO prequel series was developed in the first place. Dune: Prophecy takes place 10,000 years before the rise of Paul Atreides but configure Dune 3 in several intriguing ways. Still, Dune: Prophecy's 70% average Rotten Tomatoes score is an indication of how difficult it is to adapt sci-fi source material to the screen.
Adapting Dune for the screen is an extremely difficult task
David Lynch considers his adaptation one of the biggest regrets of his career
Before David Lynch tried to adapt Dune With its 1984 iteration, Dune was long considered unfilmable. Some might argue that Lynch's attempts to make Dune cinematography only provides more direct evidence. Even Lynch himself revealed that he is "Proud of everything except Dune,” which may be more a testament to the difficulty of adapting the material into a film than to his skills as a filmmaker, which are obviously numerous. Many of the narrative elements of Dune technically it shouldn't work on filmespecially with the high number of spikes in the characters' minds.
Pure density alone Dune The plot and world of the story should theoretically make it unadaptable on screen, and it shouldn't make for an interesting watch due to the amount of expository explanation required to fully understand the source material. Despite all this, Villeneuve does an incredible job of bringing the core elements of Dune to the big screen and making the most accessible form of Paul's origin story to date. As a masterful filmmaker behind the exceptional Blade Runner 2049, Sicarioand ArrivalVilleneuve uses a lot of brilliant visual language. In comparison, Prophecy it's more like what could go wrong when trying to adapt Dune.
Dune: Prophecy shows how easy it is for Dune to go wrong
Dune is still dense and full of story in an extended serial format
Based on the general consensus of Dune: Prophecy season 1, the first season of the series has as many hits as it does misses, resulting in a sometimes compelling but often frustrating product. As a standalone series, there's a lot of information to digest on initial viewing, which is made even more constrained by the first season's six episodes. Dune: Prophecy It should have at least been expanded to an 8 or 10 episode stretch. Watching Villeneuve's films certainly helps casual viewers get to know themselves with the world of the story and the dynamics of the Great House within Dune: Prophecy.
Dune: Prophecy implements the classic rivalry between Harkonnen and Atreides, the imperial rule of the Corrino family, and the origin of the Bene Gesserit breeding index, all set in the Dune films. It also introduces the new and intriguing elements of Thinking Machines, which were briefly mentioned in Frank Herbert's book. Dune but it didn't become a key part of the story until Dune: Prophecy. The prophecy also updates certain elements introduced in Dune, such as the powers of the Bene Gesserit and other details rooted in lore. However, it goes on a bit too long in its first four episodes which is the conclusion of episode 6, which is almost the length of a movie, is rushed and forced.
How Denis Villeneuve Succeeded With Dune
Both Dune films focused on the relationship between Paul and Chani
Villeneuve wisely established the central glue that tied his two Dune films together from the start of his first Dune entry. Paul starts having visions of Chani in the first filmwhich drives the entire narrative throughout both installments. In fact, both films can be reduced to a sci-fi love story. Villeneuve also avoids burdening viewers with preexisting lore and backstory and instead focuses on the relationships between the central characters, which begin with Paul, his mother Jessica, and his father Duke Leto Atreides.
Villeneuve also firmly establishes the good versus evil dynamic in the first film, which gradually and naturally begins to turn upside down as Paul rises to power in the second film, in anticipation of the Dune 3. Key elements of Dune tradition, as spices, the Fremen and the Bene Gesserit, are also condensed and refined to be easily understoodavoiding falling into convolution. In these and more ways, Villeneuve made the most accessible version of Dune and with his films, while Dune: Prophecy sets up more than it could yield in just one season, essentially requiring a second season.