Dune: Part Two explained

Welcome to our Colossus Movie Guide for Dune: Part Two. This guide contains our detailed library of content covering key aspects of the movie’s plot, ending, meaning, and more. We encourage your comments to help us create the best possible guide. Thank you!

What is Dune: Part Two about?

Dune: Part One was a coming-of-age story that emphasized Paul’s loss of innocence. Everything he knew of the world went up in smoke because of Emperor Shaddam and Baron Harkonnen. He lost his father, close friends, and almost his life. That movie ends with the symbolic death of “Paul Atreides, the son” and his rebirth as “Paul Atreides, Duke of House Atreides.” Dune: Part Two teeters on what kind of man Paul will be. Will he lead with his heart or his head? Can you be a good person and still win against those who aren’t? As much as Paul tries to hang on to his heart, to stay a little field mouse—he can’t. The practical, logical side wins. He chooses power, to control, and it changes him forever. Paul Atreides is the original Anakin Skywalker.   

Movie Guide table of contents

Cast

• Paul Atreides – Timothée Chalamet
• Lady Jessica – Rebecca Ferguson
• Alia Atreides – Anya Taylor-Joy
• Chani – Zendaya
• Stilgar – Javier Bardem
• Princess Irulan – Florence Pugh
• Shaddam IV, Padishah Emperor – Christopher Walken
• Gurney Halleck – Josh Brolin
• Baron Vladimir Harkonnen – Stellan Skarsgård
• Glossu Rabban Harkonnen – Dave Bautista
• Feyd-Rautha Harkonnen – Austin Butler
• Lady Margot Fenring – Léa Seydoux
• Gaius Helen Mohiam – Charlotte Rampling
• Shishakli – Souheila Yacoub
• Based on – the novel Dune by Frank Herbert
• Written by – Denis Villeneuve | Jon Spaihts
• Directed by – Denis Villeneuve

The ending of Dune: Part Two explained

Recap

The end of Dune: Part Two begins after Paul’s full ascension to Kwisatz Haderach. Against all his wishes, he ended up going to the fundamentalists in the south, drinking the water of life, then asserting himself as Lisan al Gaib. We have the assault on the Emperor’s base in Arrakeen. A cavalry of sandworms crash through the mountains to the west. Then the Fremen Fedaykin attack from the east. Paul and his fundamentalist troops march head on. The imperial forces can barely muster a response before capitulating to the blitzkrieg. 

Just before the Fremen attack, Shaddam had been dressing down Baron Harkonnen over Muad’Dib. Baron shows supreme arrogance at assuming that the south of Arrakis is uninhabited. As punishment, the emperor severs Baron Harkonnen from his breathing apparatus. 

Once Paul enters the throne room, he approaches the struggling Baron. Paul calls the Baron grandfather, then gets revenge for his father, Leto Atreides. He tells Baron, “You died like an animal.” Outside, a fleeing Rabban Harkonnen can’t outrun a pursuing Gurney Halleck. Gurney says “For my Duke. And for my friends.” That concludes the revenge portion of the film. 

Paul and the Emperor have a heart to heart. But not before Paul tells Chani, “I want you to know that I will love you as long as I breathe.” Paul then really takes control of the room. He threatens the forces of the Great Houses, massed in orbit—if they make a move, Paul will blow up the spice fields, decimating the empire’s economy. He then not only reveals his identity to the Emperor but silences the Bene Gesserit Reverend Mother. He claims the hand of Princess Irulan. 

Lastly, Paul wants the Emperor to answer for what happened to Leto. Revenge against the Baron wasn’t enough, since it was Shaddam who gave the order. The Emperor says, “Do you know why I killed him? Because he was a man who believed in the rules of the heart, but the heart is not meant to rule. In other words, your father was a weak man.” Very insulting. Paul gives Shaddam the opportunity to choose a champion. Feyd heeds the call.

So we get the duel between the Bene Gesserit’s two children of prophecy. Whoever wins will be, so the Bene Gesserit think, their powerful pawn. The battle is a fierce one. Feyd even goes so far as to taunt Chani, calling her a pet. The mind game works. Feyd successfully stabs Paul in the stomach. But when Feyd goes for the final blow, Paul pulls the blade from his side and sneaks it into Feyd’s heart. “You fought well, Atreides.” 

