I watched Dune 2 on opening night on a whim. It wasn’t even really my idea, but after a long day of staring at our respective laptops and tearing our hair out, my partner suggested we decompress by catching the hotly anticipated sequel in a nearby cinema. It was only when I’d sat down and the movie had started that I realised I didn’t remember a single thing about the movie directly preceding it.
That’s an exaggeration, but not by much. I knew the premise, and who Timothee Chalamet and Zendaya were supposed to be. The moment Rebecca Ferguson came on screen, I began volleying questions at my partner, who had to whisper the entirety of Dune’s lore in my ear in real-time. Who is that? His mom? Why is she there, I thought she died? Oh, she escaped, I forgot. Is she a space witch too? Yes? Wait, Stellan Skarsgaard is in this? Wait, Dave Bautista is in this? What does the weird box Lea Seydoux is using on Austin Butler do again? Why does everybody want spice so bad?
I promise the rest of my row was empty and I tried to be as quiet as possible so as to not annoy fellow moviegoers. I have manners.
Part Of A Story, But Not A Story In Itself
The reason that I was totally lost without things being explained to me the whole way is the same reason I haven’t been able to rate the movie – the film is part of a larger arc, and it feels that way. The first Dune was largely used to set the stage for the conflict that would happen later in the series, and established the characters and communities featured in the story. Dune: Part 2 doesn’t give you a recap, and instead simply starts its three hour journey as if you’ve just finished watching the movie before it. The film feels less like a sequel than a second act, albeit a very long one. It’s difficult to give it a rating as a standalone film, because it doesn’t feel like one, and it’s also hard for me to decide how I feel about it without seeing it in the context of the one before it and Dune: Messiah, the film that will round out the trilogy.
Is this a little annoying, as somebody who didn’t really want to watch a two and a half hour movie to remind myself what had already happened? Yes. Should I have at least read a recap to avoid this confusion? Also yes. But I actually like that the film is this way.
The Soft Reboot
With the rise of IP franchises and cinematic universes, everything is linked to something else or part of a series. Once you engage a single piece of media in a franchise’s universe, there’s constant pressure to engage with the rest of it. That’s why the creators of these series attempt to position every new installment as a feasible entry point for newcomers, even when they aren’t really entry points – a new fan means more engagement with other games, movies, and TV shows.
Marvel makes spin-off movies and series for nearly all its characters with their own arcs, but they always tie in to each other and refer to past events. The Boys had a spin-off, Gen V, in which characters, corporations and events you recognise are referenced with regularity, but it’s still positioned as a separate show. In gaming,Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth isnota good starting place for FF newbies,even if its producer tells you otherwise. Dragon’s Dogma 2made its protagonist an amnesiacso newcomers wouldn’t feel intimidated by its lore.
A lot of times, this is a way of soft rebooting a franchise to make it accessible to people unfamiliar with the lore. This is fine, when the new thing is actually a standalone, like Mad Max: Fury Road, or to some extent, Blade Runner 2049. But a lot of the time, the ‘standalone sequel’ isn’t that at all, it’s just marketed that way.
I love that Dune 2 doesn’t bother pretending that it’s an entry point, and it doesn’t hold your hand through a recap of what the first movie already told you. It’s simply the second act of a nine hour movie disguised as a trilogy, and that’s pretty sick. At this point, trying to judge the series’ quality is like watching two thirds of a movie and punching in a rating, and I feel like the series has to be watched in its entirety to really understand it. I vow to do that before I watch Dune: Messiah, whenever it comes out.
