Dune: Prophecy “Two Wolves”

Wait, what?

So, as I was watching this series, I got to thinking about how this is a sci-fi show, set in the far distant future, and it seems to revolve a good deal around, well…magic.

This isn’t Star Wars, and it’s not like Dune isn’t devoid of weird stuff, but the weird stuff is mostly psychic stuff, and that’s here, but it sure does look like magic.  The spice does things that can make people, like, see the future and stuff.  The Bene Gesserit, or the Sisterhood as they are known here, they have the Voice.  And yes, Mother Valya has used the Voice to force a suicide already.  But then there’s the other things, like how Hart can seemingly burn people from the inside out as he did to a nobleman’s young son, but it also killed a member of the Sisterhood in the same way from clear across the universe.

I had assumed Hart used some kind of poison, but then this episode suggests that may not be the case.  Hart claims he was swallowed by a sandworm on Arrakis, and that may be true, but he does have a way around the Sisterhood’s Truthsayers, and it’s a simple one:  he always tells the truth.  Did he kill that boy?  He says he sure did!  He says he’s there for the glory of the Emperor, perhaps the wimpiest character I have ever seen Mark Strong play.

Then there’s the weird part:  Hart can resist the Voice.  I mean, I didn’t think Valya’s attempt to get him to kill himself with the Voice would work in the second episode, but how did he do that?

And then there’s the ancestral memory thing.  Valya is going to the throneworld, so she tasks her sister Tula to take young adept Lila to undergo the Agony and get the ancestral memories of her great-grandma, the founder of the order.  Instead, she gets the memories of her dead grandma, the very person Valya used the Voice on to kill herself back in the first episode.  So, are those ghosts in the astral plane that Lila accessed or just the memories?  I’m not sure.  It’s kinda weird.

Then again, this is also a political show, so there are rebels, the royal family is weaker than you would think an emperor would be the most politically powerful, but it’s all about who controls Arrakis, a planet that they don’t even seem to be visiting anytime soon.  The Sisterhood wants to put one of their own on the throne, but the Harkonnen sisters running the show don’t seem to be overly benevolent.  Hart is a force working against them, but he killed a child and he’s kinda crazy as it is.  Now, I felt The Regime was a confusing show where I wasn’t sure who to cheer on, but this is similar but I find it more compelling.  Maybe because it looks more like real world politics and has a consistent tone.

Yeah, that’s probably it.