I just watched Dune. Or rather, I just finished watching the fifth installment of Dune, because 20-25 minutes was all of it I could take in one sitting. I understand that the movie is considered to be a disaster–partly because it tried to cover too much material, partly because it changed a lot from the books.
Still. It just didn’t appeal to me at all. So would someone please tell me… what is it about Dune? Are the books fantabulous? Is it just a power & fame fantasy? Is it because the sandworms look like giant genitalia?
I was a big-time Trekkie for years. I adore Star Wars. I really like Bladerunner. I even read most of the Pern books once. But this–ugly, boring, and bereft of humor, humanity, and significance.
The original book was fantastic. I still re-read it every few years. Epic in scope, hinting at depths similar to that found in Tolkien’s writings, it fired my imagination quite well.
Later volumes never really truly fulfilled the promise of the first book, IMHO.
I agree --the book is fantastic. The sequels have their appeal but do not live up to the first. As for the movie, it only makes sense as a sort of “Cliff’s Notes” for people who had already read the book. Far easier to follow is the SciFi Channel miniseries, but even that can’t fully encompass the scope of the book.
What Qadgop said about the book, but I also love the movie because it’s so disjointed. I love movie trailers: you can kind of get the idea of the plot, and there’s a lot of scenes that don’t really make any sense, but look like they’d be awesome when viewed in the context of the full film. David Lynch’s Dune is like a two hour trailer for the most kick-ass epic sixteen hour flick ever made.
Which version of Dune did you watch? The Scifi Channel “original” is more faithful to the book, but not as good, IMHO, as the David Lynch version. The Lynch Version, while not entirely successful in marshalling all the detailed plot complications, is a masterpiece of design and atmosphere.
Dune: First book of the series - read it.
Dune Messiah, Children of Dune: Next two, the first three complete the main Atreides storyline. Many people quit at these books, if not at the first book.
God Emperor of Dune: Fourth book. Weird. Veerrrrrrrrrry weird.
Heretics of Dune: Fifth book.
Dune: Chapterhouse Planet: Sixth book. Books five and six close the series, and prominently feature the Bene Gesserit.
After book six, Frank Herbert dies, and this should have stopped the story arc. At the end of the sixth book Frank writes a goodbye letter to his wife, the morning after she died.
The first six books tell a nice, long story:
I, II, III: The Atreides family and the Bene Gesserit order cause a really big problem.
IV: An Atreides fixes the problem.
V-VI: We get a glimpse of the beginning of the period after the fix in IV.
The story ends at VI.
But no, there is a son/hack writer who wanted more, so he continues to write “Dune” “novels”, dealing with prequel-type stuff. Ack. Ack. Bleagh.
[nitpick]
Actually, the tribute to Bev Herbert is the foreword to the **fifth ** book.
[/nitpick] Miller: *Sixteen hours * of heart plugs, sqoods, and weirding modules? No thanks.
For what it’s worth, my favorite book was God Emporer of Dune. My travels have proven to me that I’m unique in this regard.
Also, I accidentally skipped Dune Messiah, and… well, I didn’t miss much. Some confusion due to various character changes, but I was able to get into the groove of the plot and follow along. Went back and read Dune Messiah, and I really wasn’t all that impressed with it.
Heretics of Dune and Chapterhouse Dune have some interesting battle scenes, but I gotta agree with the above poster who said that Herbert was getting crazier with the books as he went along.
Think I got about as far as the 4th book. Didn’t care to go further, but did enjoy the first three. Hated the Lynch movie. Like, and still sometimes play, the boardgame version.
The Lynch movie is atrocious. He couldn’t have gotten the look and feel of Dune more wrong if he had taken a shit on the celluloid.
I saw the movie when I was 12, and it put me off wanting to read it until I was 19. I finally did, and it’s one of my favorite books of all time. It gives Lord of the Rings a run for its money, and that’s coming from a diehard Tolkien fan.
I can’t help but wonder how many other people were like me: had pondered reading the book, saw the movie instead and then just decided “screw it” to the whole thing.
IIRC Herbert claimed to have concieved the first three books as a trilogy, and in fact wrote portions of the second and third before finishing the first. Hated the Lynch movie so bad I don’t think I’ve ever sat all the way through it.
Oh, for what it’s worth, I also like the Lynch movie. But I like the version that had Princess Irulan doing the intro, rather than the narrator giving the Cliff’s Notes to the Duniverse. If nothing else, Irulan is rather cute, and it gave her more than one line in the entire movie to justify her showing up in the credits at the end.
And yeah, the movie doesn’t make any sense. It’s just nonsensical and epic and stuff explodes and there’s giant snakes. I love that.
I liked the Lynch movie. I read the book first, so that may have something to do with it. (The massive crush I had on Sting at the time may also have had something to do with it). I think he did a decent job with the relatively short time available for a feature film.
I’ve only ever read the first book. I had heard that the others were not nearly as good so I never bothered with them.
I’m a huge fan of the first book (the rest, not so much) and I’ve avoided watching any on-screen adaptions of the book and judging from peoples’ reaction, it was a wise decision. Don’t wanna hijack the thread, but am I missing much?
