[COLUMN ] Dune: Part Two is a Study of the Powerlessness of Powerful Men | by Darren Mooney (Patreon)

Note: This piece contains spoilers for Dune: Part Two.

Just as Dune: Part One opened with narration from Chani (Zendaya) laying out the back story of the planet Arrakis, Dune: Part Two opens with a voice over from Princess Irulan (Florence Pugh) outlining the events and consequences of the previous movie. House Atreides was betrayed on Arrakis, in a bloody coup orchestrated by House Harkonnen. The other great families of the Imperium are shocked, whispering among themselves about what could have led to such a catastrophe.

Irulan sits with her father, the Emperor Shaddam IV of House Corrino (Christopher Walken). Shaddam, Irulan explains, loved the deceased Duke Leto Atreides II (Oscar Isaac) “like a son.” There is an intense close-up on the face of Christopher Walken, one of the icons of American popular cinema. Irulan narrates, “And the emperor said…” The pause seems to last an eternity, as Shaddam weighs what he could possibly say. Eventually, Irulan punctuates the moment: “Nothing.”

It’s a moment that sets up much of the movie to come, with Irulan calling attention to her father’s perceived “inaction.” Of course, Shaddam was complicit in the massacre of the Atreides. He had come to view Leto Atreides as a potential political rival, and so conspired with Baron Vladimir Harkonnen (Stellan Skarsgård) to topple House Atreides. Shaddam had even supplied some of his own elite troops, the Sardaukar, to aid in the slaughter. However, Shaddam’s silence represents more than just complicity. It reflects powerlessness.

Although he was a significant influence on the events of Dune: Part One, Shaddam did not appear in the first movie. However, by the time that he appears in the opening scenes of Dune: Part Two, he is already a spent force. He is doomed. On Arrakis, Leto’s son Paul Atreides (Timothée Chalamet) rallies the Fremen armies to avenge his fallen father. Even if Shaddam can defeat Paul, the Harkonnens conspire to expose his involvement in Leto’s murder, which would turn the other houses against him.

Long before the film’s climactic battle, on the safety of the throne world Kaitain, the Reverend Mother Gaius Helen Mohiam (Charlotte Rampling) warns Irulan that her father’s rule is over. No matter what happens, Shaddam will not hold the throne for long. The only chance that Irulan has to secure the survival of House Corrino is through marriage. Mohiam suggests Baron Harkonnen’s nephew, Feyd-Rautha (Austin Butler). Irulan ultimately agrees to marry Paul.

Shaddam is ostensibly the most powerful man in existence. An early scene in Part One establishes that Shaddam is “ascendant to the Golden Lion Throne of Padishah Emperor of the Known Universe.” However, that power is an illusion. Even his move against the Atreides was the result of manipulation by Mohiam. When the Emperor journeys to Arrakis towards the end of Part Two, he does so in a gigantic spherical ship that reflects the outside universe back at itself. It’s all a gigantic mirror. There’s nothing there but what is projected on to it.

This is a fascinating character arc. It is central to the themes of Dune, both the original novel written by Frank Herbert and the adaptation from filmmaker Denis Villeneuve. Dune is about power and politics, about systems and structures. On the surface, Dune is similar to other epic fantasy stories like Star Wars or The Lord of the Rings, sagas about a Chosen One rising up against an evil ruler. However, Dune stands apart from other such epics in how it understands these stories.

Seeking to harness the “desert power” of the nomadic tribes that live in the harsh deserts of Arrakis, Paul finds himself drawn to the religious prophecy seeded among the local population by the Bene Gesserit. Local legends tell of the “Lisan al Gaib”, the “voice from the outer world”, a great leader who will unite the Fremen and liberate Arrakis, transforming the desert into a paradise. Paul’s mother, Lady Jessica (Rebecca Ferguson), urges him to exploit these beliefs.

In Dune, the systems are a trap. Villeneuve constantly composes shots in such a way as to underscore how tiny and powerless individual characters are in comparison to the larger structures around them, both literal and metaphorical. Corridors are improbably and impossibly large, just to make the people within them seem smaller. The imperial machinery – the spice harvesters, for example – dwarf the soldiers tasked with protecting them and the insurgents rising against them.

Part Two often literalizes this idea of human beings as fuel for these larger forces. In the film’s opening sequences, the bodies of Atreides loyalists are burnt in piles on the Harkonnen airstrips, an image mirrored with the burning of the Sardaukar at the end of the film. A few minutes into the film, a troop of Freman makes sure to harvest whatever water they can from a defeated Harkonnen squadron. Water is drained from the bodies of fallen Fremen, and deposited into a gigantic reservoir that will hopefully be used one day to reseed Arrakis.

Throughout Part Two, Chani is skeptical of the religious fervor that Lady Jessica seeks to exploit. At various points in the film, characters bend the knee in submission to Paul, but Chani always refuses. She admonishes her fellow Freman when they embrace Paul as a savior, the Mahdi. They believe that such belief will lead them to freedom, but Chani sees the truth. “This prophecy is how they enslave us!” she screams. She is entirely correct.

