travel without moving dune

• Technologies and developments
• Holtzman technology
• Spacing Guild
• Terms and meanings

Space travel

• View history

Space travel played a major role in the evolution and expansion of humanity throughout the known universe . Two forms of space travel existed: faster than light space travel , and conventional space travel .

• 1 Faster than light travel
• 2.1 Space Travel Calculator
• 4 References
• 5 Behind the Scenes

Faster than light travel [ ]

Supposed early draft for Jodorowsky´s Dune

For several thousand years, faster than light travel ( FTL travel or space-folding ) was conducted exclusively by the Spacing Guild , using Spacefolder vessels piloted by Guild navigators that folded space-time and moved almost immeasurable distances in the blink of the eye.

This form of travel, while extremely expensive, was also not safe as one in ten ships that used space folding engine disappeared, at least during the early years of the technology's use before the advent of Navigators . It was utilized for both commercial and military purposes. Space-folding made use of two key factors:

• The folding of space-time, which was accomplished by the practical application of the Holtzman Effect .
• The plotting of a safe course through folded space by a Guild Navigator , who used prescient planning induced by vast amounts of the Spice Melange .

Eventually, at some point between the fall of the Atreides Empire and the discovery of the Dar-es-Balat hoard, Ixian navigation machines broke the guild monopoly on foldspace by providing a means of safely navigating foldspace without a navigator. [1] [2]

Conventional space travel [ ]

The old FTL conventional space travel was used mainly for travel within the confines of a star system (not for interstellar travel). However, before the discovery of the new faster-than-light travel method, it was also used for long-distance space travel. The old method was described as "outracing photons". Even after space-folding became the primary means of interstellar travel, many Imperial warships still kept their old FTL drives as an alternative to the much faster but less reliable Holtzmann engines.

A calculation for velocities obtainable with old FTL conventional space travel can be made from the book "The Butlerian Jihad" by Brian Herbert and Kevin J. Anderson. Before the Battle of Earth , the unified Armada is stated to have gathered at Salusa Secundus . This planet is stated in this wikipedia to be located in the  Gamma Waiping system which is about 130.8 light-years form Earth , again according to this wikipedia.  In the book "The Butlerian Jihad"  Xavier Harkonnen states that the Armada takes over a month to reach Earth while traveling at its maximum sustainable speed.  Using terrestrial time periods (days, weeks, months) for simplicity's sake, we get 1,591.4 c for a month, 1,136.72 c for six weeks, and 795.7 c for two months ( c being equal to the speed of light).

Space Travel Calculator [ ]

Space Travel Calculator: In the realm of modern astrophysics and space exploration, understanding the time and resources required for interstellar and interplanetary journeys is crucial. The Space Travel Calculator is a novel tool that provides enthusiasts and researchers alike with valuable insights into potential travel times between various celestial bodies, taking into account several complex variables. This digital utility not only demystifies the vastness of space travel but also fosters a deeper appreciation for the challenges of space exploration. For detailed computations and insights, visit the calculator here: Space Travel Calculator

See also [ ]

• Spice Melange
• Holtzman Effect

References [ ]

• ↑ God Emperor of Dune
• ↑ Heretics of Dune

Behind the Scenes [ ]

The connection between faster than light travel and the Holtzman Effect is not explicitly mentioned by Frank Herbert . It is a connection made in the prequel novels by Brian Herbert and Kevin J. Anderson .

In the ' Legends of Dune ' trilogy, the pair describe the time shortly before and during the discovery of space-folding. In these works the discovery of space-folding is attributed to Norma Cenva , who goes on to become the first prescient folded space navigator. Prior to this, although described in 'The Machine Crusade' as "outracing the old faster than light method", vessels still took weeks or months to cross between even the closest stars.

• 1 Paul Atreides
• 2 Leto Atreides II
• 3 Kwisatz Haderach

Dune (film)

Quotes from Dune , the 1984 motion picture directed by David Lynch , based on the novel Dune by Frank Herbert . See also Dune (TV miniseries) .

• 1 Princess Irulan
• 2 Duke Leto Atreides
• 3 Padishah Emperor Shaddam IV
• 4 Paul Atreides
• 5 Liet-Kynes
• 10 External links

Princess Irulan [ edit ]

• Introductory narrative
• Introducing House Atreides
• House Atreides took control of Arrakis 63 standard days into the year 10,191. It was known that the Harkonnens, the former rulers of Arrakis, would leave many suicide troops behind. Atreides patrols were doubled.
• Following the Bene Gesserit tradition, the old Reverend Mother surrendered her life as she surrendered her knowledge. Jessica has successfully transmuted the poisonous Water of Life. The tremendous power of the Water of Life caused the premature birth of Jessica's daughter, Alia. Alia was born with all the knowledge and powers of a Reverend Mother.
• In the two standard years that followed, Muad'Dib and his Fremen brought spice production to a standstill. Fearing for his life, Rabban did his best to hide this fact from his uncle, the Baron. Paul's sister, Alia, matured at a frightening rate. Her small body harbored tremendous powers. Paul and Chani's love grew.
• Final line spoken by Irulan, when Paul becomes Emperor, just before Arrakis has its first rainfall

Duke Leto Atreides [ edit ]

• Thank you for joining me, Paul. Thufir Hawat has served House Atreides for three generations. He swears you are the finest student he has ever taught. Yueh, Gurney and Duncan say the same. It makes me feel very proud.
• As House Atreides prepares to leave Caladan for Arrakis
• [voiceover] Jessica, what is wrong? Forgive me, my beloved concubine. I should have married you. Why hold a dream to ascend to a throne through a political marriage? I should have married you.

Padishah Emperor Shaddam IV [ edit ]

• In conversation with a Third Stage Spacing Guild Navigator, regarding the Atreides/Harkonnen feud and control of Arrakis and how the Atreides will be felled
• Padishah Emperor Shaddam IV
• Padishah Emperor Shaddam IV, after the Fremen succeed in their assaults on the spice trade.

Paul Atreides [ edit ]

• Reciting a Bene Gesserit mantra
• To his mother, as they try to reach safety of rock outcrops in the desert.
• Instructing Fremen on the use of weirding modules .
• After one of the Fedaykin begins to ask a question of Muad'Dib while holding a weirding module.
• I'm dead to everyone unless I try to become what I may be.
• The Guild and the entire universe depends on spice. He who can destroy a thing, controls a thing.
• When the spice flow stops, all eyes will turn to Arrakis. The Baron and the Emperor himself will be forced to deal with us.
• Your time has come. A storm is coming. Our storm. And when it arrives, it will shake the universe . Emperor...we come for you!!
• Long live the fighters!
• After surviving the spice agony on taking the Water of Life .
• We Fremen have a saying: " God created Arrakis to train the faithful ." One cannot go against the word of God .