Lady Jessica tells Gaius she chose the wrong side. Gaius says there are no sides. Then acknowledges Jessica as the new Reverend Mother. Princess Irulan agrees to the marriage, if Paul spares her father. He accepts. Chani is upset by everything and leaves.

The Great Houses reject Paul’s claim to the throne. Paul’s response to his generals? “Lead them to paradise.” The Fremen rush aboard ships. Alia, Paul’s sister, asks Lady Jessica what’s happening. Lady Jessica explains: “Your brother attacks the great houses. The Holy War begins.” 

Meaning

There are two sections here. The first section is the meaning and message of Dune: Part Two’s ending. While reading, you might find yourself thinking “Is Chris reaching here?” That’s why I included the second section. It’s Frank Herbert’s own words about why he wrote Dune. If you trust I know what I’m talking about, you don’t need the second section (though I still recommend it!). If you’re skeptical, read what Frank had to say, then, hopefully, you think “Chris nailed it. I should have never doubted.”

The tragedy of Paul Atreides

Dune: Part One is a classic coming-of-age story that shows us Paul’s loss of innocence. He starts the film as a kid who is sheltered from the world at large. He’s trained but not experienced. Once his family moves to Arrakis, that all changes. He’s introduced to politics, subjugation, betrayal, cruelty, and death. He loses pretty much everything and everyone. As dramatic as that all is, it’s symbolic for the end of his childhood and the transition to adulthood. That’s what his final fight with Jamis represents and why the Bene Gesserit voices tell him “When you take a life, you take your own.” By defeating Jamis, he snuffs out the last embers of his youth. The kid he was is gone. There’s only the man he will become. 

Dune: Part Two is a much harsher film. While Part One focuses on Paul’s potential, Part Two emphasizes the forces that seemingly determine our fate for us. Paul didn’t want to go south to the fundamentalists because he knew that way would lead to a Holy War. So he did everything he could to stay north and still succeed. It wasn’t enough. The machinations of the Bene Gesserit, the Emperor, Baron Harkonnen, Stilgar, and his mother, Lady Jessica, all conspire to drive him south. “All my visions lead to horror,” Paul tells Gurney. “Because you lose control?” Gurney responds. Paul answers: “Because I gain it.” Despite telling Gurney and Chani about what would happen, they still advise him to go south.  

When Paul was simply part of the Fremen, he wasn’t the one in control. Rather, he was one of many. A member of a tribe. Compare that to the end where he’s declared himself the emperor of the universe and embarks on a Holy War. The contrast is the point of the story. Power corrupts. 

But it’s not as simple as that. The issue was never, like in Star Wars, Paul’s capacity for evil. The issue is the structures around Paul that created the role of a savior seeking revenge then demanded he play the part. That’s the tragedy at the core of Dune. We know the kind of person Paul was, the person he could have been. Adulthood isn’t that straightforward, though. The world has expectations of you. There’s who we want to be and who society has pestered us to be. 

Maybe you dreamed of becoming a musician. Instead, you went to college and got a job and now don’t even own a guitar. You consume music. You don’t make it. On the flip side, what about those who do achieve their dream? Billie Eilish chose the path of the musician and is, as of 2024, one of the most popular artists in the world. Great! But how does she feel about the success? “Fame f**king sucks. I hate it.” 

Eilish told Allure in 2023: When I was 17, I was like, I found it. I found the person I am, forever. This is how I’m going to do it. I found all the ways! These are my boundaries. These are the things that make me happy, and this is my recipe for how I’m going to make music and be happy. Then I grew up a little, and suddenly life was like, “These aren’t going to work. You’ve got to change. You’re not that person anymore.” …. I’m starting to do better, but I’ve not been doing so great, to be honest. For a while. I have impending-doom feelings most of the day. When I think too much about it, how I can never have privacy again, it’s enough to make you want to do all sorts of crazy things. But you have to let it go.”  

Being a famous musician isn’t the same thing as being the messiah of Dune. But in some ways it is. You have the weight of expectation on you. The artist’s heart yields to the practicality of being a celebrity. What you can say. Where you can go. Who you can spend time with. Who you can trust. What you endorse. An entire industry asks you to behave in a specific way in order to make a lot of people a lot of money. And even the public has expectations for you. Indulge them, and they love you. Go against them, and they turn on you. 