Throughout Dune, there is a recurring emphasis on the gulf between humanity and animals. While Paul longs to be an “equal” to Chani, Feyd-Rautha describes her as a “pet” comparable to his concubines. According to Mohaim, the Bene Gesserit “sift people”, testing to see that royalty can resist their animal impulses. The Harkonnens splice human beings with animals, to create uncanny creatures like the weird spider-monster in the Baron’s chambers or the figures that accompany Feyd-Rautha in the arena.

However, the irony is that it’s often difficult for humanity to survive and thrive in this broken world. Gurney Halleck (Josh Brolin) warns Paul that the Harkonnens “are not human, they’re brutal!” Feyd-Rautha’s older brother is the “Beast” Rabban (Dave Bautista). Ecologist Liet Kynes (Sharon Duncan-Brewster) warns Leto that “the desert’s not kind to humans either.” When asked to take a Freman name, Paul chooses Muad’dib, the small mouse that can survive in the desert.

Paradoxically, Dune suggests that human beings may not be so much better than animals. Mohaim warns Paul that “an animal caught in a trap will gnaw off its own leg to escape.” However, for human beings, there is no trap more inescapable than a convincing narrative. Just as Lady Jessica attempts to cultivate a messianic mythology around Paul, the Baron Harkonnen schemes to craft a compelling story for Feyd-Rautha, framing him as a hero and savior who could rally the Imperium behind him.

In Dune, even emperors and leaders are beholden to these larger systems and structures. There is a recurring sense that even the most ostensibly powerful people in this universe have very little agency. Both Emperor Shaddam IV and Baron Vladimir Harkonnen are impotent. Neither has produced a viable heir. As Paul notes, Shaddam “has no sons - and his daughters have yet to marry.” The Baron’s only offspring is Lady Jessica, meaning that his male heirs are his nephews, not his sons.

Unusual for this sort of “Chosen One” narrative, Paul spends most of Part Two trying to fight his destiny. He refuses to follow Lady Jessica’s advice to rally the religious fundamentalists in the Southern Desert to his cause. Paul understands that to do that would unleash something that he cannot control. He desperately seeks any alternative that won’t require him to be complicit in mass murder. Unfortunately, Feyd-Rautha’s campaign of terror forces Paul’s hand. Paul must become a monster.

However, the power of Dune: Part Two lies in the sense of inevitability. Paul knows what he must do - what he will do. Everything else is just a stalling tactic. As Jessica points out, Paul doesn’t marry Chani because he knows that he will need to marry Irulan to secure his claim on the throne. When Paul removes his royal ring to symbolize his equality with the Fremen, he doesn’t throw it away. He keeps it in his pocket, knowing that one day he will take it out again. In his final conversation with Jessica, Leto mused that he “wished [they’d] had more time.” All that even leaders like Leto or Paul can hope to do is to delay the inevitable.

In the end, these powerful men are beholden to forces beyond even their control. “The world has made choices for us,” Chani tells Paul. When Chani discovers that Paul has undergone the ritual that will allow him to see both past and future, Lady Jessica admits, “Paul didn’t want to do this, Chani.” Much like Emperor Shaddam, Paul has no real say in the power that flows around him. When Paul tries to reject the religious mantle thrust upon him, the Freman Stilgar (Javier Bardem) protests, “It doesn’t matter what you believe! I believe!”

“Heroes are painful, superheroes are a catastrophe,” wrote Frank Herbert, outlining the core themes of his science-fiction masterpiece. “It is the systems themselves that I see as dangerous. ‘Systematic’ is a deadly word. Systems originate with human creators, with people who employ them. Systems take over and grind on and on. They are like a flood tide that picks up everything in its path.” That’s the thing about being a Chosen One; the character involved rarely has any choice at all.

In some ways, Dune feels like a blockbuster science-fiction companion piece to the recent wave of biopics like Oppenheimer, Napoleon and even The Iron Claw, stories that reject and deconstruct “the Great Man Theory of History” by presenting their central figures as caught in the gravity of larger events. Villeneuve’s adaptation of Dune feels very timely. After all, it increasingly feels like those in positions of authority have relatively little power over the larger systems around them, even as their loyal followers rally to their banner.

Dune: Part Two also overlaps neatly with movies like Killers of the Flower Moon or The Zone of Interest, as a study of how human beings can go along with incredibly horrific events by either denying their own agency or by ignoring the consequences of their actions. Paul is gifted with sight that allows him to see all that has happened and all that might yet happen. The consequence of that is the complete erosion of his own autonomy, passive resignation to the slaughter necessary to secure his reign.

Dune: Part Two ends with Chani demonstrating what little agency is possible in a world so fundamentally broken. As Shaddam kneels before Paul and kisses the ring in supplication, the rest of the throne room adopts a similar pose of submission. Once again, Chani refuses. She walks away, out into the desert. She summons a worm and rides away from the royal encampment. Perhaps that’s the only way to be truly free.