Liet-Kynes [ edit ]

• (Thinking about Leto's reaction after the sandworm attack) He's more concerned about the men than the spice. I must admit, against all judgement, I like this duke.

Chani [ edit ]

• Words Paul Atreides had foreseen that she would express to him in a vision-dream, before they had ever met, and before he had yet received the name Usul.
• (Before Paul takes the Water of Life) Paul... whatever happens, I will love you forever. You are my life. You are my life.

Others [ edit ]

• Reverend Mother Gaius Helen Mohiam
• The Mentat Mantra, recited by Piter De Vries
• Piter De Vries
• A member of the Spacing Guild, from a special report within the Guild
• A Guildsman tells the Emperor that his Truthsayer has to leave the room
• Third stage Guild navigator, informing the Emperor that they want Paul Atreides killed during Baron Harkonnen's invasion of Arrakis.
• The Baron Harkonnen's doctor treating the pustules of his skin
• Baron Vladimir Harkonnen
• Duncan Idaho talking to Duke Leto about the Fremen
• Stilgar and the Fremen, chanting.
• Feyd-Rautha , about Chani
• Feyd-Rautha armed with the Emperor's blade against Paul Atreides

Dialogue [ edit ]

Taglines [ edit ]

• A world beyond your experience, beyond your imagination.
• A place beyond your dreams. A movie beyond your imagination.

External links [ edit ]

• Dune quotes at the Internet Movie Database
• Dune at All Movie Guide
• Dune at Rotten Tomatoes

• Space adventure films
• Films based on novels
• American films
• Extraterrestrial life films
• Films set in deserts
• Films directed by David Lynch
• Films set on fictional planets
• Steampunk films

Navigation menu

Mystery of the Spacing Guild in Lynch’s ‘Dune’ Movie

Unlike Denis Villeneuve's 'Dune' adaptation, the Guild were heavily featured in David Lynch's version (1984). Latter's deleted scenes, storyboards, and scripts uncover an even larger planned role for the Navigators and shed light on the movie's controversial ending.

One of the many changes in Denis Villeneuve’s Dune: Part Two movie was the complete lack of the Spacing Guild. We had glimpsed them briefly at the start of Dune: Part One and their Heighliners appeared several times, but, for fans of the novel, they were conspicuous by their absence.

… we had to choose to embrace just one aspect of the book, which is the Bene Gesserit plot line. Other elements had to fall away. You could do a whole other film just focused on the mentat or on the Spacing Guild – they would be interesting to see, of course, but we had to choose. Denis Villeneuve, Sight and Sound – April 2024

For David Lynch however, while the Bene Gesserit and Mentats are featured in his adaptation, it is the Spacing Guild that drive the story forward, from their visit to the Emperor at the start, through Paul’s vision of them prompting him to take the Water of Life, to Paul’s final (and ultimately cut) confrontation with them at the end of the movie.

Indeed, evidence from the movie’s deleted scenes, storyboards, and multiple drafts of its script reveals that the Guild were originally intended to have a much bigger role. Navigators would have been positioned as the primary antagonists to Paul’s journey.

Lynch even introduced the mutated Navigators, who in the novels aren’t “seen” until Dune Messiah , as well as creating First and Second Stage Navigators, representing the progressive mutation caused by the Spice. Heads were created for the latter form, but they were ultimately shown in the movie with their faces simply covered.

Originally Lynch’s Dune was to open with the Fremen Reverend Mother Ramallo providing exposition on the universe of Dune, but in the final film it was replaced with Irulan’s introduction, followed by “The Secret Report within the Guild”, voiced by Kyle MacLachlan!

The Guild then arrive at the palace on Kaitain, and it is clear that despite Shaddam IV being the Emperor of the Known Universe it is the Guild that have the real power. Upon entering the throne room they dismiss the Emperor’s Truthsayer, order the Emperor to share details of his plan, and then command him to have Paul Atreides killed. The Emperor wonders why, but it is something that he dares not ask the Guild out loud.

Later, on Caladan, Paul talks with Thufir who warns that the Harkonnens will still pose a threat on Arrrakis. Paul realizes, however, that the bigger danger comes from House Corrino, but it won’t be until later that he understands that behind the Emperor are the Guild.

The Harkonnens are our enemies, yes…but behind them, I suspect, is the Emperor. Paul Atreides, Lynch’s Dune

We next see the Navigator when House Atreides travels from Caladan to Arrakis in the heighliner. Although not described in the novel, Lynch spends almost two minutes (and a good chuck on the VFX budget) on the space folding scene.

In the novel the folding of space is done by Holtzman engines, but—after the Butlerian Jihad outlawed thinking machines—humans could not use navi-computers to calculate a safe journey. To paraphrase a Spice smuggler from another sci-fi series – “Folding space ain’t like dusting crops, boy! Without precise calculations we could fly right through a star or bounce too close to a supernova and that’d end your trip real quick, wouldn’t it?”

The Guild Navigators of the novel used their prescience to see many possible futures and chose the narrow path to safety. Things are different in the Lynch movie, with the Navigators appearing to fold space directly, swimming through rings of light before the Heighliner appears in orbit over Arrakis.

It is easy to dismiss it as just Sci-Fi spectacle, however the scene contains several important visual clues for events later in the movie – even if some of the context was later lost in the editing of other scenes.

Both Spacing Guild and the Emperor then disappear for a good chunk of the movie. It is only when Paul and the Fremen have bought Spice production to a standstill that the Guild visit the Emperor again, and threaten him with a life in a pain amplifier unless the Spice flows. We are left in no doubt who is really running the Imperium!

We then cut to Paul’s dream/vision showing the Guild saying Paul won’t take the Water of Life. The audio of their conversation drops, but we can see that they are still talking, and the fifth draft reveals the original full intended dialogue:

Here the Guild instead say that Paul will take the Water of Life, but it the last part that is the most revealing “…we must kill him when he enters the Alam .”

The Alam refers to the Alam al-mithal, which is described in the Terminology of the Imperium at the end of the novel as: “the mystical world of similitudes where all physical limitations are removed.”

With this single word much of the film’s imagery of the navigators falls into place – in Lynch’s Dune the Alam is where the Guild travel to through the light-rings, a place where, with no physical limitations, space can be folded.