We know Paul loves Chani. He could have lived joyfully with her, in the desert, and had a good life. Paul the Normal Person would have been happy with that. But what about Paul Atreides, Duke of House Atreides, Muad’Dib, Lisan al Gaib, the Kwisatz Haderach? He can’t marry just anyone. It’s not constructive. Marriage to Princess Irulan is. Love doesn’t matter. The political gain does. 

So as dramatic and hyperbolic as Paul’s story is. It resonates because all of us have encountered that pressure to fill a role that seems predestined for us. When you graduate high school, society doesn’t tell you to be free and pursue your greatest dreams. It says go to college. Major in a field that makes money. Get a job. Marry. Have kids. Even if you go a different way, like Billie Eilish did, you’re still met with a list of demands that cause you to question who you are and who you get to be. 

We saw at the end of Dune: Part One that when Paul defeats Jamis he becomes Fremen. What’s it mean, then, when he defeats Feyd-Rautha? Feyd was the sociopathic heir to the evil house Harkonnen. Paul himself even said that he will succeed not by being an Atreides, like his father, but by embracing the heritage of his mother, the daughter of Baron Harkonnen. His victory over an actual Harkonnen marks that transition. “When you take a life, you take your own.” So we witnessed the death of Paul Atreides (in Part One). Then the death of Muad’Dib. And the rise of “Paul Harkonnen.” We might as well call him Darth Paul. 

That plays into what the Emperor said to him, about why the Emperor killed Leto. “Because [Leto] was a man who believed in the rules of the heart, but the heart is not meant to rule. In other words, your father was a weak man.” Chani represents the heart. Paul’s choice of Irulan over Chani is him choosing “strength” over “weakness”. When someone commits to strength, power becomes the solution to all questions, all conflicts. 

So when the houses reject Paul’s claim to the throne, he doesn’t hesitate—his first response is a declaration of war. The phrase “Lead them to paradise” is haunting because it has a horrific subtext. The Fremen fundamentalists believe the Lisan al Gaib is the “Giver of Water”. Paul even mentions transforming Arrakis into a green paradise. So superficially speaking, “Lead them to paradise” is this idea of “lets go fulfill the prophecy and make Arrakis great again!” 

But how many times did Paul tell us that this Holy War results in the deaths of billions of people? So “Lead them to paradise” is pretty much saying “Sacrifice them for my own gain.” And the Fremen cheer! And gleefully, willingly, board the ships. Whatever hesitation Paul had about the future is gone. He has become the exact thing he feared. And he doesn’t seem to mind. 

To be clear—the end of Dune: Part Two is not triumphant. We’re not supposed to be proud of Paul. Or hopeful for him. Or cheer him on. This isn’t the Paul we wanted to root for. It’s someone else entirely. A dreadful figure who will unleash tragedy. We’re supposed to feel how Chani feels—betrayed, shocked, and unnerved. There’s even a sense of grief over the loss of Paul we had known. And the fate that awaits the Fremen and the rest of the universe. 

Frank Herbert explains Dune

Frank Herbert, who wrote the original novel, said this about the point of the book: I conceived of a long novel, the whole trilogy as one book about the messianic convulsions that periodically overtake us. Demagogues, fanatics, con-game artists, the innocent and the not-so-innocent bystanders all were to have a part in the drama. This grows from my theory that superheroes are disastrous for humankind. Even if we find a real hero (whatever or whoever that may be), eventually fallible mortals take over the power structure that always comes into being around such a leader. 

Personal observation has convinced me that in the power area of politics/economics and in their logical consequence, war, people tend to give over every decision-making capacity to any leader who can wrap himself in the myth-fabric of the society. Hitler did it. Churchill did it. Franklin Roosevelt did it. Stalin did it. Mussolini did it. My favorite examples are John F. Kennedy and George Patton. Both fitted themselves into the flamboyant Camelot pattern, consciously assuming bigger-than-life appearance. But the most casual observation reveals that neither was bigger than life. Each had our common human ailment—clay feet*.

This, then, was one of my themes for Dune: Don’t give over all your critical faculties to people in power, no matter how admirable those people may appear to be. Beneath the hero’s facade you will find a human being who makes human mistakes…. Heroes are painful, superheroes are a catastrophe. The mistakes of superheroes involve too many of us in disaster.