Review – ‘Dune: Part Two’ Movie Soundtrack

Paul then takes the Water of Life, and we see a projection of his body flying through the same rings of lights that the navigators passed through – Paul has entered the Alam and is now able, as Paul says, to “ travel, without moving ” – to fold space.

As late as the seventh and final draft of the script, the Third Stage Guild Navigators enact their plan to kill Paul, and attack him in the Alam – a scene missing from the final film.

Paul communicates through his sister Alia, revealing that the Guild are behind everything. This scene still exists as a deleted scene, but with Alicia Witt’s original voice recorded on set, and not replaced with Kyle MacLachan’s voice as Paul.

In the film Paul’s final encounter with the Guild is very brief, with just a line to the Guildsmen of “You have some idea of what I could do” – alluding to his ability to destroy the Spice, but in the fifth draft Paul projects his mind into the Heighliner to speak to a 500-foot long, worm-like Fourth Stage Navigator!

Having dealt with the Guild all that remains is a knife fight with his cousin Feyd in the physical world, before taking the throne as Emperor of the Known Universe.

Lynch’s Dune infamously ends with rain falling on Arrakis, and this is often ascribed to a divine miracle, with Paul having become a god. Instead we can now interpret this to be Paul using his new ability to transport clouds from Caladan to Arrakis by folding space. To travel without moving. To be in many places at once.

And how can this be? For he is the Kwisatz Haderach!

The various scripts for David Lynch’s Dune , along with many other Dune related scripts can be download from the DuneInfo Script Archive .

Top Reviews

Movie review – ‘dune: part two’, review – ‘dune: imperium digital’ early access, book review – ‘dune: exposures’.

Screen Rant

Dune: how space travel works & why spice is important.

The world of Arrakis, also called Dune, is the only source of the spice melange, the key to interstellar travel and the only currency that matters.

Why is the spice important to  Dune,  and the key to its space travel? Dune is a science fiction story about warring noble houses in space; their wars, betrayals, and political maneuvering, both a grand space opera and a seminal science fiction story. Central to all conflict in  Dune  is the spice called "melange", which everyone desires. With the hype centering around Denis Villeneuve's  Dune,  those unfamiliar with the story may feel like they have to do a lot of homework about the  Dune  universe to understand it. The relationship between spice and space travel is actually pretty simple, however, although it has big implications. In understanding the spice, one understands  Dune.

Dune  began as a much-loved 1965 science fiction novel by Frank Herbert, the first book to win both the Hugo and the Nebula awards. Its success led to a series of novels that enriched and expanded the universe. The book has struggled to be adapted to screen, with many believing the  Dune book   can't be faithfully adapted  due to the sprawling world and dense story. Since Dune is a large book—its first edition was just over 400 pages—adaptation has certainly proved challenging, and what has appeared on screen has been truncated or drastically altered. Through several failed productions,  Dune  has made it to film only twice: once in 1984 under the direction of David Lynch, and once in 2021 under Denis Villeneuve, and once in miniseries format in a 2000 SyFy production. Central to all versions of the story is the spice.

Related:  Why Villeneuve's Dune Is Already Beating Blade Runner 2049's Box Office

The spice is the great McGuffin within the narrative of the Dune universe. Every character wants spice, to control the spice, or to ingest the spice. " The spice must flow " as they say repeatedly in the books, in voice-over whispers in David Lynch's  Dune , and it even manages to work its way as a mantra into Denis Villeneuve's film. Dune has a large cast of characters , but every one of their personal journeys are at least tangentially related to the spice. The key aspect of the spice is that ingesting it grants " prescience, " the ability to briefly see into the future, or rather to experience time outside the restrictions of a past-present-future framework. This is so tremendously useful to the people of the Dune universe that it influences all of the most important aspects of its setting: religion, politics, and space travel.

What Exactly Is Spice?

The spice called " melange ," or more often simply referred to as " the spice " is a dusty red substance created by monstrously large and incredibly dangerous sandworms as they burrow through the sands of their home planet of Arrakis, known colloquially as Dune. Sandworms do not live on any other planet than the desert planet Arrakis. The sandworms of Dune have animal-like intelligence, varying only slightly in appearance between adaptations, and are so tremendously large that they can rise from the ground and eat whole buildings.

Despite the danger, spice is still sought out as it's so valuable–the most important commodity in the universe due to its ability to grant longevity, vastly increase mental powers, and enable faster-than-light travel known as space folding. Therefore, the noble family House that controls Arrakis singularly controls the harvesting of spice. Likewise, Dune is the key location of the universe, with spice getting shipped across the universe from the central point of Arrakis. Beyond just its political power as a commodity, however, the spice also has practical applications within the narrative of  Dune.

What is the Spacing Guild?

Notably, all space travel is controlled by the Spacing Guild, an organization granted a monopoly on all space travel by the Padishah Emperor who rules over the noble Houses, and therefore controls the distribution of spice melange. With the prescience granted by ingesting the spice melange, the guild's skilled and highly trained Navigators are able to fold space, essentially creating wormholes to pilot their gigantic starships instantly across the galaxy. Unfortunately, the Navigators on those spacefolder ships take so much spice to achieve their navigational powers that their bodies mutate horribly into a sort of fish-like creature. It's a high price that some are nonetheless willing to pay. Without the spice, space journeys would be undergone by atomic rockets and take hundreds of years to move from planet to planet. The vast scope of the  Dune film   runs the risk of alienating audiences with so many details about the implications of spice, but, luckily, the Spacing Guild does not factor much into the story of  Dune  and its direct events. Mostly readers are told of its influence as a way of leveraging the importance of the spice.

Related:  Dune's Sequel Chances Show How Important Streaming Is Now

Who Are The Bene Gesserit?

It is easy to get lost in Dune 's overwhelming glossary  and unique terminology, but one term to know is " Bene Gesserit ," an organization of what are effectively space witches and oracles. Part religious organization and part spy and assassin guild, the women-only Bene Gesserit are martial artists, philosophers, scientists and advisors, and probably the group with the greatest influence on the narrative of  Dune.  The machinations of the Bene Gesserit are complex, but in simplest terms, they ingest spice to gain prescience, as well as other supernatural abilities, and use them for political maneuvering. To become Reverend Mothers, the Bene Gesserit also undertake a ceremony where they ingest a modified, highly toxic version of spice known as the Water of Life. Many die, but those who survive the ordeal are granted the memories of all of their female ancestors. Without the spice, they effectively lose their powers. Without their powers, the Bene Gesserit lose their advantage in the fierce political arena of the  Dune  universe.

It is a testament to Frank Herbert's craft that  Dune  can focus so intensely on one planet and one object and still feel like such a large, imposing universe. The story of  Dune   has had a drastic influence on other science fiction properties, with its magical monastic order, its noble Houses, its desert planet, and generally the complexity of its world-building. Spice is at the very center of the story and its events. Without it, spaceships do not run, magical sorceresses lose their powers, and the plot of  Dune— where, as the story begins, many of these established facts are flipped on their head—does not happen. While Denis Villeneuve's  Dune   promises to indoctrinate new fans, it all comes down to the spice melange: The spice must flow .

Next:  Dune 2 Story: What Happens Next In The Books

• Mobile Site
• Staff Directory
• Advertise with Ars

Filter by topic

• Biz & IT
• Gaming & Culture

Front page layout

the spice must flow! —

Before the new version, let’s revisit 1984’s dune —the greatest movie ever made, the pursuit of greatness must embrace the ridiculous..

Peter Opaskar - Oct 17, 2021 7:00 pm UTC

Frank Herbert's 1965 sci-fi novel Dune  gets a new film adaptation—this one helmed by Denis Villeneuve ( Arrival , Blade Runner 2049 )— later this month . But before Ars Technica reviews the movie, there's the matter of its predecessor: 1984's Dune , made by a then up-and-coming filmmaker named David Lynch.

Detractors call Lynch's saga—a tale of two noble space families 8,000 years in the future, fighting over the most valuable resource in the universe amidst sandworms the size of aircraft carriers—incomprehensible, stilted, and ridiculous. It lost piles of money. Yet fans, especially in recent years, have reclaimed Lynch's film as a magnificent folly, a work of holy, glorious madness.

• Lynch begins Dune where his previous film ( The Elephant Man ) ends: a starfield. The Emperor's daughter (Virginia Madsen of Sideways ) fades in to bring us up to speed. She doesn't appear again for nearly 2 hours and, when she does, she doesn't say or do anything. Universal Pictures
• Jose Ferrer is more subdued than the moniker "Emperor of the Known Universe" might lead you to believe. His son Miguel was on Twin Peaks . Siân Phillips plays his personal space nun. Universal Pictures
• The Emperor talks to a Guild Navigator. Look at that set. Your ranch-style two-story in the exurbs doesn't seem so fancy now, does it? Universal Pictures
• The Guild Navigator started out as a regular human but has been mainlining the Spice for a thousand years or something. He can fold space but probably can't get a date. Universal Pictures
• This is where the Atreides family lives. Long live models. Universal Pictures
• Paul (Kyle MacLachlan) has a tête-à-tête with the Emperor's space nun. Fear may be the mind killer, but that thing at his neck is the regular kind of killer. Phillips has more dialogue in this scene than in any other, but she gets in some grade-A sighing and moaning throughout, because Lynch loves showing older women with wild hair having meltdowns. She's why you hire great talents. Universal Pictures
• Little spaceships carry the Atreides and their entourage to a big spaceship for the journey to Dune. This whole space-travel sequence, like much of Dune , plays out like a ritual. See the docking bay where the spaceships are going in? I don't think this screenshot does justice to all the baroque decoration. Nothing says, "We've had space travel for thousands of years" like needless ornamentation. Universal Pictures
• A Guild Navigator in his natural habitat. The Spice lets him move the Atreides' big spaceship. Universal Pictures
• The Guild Navigator looks for Dune on his handy starchart. Complaining about dated special effects is like complaining when you see a Model T at a car show. Universal Pictures
• The big spaceship has been teleported to Dune. Note that it has no means of propulsion; it doesn't need any. Universal Pictures
• Small spacecraft bring Atreides to the surface of Dune. The little ships look kind of like birds with their heads cut off. Universal Pictures
• Unloading. Universal Pictures
• A shuttle flies across the surface of Dune. Universal Pictures
• How'd I forget that Max von Sydow is in this? Anyway, he's flying the shuttle. The patriarch of the Atreides (Jürgen Prochnow) is the hale fellow on the right. Universal Pictures
• Why wouldn't David Lynch be a Spice miner on the planet Dune? He is, after all, the kwisatz haderach . Universal Pictures
• The hoopla around Duncan Idaho's (Richard Jordan) appearance, followed by him doing just about nothing, helps give Dune its dreamlike feel. Universal Pictures

MY HISTORY WITH DUNE

So which group am I in? Both. Am I about to describe Dune as "so bad it's good"? No, that's a loser take for cowards.

I once half-heard a radio interview with someone speculating that the then-current artistic moment was not "so bad it's good," and it wasn't "ironic" either—it was actually "awesome." (I didn't catch who he was, so if any of this sounds familiar, hit me up in the comments.) Art can speak to you while at the same time being absurd. The relatable can sometimes be reached only by going through the ridiculous. The two can be inseparable, like the gravitational pull between a gas giant and its moon—or Riggs and Murtaugh .

The example the radio interviewee gave was of Evel Knievel, the '70s daredevil who wore a cape and jumped dirt bikes over rows of buses. Absurd? Heavens, yes. A feat of motorcycling and physicality? Absolutely. But beyond that, we can relate to Knievel's need to achieve transcendence at such a, shall we say, niche skill. We might also marvel at our own ability to be impressed by something that should be objectively useless but is instead actually  awesome.

A more contemporary example might be Tenet . It's a relentless international thriller about fate and climate change and the need for good people to hold evil at bay . But it's also a "dudes rock!" bromance between Two Cool Guys in Suits spouting sci-fi mumbo-jumbo. It can't be one without the other.

• From their first appearance, the Harkonnen are all about domination and humiliation. Nature is being dominated on the Harkonnen home world. Universal Pictures
• Baron Harkonnen (Kenneth McMillan) has problems. I took so many screenshots of him because I was trying to get one in midspittle. He's a spittle-heavy guy. Universal Pictures
• His nephews are The Beast (Paul Smith) and Feyd (Sting). Their uniforms combine Flash Gordon schlock with fetish gear and are obviously too heavy for the sweaty environs of the Harkonnen home world. Universal Pictures
• Some Harkonnen lackeys. On the left is Eraserhead himself, Jack Nance. He also finds Laura Palmer's body and has the first line of dialogue in Twin Peaks . Next to him is Brad Dourif, who has been in sequels to Alien , The Exorcist , Lord of the Rings , and Bad Lieutenant , and he is the voice of Chucky . Truly, a weirdo's weirdo. Universal Pictures
• Here's a Harkonnen servant. Remember to join a union, kids! Universal Pictures
• A behind-the-scenes shot of the Baron's... throne room? Having your lackeys watch you get your zits popped is a flex, I guess. Also, the Baron can fly. Universal Pictures
• Here's the image you've been clamoring for, you animals. Universal Pictures
• Paul trains to fight with this voice gun, but Dune is mostly a quiet movie. I'm showing off this screenshot at my next performance review. I got mad screenshot skills. Universal Pictures
• No, your monitor isn't messed up, and you're not having a stroke—that's Paul wearing an energy shield! Universal Pictures
• The shield is activated by a button on your belt, which was the style at the time. Universal Pictures
• Harkonnen soldiers prepare for battle. Universal Pictures
• The Harkonnen en route to Dune. Universal Pictures
• A pitched battle in the sky. Pew-pew! Universal Pictures
• Ka-blammo! Universal Pictures
• My mom does the same thing when I drive. Universal Pictures
• Paul and his mom (Francesca Annis) flee the Harkonnen assault. Universal Pictures