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. How do they originate? 

…. Yes, there are analogs in Dune of today’s events—corruption and bribery in the highest places, whole police forces lost to organized crime, regulatory agencies taken over by the people they are supposed to regulate. The scarce water of Dune is an exact analog to oil scarcity. CHOAM is OPEC. 

You may have heard of the idiom “feet of clay”. The phrase comes from the Bible. Specifically the Book of Daniel. It’s a weird situation. This King named Nebuchadnezzar has a bunch of bad dreams. The prophet Daniel comes to him and tells him one of his dreams. Your Majesty looked, and there before you stood a large statue—an enormous, dazzling statue, awesome in appearance. The head of the statue was made of pure gold, its chest and arms of silver, its belly and thighs of bronze, its legs of iron, its feet partly of iron and partly of baked clay. While you were watching, a rock was cut out, but not by human hands. It struck the statue on its feet of iron and clay and smashed them. Then the iron, the clay, the bronze, the silver and the gold were all broken to pieces and became like chaff on a threshing floor in the summer. The wind swept them away without leaving a trace.

At first glance, the statue seemed magnificent. It’s gold and silver! But the lower you go, the cheaper it gets. The more fragile it becomes. A statue is only as good as its base. Clay is easily broken. That’s why the whole figure collapsed and shattered. So the phrase is used to refer to character flaws. Especially in someone who seems otherwise “made of gold”.

Herbert believes no one is without character flaws. We all have weaknesses and vices. That’s why he finds the concept of the superhero so absurd. It relies on someone being pure gold. When that’s impossible. Humans aren’t perfect like that. Even if one of us was that flawless, the people who would surround them aren’t. So no matter what, the statue always falls. You have to imagine he would be somewhat appalled at the celebrity worship that’s so prominent in 21st-century America. 

The themes, message, and meaning of Dune: Part Two

The false messiah

The thing to remember about Dune is this: everything has been planned by the Bene Gesserit. That means Paul isn’t special. In fact, we’re told by Gaius that the Sisterhood has multiple candidates who could be Kwisatz Haderach. Feyd, for example. The person who becomes Kwisatz Haderach is simply a byproduct of a centuries-long breeding plan. 

All that prophecy we hear from Stilgar and the Fremen about Lisan al Gaib? The Bene Gesserit planted those beliefs, inflamed them for centuries, just in case they one day sent someone like Paul to Arrakis to fulfill them. 

When Paul lives up to the prophecy, it’s not meaningful the way it is in Star Wars, The Matrix, Harry Potter, Lord of the Rings, or Game of Thrones. Those are positive predictions that relate to the downfall of an evil power or system. In Dune, the Bene Gesserit manufacture the prophecy for their own benefit. In this case, it seemed so they could have access to the water of life, knowing it might unlock genetic memory in their chosen male. And it worked. 

So what the Fremen think is a miracle is nothing more than generations of brainwashing by a powerful illuminati-like order. Paul isn’t a special figure who carries the burden of responsibility to defeat a great evil like Luke, Neo, Harry, Aragorn, and Daenerys/Jon. And you could argue that once Paul becomes the Kwisatz Haderach, he isn’t even Paul anymore. 

What does that mean? We see with Lady Jessica that once the genetic memory unlocks that the person you were becomes overwhelmed by all the “people” you now contain. After the water of life, Lady Jessica is no longer Paul’s mother—she’s an accumulation of generations of Bene Gesserit whose sole purpose was empowering the Sisterhood. So of course her sole purpose becomes doing the same. (Some of her personality remains, but she’s clearly not who she was).  

Paul’s a bit different. In the books, it’s never clarified that he has genetic memory. Despite that being the whole point of the Kwisatz Haderach. Instead, the emphasis is on his prescient abilities, the power to see infinite potential futures. 

In the novel, he says: “How would you like to live billions upon billions of lives?” Paul asked. “There is a fabric of legends for you! Think of all those experiences, the wisdom they’d bring. But wisdom tempers love, doesn’t it? And it puts a new shape on hate. How can you tell what’s ruthless unless you’ve plumbed the depths of both cruelty and kindness? You should fear me, Mother. I am the Kwisatz Haderach.” 