Travel without moving

I love Dune because it feels just as alien as something set 80 centuries in the future should. (To put that span of time in context, remember that 8,000 years in the past would still be 3,500 years before the Great Pyramids were built.) To create this feeling, Lynch blurs the novel's plot and characters into a  Spaceballs "ludicrous speed" lightshow.

Dune is the dream you have after reading a book about the distant future while listening to a 90-minute prog-rock album. Also, you may have done a pile of blow before falling asleep, because Sting is strutting around in Batman's speedo.

Characters drift in and out, and their identities and relationships are unclear. A bear-sized scrotal mutant can move spaceships with drug-induced mind-magic. Soldiers bring drums to a knife fight. Plot threads are left untied. Brad Dourif has breathtaking eyebrows. Cast members deliver their inner thoughts via whispered, close-to-the-mic voiceovers worthy of an ASMR YouTube channel. The pacing is leisurely, almost hypnotic. You're here for the wild sights, the rococo spaceships, the high-collared uniforms, and conversations so formal they border on liturgical. Just sit back and let them wash over you.

In other words, this was not exactly how Universal Studios intended to spend $40 million in 1980s money.

reader comments

Channel ars technica.

Dune (1984)

Jürgen prochnow: duke leto atreides.

• Photos (38)
• Quotes (14)

Photos 

Quotes 

Duke Leto Atreides : I'll miss the sea, but a person needs new experiences. They jar something deep inside, allowing him to grow. Without change something sleeps inside us, and seldom awakens. The sleeper must awaken.

Dr. Kynes : [whispering]  Bless the maker and his water, bless the coming and going of him, may his passing cleanse the world.

Duke Leto Atreides : What's that you're saying?

Dr. Kynes : Nothing.

Duke Leto Atreides : What have you discovered about the Fremen, Duncan? Tell me. Why haven't we heard from you?

Duncan Idaho : My lord, I suspect so much. I think they are the allies we seek. They are strong, fierce. They do not give their loyalty easily or quickly. As you know, the Imperium has never been able to take a census of the Fremen. Everyone thinks that there are but few, wandering here and there in the desert. My lord, I suspect an incredible secret has been kept on this planet: that the Fremen exist in vast numbers - vast. And it is they who control Arrakis.

Lady Jessica : [Jessica and Leto are lying in bed together the night before the family's journey to Arrakis]  I once told you a daughter would be conceived at a time of parting.

Duke Leto Atreides : I remember. Conceived in love, at a time of parting. Arrakis is a hostile world.

Lady Jessica : I must be sure you want this. It has to be tonight, under these influences. I could hear you with the wind.

Duke Leto Atreides : And I whispered 'Yes'.

Lady Jessica : And I whispered 'I love you'.

Spice Worker : Sire, we can't leave all this Spice.

Duke Leto Atreides : Damn the Spice! Get out of there!

Duke Leto Atreides : [responding to Thufir's resignation, after Paul narrowly cheats death via a "hunter-seeker," with which his chamber was boobytrapped]  ... Enough of this, Thufir! *If* you made a mistake, it was in over-estimating the Harkonnens. Their simple minds came up with a simple trick! Moreover, Paul survived this largely because of your training; you didn't fail there.

Thufir Hawat : Sector six through eighty progress reports, Sire.

Duke Leto Atreides : Take it, Thufir.

Thufir Hawat : [speaking rapidly into a communications device]  Sector six-eighty, copy the sixth the sum of the eighth quadrant of the ninth plus eight-four circles weave the eighth quarter the fourth, copy!

[the device hums briefly] 

Thufir Hawat : [to the communication device]  Eight! Thufir Hawat, Mentant, Master of Assassins.

Thufir Hawat : [to the Duke]  The palace is now secure.

Thufir Hawat : My lord?

Duke Leto Atreides : Thufir, haven't you heard from Duncan Idaho yet?

Thufir Hawat : No sire. I have, however, discovered what the city Freemen called out to Paul when we entered the city.

Duke Leto Atreides : Mahdi... And Lisan al Ghaeeb. Yes.

Thufir Hawat : It is a prophecy that a young leader will come to them with a Bene Gesserit mother. It follows the familiar messiah pattern.

Duke Leto Atreides : But Mahdi?

Thufir Hawat : Yes. It seems it is written that he will lead them to true freedom.

Duke Leto Atreides : Oh Jessica, my beloved concubine. I should have married you.

Duke Leto Atreides : Soon, they will begin to fold space.

Paul : [inner voice]  Far off, in the control rooms of spice gas, traveling without moving.

Dr. Wellington Yueh : I sabotaged the Shield Generators. I've brought House Atreides down.

Duke Leto Atreides : Why?

Dr. Wellington Yueh : I wanted to kill a man. Not you, my dear Duke. You were already dead.

Duke Leto Atreides : They have tried to take the life of my son!

Duke Leto Atreides : [saving Spice Miners from The Worm]  Sloppy! Damn sloppy!

Duke Leto Atreides : [VO]  My beloved concubine, I should have married you.

Release Dates | Official Sites | Company Credits | Filming & Production | Technical Specs

• Full Cast and Crew
• Release Dates
• Official Sites
• Company Credits
• Filming & Production
• Technical Specs
• Plot Summary
• Plot Keywords
• Parents Guide

Did You Know?

• Crazy Credits
• Alternate Versions
• Connections
• Soundtracks

Photo & Video

• Photo Gallery
• Trailers and Videos
• User Reviews
• User Ratings
• External Reviews
• Metacritic Reviews

Related Items

• External Sites

Related lists from IMDb users

Recently Viewed

• Songwriter Interviews
• Song Writing
• Fact or Fiction
• They're Playing My Song
• Songfacts Pages
• Songwriting Legends
• Songfacts Podcast
• Amanda Flinner
• Bruce Pollock
• Corey O'Flanagan
• Dan MacIntosh
• Laura Antonelli
• Leslie Michele Derrough
• Maggie Grimason
• Nicole Roberge
• Roger Catlin
• Shawna Ortega
• Stephanie Myers
• Trevor Morelli

Travelling Without Moving by Jamiroquai

Songfacts®:

• Written by lead singer Jay Kay, this song starts with him accelerating up until fifth gear in a 1994 Lamborghini Diablo SE30. >> Suggestion credit : Eric - Vancouver, Canada
• Jay Kay was branded a hypocrite by some critics for using the Ferrari-inspired logo that adorned the Travelling Without Moving album cover (with the group's Buffalo Man mascot standing in for the familiar black horse), undermining the environmentally conscious Emergency on Planet Earth album. But the frontman is unapologetic about his addiction to sports cars. "People say, 'Jay you've got fourteen cars, how unenviromentally friendly.' But you can't drive them all at once. Even if I'm driving one, there's thirteen that somebody else can't because they're mine," he reasoned in a 2001 Esquire interview. At the time, his collection included numerous Ferraris, an Aston Martin DB5, two Mercedes 4×4s, a 1960s Mercedes convertible and an Audi RS4.
• If your spell-checker flagged the song and album title, you're probably American; most English-speaking countries spell "Traveling" with two Ls ("Travelling").
• More songs from Jamiroquai
• More songs from 1996
• Lyrics to Travelling Without Moving
• Jamiroquai Artistfacts

Comments: 2

• Simon from Atlanta, Ga The about is about being high.
• Joshua from Twin Cities, Mn The title may be referring to Frank Herbert's sci-fi epic Dune . In the Dune universe, the preferred method of interstellar space travel is "folding space", which is described by one of the characters as "traveling without moving".

More Songfacts:

Foolish Games Jewel

A guy Jewel fell for when she was 16 inspired her hit "Foolish Games."

I Gotta Feeling The Black Eyed Peas

Will.I.am, literally dreamt up "I Gotta Feelin'." Said the Black Eyed Pea: "Have you ever had a dream where there's a melody in your dream? I'll wake up out of my sleep and record that! 'I Gotta Feelin' was one of those songs."

Cinnamon Girl Neil Young

Neil Young was married when he wrote "Cinnamon Girl," which clearly was not about his wife. He had a hard time explaining it to her.

Bloodstream Ed Sheeran

Ed Sheeran's "Bloodstream" was written after an experience taking MDMA during a wedding celebration in Ibiza, and it's basically about all the feelings that he got from that time.

He Ain't Heavy, He's My Brother The Hollies

The motto for Boys Town, which was a Nebraska home for troubled youth, inspired the song "He Ain't Heavy, He's My Brother" by The Hollies.

If I Ain't Got You Alicia Keys

Alicia Keys wrote "If I Ain't Got You" just after she'd heard the news that Aaliyah had passed away. in a plane crash.

Editor's Picks

Brandi Carlile Songwriter Interviews

As a 5-year-old, Brandi was writing lyrics to instrumental versions lullabies. She still puts her heart into her songs, including the one Elton John sings on.

Keith Reid of Procol Harum Songwriter Interviews

As Procol Harum's lyricist, Keith wrote the words to "A Whiter Shade Of Pale." We delve into that song and find out how you can form a band when you don't sing or play an instrument.

James Williamson of Iggy & the Stooges Songwriter Interviews

The Stooges guitarist (and producer of the Kill City album) talks about those early recordings and what really happened with David Bowie.

Songs in Famous Movie Scenes: Tarantino Edition Music Quiz

Whether he's splitting ears or burning Nazis, Quentin Tarantino uses memorable music in his films. See if you can match the song to the scene.

Church Lyrics Music Quiz

Here is the church, here is the steeple - see if you can identify these lyrics that reference church.

Taylor Dayne Songwriter Interviews

Taylor talks about "The Machine" - the hits, the videos and Clive Davis.

Songfacts® Newsletter

A monthly update on our latest interviews, stories and added songs

Information

• Terms of Service
• Our Privacy Policy
• Google Privacy Policy
• Songfacts API
• Music History Calendar
• Song Licensing
• Affiliate Disclosure
• Privacy Manager
• X (Twitter)

Contribution

• Message Boards
• Songfacts Writers

©2024 Songfacts, LLC

A Magazine of Science Fiction and Fantasy

Advertisement

Traveling Without Moving

By michi trota in uncanny magazine issue thirty-seven | 2010 words.

Paul: “What’s in the box?”

Rev. Mother Gaius Helen Mohiam: “Pain.”

The summer after my tatay died, I went into his study and pulled every single science fiction novel from the shelves to send to Reading, Pennsylvania, where I was moving to start high school and live with my mother’s oldest brother and his family. Both of my parents had been avid readers, but Tatay was the one with a personal book collection, which spilled out of haphazard stacks on bookshelves amidst an obstacle course of unfiled paper piles and model battleship boxes littering the floor. Unlike my mother’s sunlit sewing room, with its bins of neatly folded fabric and shelves of supplies and everything grouped by size and color, none of Tatay’s books were organized by title or author or even genre, so I grabbed anything and everything with familiar names on spines and covers with spaceships, galaxies, and silhouettes of humans in spacesuits. These were the books he talked about at dinner parties, whose plots he told me as bedtime stories. While our relationship had become strained in the two and a half years between my mother’s death and his, SF/F remained one of the few ways we could communicate without stumbling into another cycle of resentment, disappointment, and recriminations. I never felt closer to him than when we watched and talked about Star Trek, Robotech, or Doctor Who, so if he’d loved these books, I thought I could, too .

At the very least I wasn’t about to let them end up in the garage sale my stepmother was unaware I’d overheard her talking about.

I found several of Isaac Asimov’s Foundation novels, which I would bounce off multiple times before finally giving up in my 30s. There were hardcover copies of Arthur C. Clarke’s 2010 and 2061 , but oddly 2001 was nowhere to be found. I’m sure there were a few Year’s Best collections from the 1980s and dozens of other books that would be considered part of the SF/F canon. I packed them all. But the ones that mattered most were all six (at the time) of Frank Herbert’s Dune series.