Whether he’s referring to genetic memory or his prescient powers or both, Paul’s entire psyche changes. He’s no longer an individual with limited experiences and perspective. He becomes the ocean. And it drowns his heart. 

How does that translate to the real world? It’s a pretty classic story. Someone becomes successful and receives a ton of praise. Their ego grows. They replace their close friends and family with yes-men and business partners. Suddenly, they’re “not the person they used to be”. At that point, results vary. Sometimes they work through it. Other times they just stay a successful jerk. Or everything falls apart. Robert Downey Jr., Tiger Woods, Justin Beiber, and Natasha Lyonne recovered from their rock bottoms. Elon Musk and J.K. Rowling have embraced their tarnished reputations. While Bill Cosby and Harvey Weinstein are utterly disgraced.

But this usually comes back to the fact that regular people get elevated into heroic figures and receive a lot of power because of it. And many don’t know what to do with it. The money, the attention, the opportunity, and the authority tricks them into thinking they’re more important than they actually are. A lot of celebrities manage to stay grounded. But a number go off the rails. 

Dune doesn’t posit that the individual is entirely the problem. Rather, the problem is the system that not only creates such figures but empowers them. 

The tragedy of radicalization 

Herbert was born in 1920. He grew up in the aftermath of World War I then came of age during World War II. The 20th century was defined by the catastrophes brought on by charismatic leaders and their followers. That was mostly only possible on the national level and done through newspaper, radio, and television. 

That’s still an issue and always will be. But in the social media age, we have a new twist. Stan culture. Which is an extension of the same psychology. You have charismatic figures who many start to see as superheroic. Their fans connect online and reinforce and validate this perception. Fandom turns to standom. One journalist wrote an article that “gently criticized” the tour of a popular musician. The result? “Hundreds of messages…filled my notifications. Some were doxxing my personal information, and others were predicting how and when I’d die. One said they were tracking down my family and friends…. The worst came when a group…tried to mass email my boss and get me fired…. I was shocked and chilled by how far it went.” 

Little “holy wars” like this happen all the time, now. This is from a February 2023 CNN article: Football authorities have called on social media companies and officials to take “the strongest action” after Tottenham Hotspur said forward Son Heung-min was subjected to “reprehensible” online abuse…. The claims of online abuse toward Son come a week after Brentford said that striker Ivan Toney was subjected to abuse on social media after scoring against Arsenal in the Premier League…. Last year, a study conducted by players’ unions in football and basketball revealed that sports stars were receiving hundreds of “abusive” comments, including racist posts and “threatening or violent language.”

What did Son do? He simply scored a goal in a win over an opposing team. But fans of that opposing team, stans, used social media to hurl vitriol at him. 

We see a similar kind of radicalization with the Fremen in Dune: Part Two. They’ve spent centuries on Arrakis. Recent history has been unkind to them, but they still have, for the most part, independence. Communities, culture, history, society. When Paul announces himself as Lisan al Gaib, what happens? The Fremen abandon everything they’ve been to fight Paul’s war. It’s like if Ice Spice convinced everyone in New York City to board a bunch of ships then sail off to invade Australia  so she could perform on the steps of the Sydney Opera House. 

The Fremen had initially been so suspicious of Paul. But he said the right things. Did the right things. And converted them from non-believers into fanatics. At the end, he starts to say and do many of the things he promised he wouldn’t. The pro-Fremen talking points go out the window. It becomes all about him. It doesn’t matter, though, because the Fremen have already bought in. Even if it means going against their own interests. If it’s what Lisan al Gaib wants, then so be it. To paradise they’ll go.

As Chani says early on, “Want to control people? Tell them a Messiah will come and they’ll wait.” 

The heart versus the mind

The Emperor says that he had Duke Leto exterminated because Leto “was a man who believed in the rules of the heart” and that “the heart is not meant to rule”. It’s a very cynical view of the world—it implies that human decency is counter-productive to society. That the only way an empire can thrive, much less exist, is through logic, pragmatism, rationality. We’re told Leto was like a son to Shaddam. Yet Shaddam had Leto eliminated. Why? Because the heart is not meant to rule? If that’s how the mind rules…yeesh.