While I didn’t actually read Dune until after Tatay died, we still had a shared love of the story since I’d watched David Lynch’s 1984 film adaptation of Dune with him for the first time when I was seven. Unlike Star Wars , the world of Dune was dark, morally ambiguous, violent, and utterly, unapologetically bizarre. I was fascinated. I dug up earthworms to bring to the playground sandbox to play “Arrakis” and pretended I had a weirding module. I still think of Patrick Stewart more as Gurney Halleck than Captain Picard. And because Tatay recorded Dune on VHS when it was broadcast as a two-night movie “event” on network TV, we would watch it together repeatedly. He taught me to recite the Litany Against Fear from memory by the time I was in second grade. I still have some of my old notebooks from junior high and high school where I’d jotted down the Litany on the blank untreated backs, nestled among lyrics by Metallica and Megadeth and Joy Division and snippets of poems by Sylvia Plath and Allen Ginsberg.

I remember reciting the Litany under my breath when the plane carrying me away from Chicago took off while I cried silently.

Bene Gesserit proverb: “Survival is the ability to swim in strange water.”

Tatay didn’t talk much about his childhood in the Zamboanga Peninsula of Mindanao in the southern Philippines. I know that my lolo was a prominent local doctor and that my lola was deeply involved with the Catholic church, and they had adopted my tatay from a Catholic-run orphanage when he was a toddler. I have vague memories of meeting two Filipinas visiting from Canada who were his sisters, but that singular visit is the only time Tatay ever mentioned his birth family. The only paternal aunt I really knew was the daughter Lola and Lolo had a few years after adopting my Tatay.

Despite growing up close to the coast, Tatay hated the ocean only slightly more than he hated the jungle. Every story he ever told about being out in nature ended with him stepping on pissed off eels or getting blisters from fire coral or falling off the back of a runaway horse into a patch of what he swore was “razorblade grass.” The last time I visited the Philippines, we went on a beach resort vacation with his family, and he refused to go any farther out than knee deep in the water. After treating my arm when I accidentally swam into a swarm of jellyfish and got stung from fingertips to shoulder, he admonished that the best way to avoid jellyfish stings was to stay out of the ocean, and that’s why he’d never been stung. I got back in the water the next day, bandages and jellyfish swarms notwithstanding, while he sipped martinis at the beach house.

Tatay preferred to keep his adventures mostly imaginary, reading anything he could get his hands on. He often lamented the loss of his collection of Prince Valiant and Superman strips, which were left behind when his family had to pack up in the middle of the night and escape into the mountain jungles. Tatay was 14 when the Japanese armed forces invaded the islands at the end of 1941 and declared Manila an occupied city in January 1942. The Japanese military initially overlooked Tatay’s family since Lolo was a well-respected doctor whose skills they thought they could make use of. Lolo, however, was apparently treating Filipino resistance fighters on the sly, and eventually someone let that knowledge slip. Tatay and the whole family fled their home to avoid retaliation. By the time the family returned from the jungle after Japan’s surrender to the US in 1945, Tatay was no longer a child. His comics collection had burned to ashes, along with everything else in the house.

At some point, Lolo moved the family to Manila, and Tatay immigrated to the US to attend medical school after graduating from the University of the Philippines. He eventually became a naturalized citizen, got married, divorced, married, widowed, and married again. From the time I was born until Tatay’s death, we only visited the Philippines three times. The last time was when I was 13, shortly before Lola died, so that Tatay could introduce her to my future stepmom. He died a year later, and I haven’t been back since.

Maud’dib: “There is probably no more terrible instant of enlightenment than the one in which you discover your father is a man – with human flesh.”

I started reading Dune as soon as it arrived with the rest of my things at my relatives’ house. Here’s the thing about reading Dune if you’ve already seen the 1984 movie: familiarity with the movie doesn’t actually mean you’re prepared for the full depth of the book. It’s like thinking once you’ve waded in a pond, you know what it’s like to swim in the ocean, and finding yourself utterly unprepared. Everything that I’d loved about the movie was magnified and deepened in the book: the complex relationship between economics, religion, politics, and propaganda, the scheming between Houses and the Bene Gesserit, the fascinating weirdness of Herbert’s vision, and in particular, Paul’s uncertainty and his struggle to carry the weight of his father’s legacy and mistakes.

I didn’t realize until reading the book that Paul was in fact nearly the same age as me when my Tatay died, nearly the same age as Tatay when he fled his familiar home to find refuge in an environment he’d learned to see as dangerous and unpredictable. Like Paul, the end of Tatay’s boyhood was marked by war and exile, and an accelerated path to adulthood. I wondered how much of himself my tatay had seen in Paul, what he thought about losing his childhood to another country’s dreams of empire, if he had allowed his fear to pass over and through him to see a path forward with a clear eye.

I wondered what kind of legacy he’d wanted to leave for me, or if he’d even thought about it at all.

While Tatay occasionally talked about being a teenager during the Japanese occupation, I didn’t actually learn that his family had spent that time in hiding, and why, until years after he’d died. It was his first wife who shared that story when I was visiting with my oldest brother and his family on a holiday break in college. When I asked her why he never told us, she shrugged and said that Tatay was just the kind of person who preferred to avoid talking about “unpleasant things” at all costs. I couldn’t argue with her assessment. She’d had to be the one to initiate the divorce after Tatay had started dating my mother (while he was also still seeing another woman with whom he’d had one of my older brothers).

Knowing that Tatay had actually spent his young adult years not just living through war, but actively hiding his identity from hostile occupiers, put a different lens on the ways he expected my younger brother and me to behave after our mother died. He would abruptly leave the dinner table and retreat to his study if we talked about her “too much.” I wasn’t allowed to look unhappy when I was around him and my stepmother because it was “rude and disrespectful.” Apparently after my mother had died, Tatay got into arguments with some of our closest family friends when they pushed for him to send my younger brother and myself to therapy. Therapy, in his view, was unnecessary, and his children “needed to learn how to weather the slings and arrows of life.” He might as well have said he wanted us to endure our own gom jabbar.

I’d like to think that this was my tatay’s way of protecting his kids, teaching them how to survive shock and loss. Maybe for him, trauma and pain were just something you learned to live with, processed or not. I wonder if he was afraid of the path we might find if we had guidance through our own fear and pain, rather than being left to fend for ourselves.

I eventually finished the series with Chapterhouse: Dune somewhere around sophomore year. I didn’t exactly end up loving it, and I couldn’t feel satisfied at having completed a series that was itself unfinished. All Herbert had left were notes and sketches, a vague outline of his intentions. Piecing it all together might complete the story, but it was still just an approximation.

I kept reading Tatay’s books, and when I finished them all, I bought more books by the same authors, and books I thought he would have liked, more than enough books to fill the space and time I was left to myself, but never enough to forget where I was, or that he was gone. I rewatched the same shows and movies we’d seen together, staying up late at night to use the one VCR in the house after my relatives had gone to sleep, volume low, seated close to the TV screen in the dark. Returning to familiar stories is its own kind of time travel, although that’s no guarantee you’ll find what it is you went back for.

© 2020 Michi Trota

Michi Trota

Michi Trota is a five-time Hugo Award winner, British Fantasy Award winner, and the first Filipina to win a Hugo Award. Michi is Editor-in-Chief of Science Fiction & Fantasy Writers of America (SFWA) and Senior Editor of Prism . She is also co-editor of the WisCon Chronicles Vol. 12 with Isabel Schechter (Aqueduct Press), has written for Chicago Magazine , and was the exhibit text writer for Worlds Beyond Here: Expanding the Universe of APA Science Fiction at the Wing Luke Museum in Seattle, WA. She’s been featured in publications like the 2016 Chicago Reader People Issue , Chicago Tribune , and The Guardian , and has spoken at the Adler Planetarium, the Chicago Humanities Festival, and on NPR about topics spanning feminism, media representation, and pop culture. Michi is a firespinner with the Raks Geek Fire+Bellydance troupe, past president of the Chicago Nerd Social Club Board of Organizers , and lives with her spouse and their two cats in Chicago.

Photo credit: Patricia Nightshade

Leave a Reply

Click here to cancel reply.

You must be logged in to post a comment. You can register here.

How The Fremen Get On & Off The Giant Worms

Spoilers are ahead for Dune: Part Two.

• Riding sandworms is a crucial Fremen skill, and they primarily use maker hooks to mount and control them.
• Frank Herbert's Children of Dune reveals Fremen wait for the sandworms to get tired before dismounting.
• Sandworms hold cultural significance — they are vital in spice production and religious beliefs.

Dune: Part Two delves deeper into the Fremen's relationship with sandworms and how they manage to ride them, but how they mount and dismount the autotrophic animal is still a little confusing. In the first installment of Denis Villeneuve's Dune , the sandworms barely showed up on screen for a minute and a half, which was surprising given their significance in the franchise's overarching lore. However, by limiting their screen time in the first film, Villeneuve effectively raised viewers' excitement about their appearance in Dune: Part Two .

Unlike the first film, Dune: Part Two does not hold back from giving audiences a better look at the sandworms and how the Fremen interact with them. It also explores the intricate methods the Fremen use to ride and control the Arrakis animals. However, despite the film's best efforts to show and not tell how the Freemen maintain a symbiotic relationship with them, some aspects surrounding how the two Arrakis forces work in tandem remain unclear.

Why Paul's War On The Houses Is A Holy War

How fremen get on (& ride) sandworms, what the dune books and movies reveal.

Riding the sandworms is a skill that all Fremen have to master before the age of 12. Therefore, to prove that he is one of the Fremen, Paul Arteides also hones his worm-riding skills under Stilgar's guidance and puts his newfound learnings to the test by attempting to ride a full-fledged worm without assistance. As shown in Dune 2 , Paul Arteides first lures a sandworm using a thumper that sends rhythmic vibrations into the ground. Once a worm reaches the desired location for mounting, Paul jumps on its back using "marker hooks."

These hooks dig into the sandworms' scales, and when pulled back, they expose the sensitive flesh underneath the scales to the sand. Once sand enters the sandworms' scales, they move their pulled scale further up and avoid going underground to prevent more sand from entering. They also do not twist and turn when the scale is exposed to avoid getting irritated by more sand. This not only helps the Fremen stay on top of the sandworms without toppling off but also allows them to control the direction in which the sandworms are moving by carefully manipulating the degree of exposition in the scales.

How Does Someone Get Off A Sandworm?

Dune 3 will answer the mystery.

Dune: Part Two gives a glimpse of how the Fremen mount the sandworms and use them to travel long distances. However, it does not reveal how they get off them. In a recent interview (via Indiewire ), Denis Villeneuve hinted that he has figured out a way to portray how they dismount the desert beings but did not find it necessary to reveal how it is done in Dune: Part Two . While the director may eventually traverse his ideas to the screen, Frank Herbert's Children of Dune already provides some answers. In the novel, a Fremen waits for the worm to get tired.

Once the sandworms get exhausted from zooming through the sands, they dig deep and sulk underground. However, before they do that, they slow down and sometimes even stop, allowing the riding Fremen to repel down from the side or walk down the worm's tail . In most cases, however, the Fremen avoid using the tail route to get off because the worms let out extremely hot exhausts from their tails.

Dune 2's 12 Biggest Unanswered Questions Explained

Why sandworms are so important to the fremen, they have a deep history in arrakis.

Apart from being used for moving from one place to another, the sandworms have immense cultural significance for the Fremen. While several details of their origins are unknown, many groups in the Dune universe, including the Fremen, heavily depend on the spice melange produced by them. The weather conditions in Arrakis heavily contribute to the production of the spice. However, the pre-spice mass required for the final spice melange is created when the fungal excretions of larval sandworms mix with Arrakis' groundwater. When this pre-spice gets exposed to the planet's extreme heat and high-pressure winds, it forms the final spice.

According to the Zensunni religious belief system, the sandworms embody the One God, explaining why they are also referred to as The Maker or Shai-Hulud (roughly translating to "Old Man of the Desert" or " Old Father Eternity" )

The sandworms are also perceived as spiritual symbols by the Fremen . According to the Zensunni religious belief system, the sandworms embody the One God, explaining why they are also referred to as The Maker or Shai-Hulud (roughly translates to "Old Man of the Desert" or " Old Father Eternity" ). Considering the depth of the lore surrounding the sandworms, the Dune live-action franchise could easily have a complete spin-off that explores everything from their origins to the first Fremen, Selim Wormride, who mastered the art of riding them.

Dune: Part Two

Dune: Part Two is the sequel to Denis Villeneuve's 2021 film that covers the novel's events by Frank Herbert. The movie continues the quest of Paul Atreides on a journey of revenge against those who slew his family. With insight into the future, Atreides may be forced to choose between his one true love and the universe's fate. 

Director Denis Villeneuve

Release Date March 1, 2024

Studio(s) Legendary Pictures

Distributor(s) Warner Bros. Pictures

Writers Jon Spaihts, Denis Villeneuve

Cast Zendaya, Austin Butler, Timothee Chalamet, Rebecca Ferguson, Florence Pugh

Rating PG-13

Genres Drama, Sci-Fi, Thriller, Adventure

Franchise(s) Dune

Sequel(s) Dune: Part Three

prequel(s) Dune

Budget $122 Million