By all accounts, Leto was a wonderful Duke. House Atreides was one of the best. From what we saw in Part One, the people seemed happy and treated well. Leto wanted to work with the Fremen, rather than enslave them. The other Great Houses respected him. What’s so wrong with the heart?

When Paul’s with the Fremen in the first half of Part Two, you could argue that he’s “ruling” through his heart. Especially because the romance with Chani is the backbone of that whole stretch. Because Paul loves Chani, cares about Chani, he respects the Fremen-ways and leads through their customs and culture. And it goes well. What’s so wrong with the heart?

Then we get to the fundamentalists. And they serve as a bit of a counterpoint to the conversation. For them, logic goes out the window. Faith is all that matters. What they feel and believe and want to be true is important. They turn off their minds and give their hearts to Lisan al Gaib. And that will go very poorly for them.  

And even though we can attribute unlocking ancestral memory/powers of prescience as the cause of Paul’s turn to the darkside, we know that his main motivation, even before then, was to get revenge on Baron Harkonnen and Emperor Shaddam. Lady Jessica even said to him “Your father didn’t believe in revenge.” Paul’s response? “I do.” 

He wasn’t thinking about what was best for the people of Caladan who depend on House Atreides, or the Fremen, or Chani, or his mother, or unborn sister, or even himself. All he wanted was revenge. And that desire stained Paul’s choices. Before and after his becoming Kwisatz Haderach. That’s what’s wrong with the heart. 

Like with most things, you need a healthy balance. 

You can view Feyd and Paul as embodying each side of the coin. Paul is the son of the guy who led with his heart and obviously cares about people and wants to do right by everyone. While Feyd’s favorite hobby is slaughter. Lady Margot Fenring calls Feyd a sociopath. Yet each is intelligent, effective, and charismatic in very different ways. One earns loyalty, the other demands it. 

At first, Feyd’s a foil for Paul. We’re supposed to hope Paul’s the Kwisatz Haderach and not Feyd. Feyd’s so clearly a monster and Paul named himself after a little desert mouse. He’s a good guy! Until he’s not. By the end of Dune: Part Two, Paul abandons his heart. And that changes Feyd from a foil of who Paul isn’t into a foreshadowing of who Paul will become.  

Why is the movie called Dune: Part Two?

The Part Two is obvious. This is the sequel to Dune: Part One. In the Part One explanation, we discussed Baron Harkonnen’s quote where he calls Arrakis “My Dune.” Also how Paul’s prescient abilities ties into the idea of the famous idiom about the “sands of time”. 

We get a bit more context in Part Two. Specifically, from the scene where Paul announces himself as the Lisan al Gaib to the fundamentalists. Paul uses his powers over time to tell a few Fremen details no one but Lisan al Gaib could know. Then he gives a speech to one Fremen that includes a history of the guy’s grandmother.

Paul: A rock smashed her face as she was crossing the Belt. She was twelve when it happened. At that time, this world had a Fremen name. Dune. [He continues to someone else]. In your nightmares, you give water to the dead and it brings joy to your heart. 

Stilgar then asks Paul “What do you see for us?” And Paul responds: “Green Paradise.” He then declares himself Duke of Arrakis. And pronounces that “the Hand of God be my witness. I am the Voice from the Outer World. I will lead you to Paradise!” 

The immediate reaction from the fundamentalists is to accept Paul as Lisan al Gaib. 

So the title not only refers to the setting of the film but it now has this added meaning of being the ancient name for Arrakis. A name Paul evokes to sway the fundamentalists to embark on a Holy War. The recontextualization is kind of chilling. “Dune” is no longer a place but an idea of freedom. One Paul can call upon to control the masses.

Important motifs in Dune: Part Two

Power

The first thing Dune: Part Two does is put a quote on screen that says “Power over spice is power over all.” The next thing is a monologue from Princess Irulan. She talks about the fall of House Atreides and that her father had loved Duke Leto as a son but that “My father has always been guided by the calculus of power.” 

That brings us back to the theme of heart versus mind. The Emperor loved Leto but found that the mathematics of maintaining power called for Leto’s demise. He didn’t hesitate to solve the equation. 

When you zoom out, almost everything in Dune: Part Two comes back to this struggle for power over spice. Most of the story is about the Harkonnens trying to restart spice harvesting and Paul, as Muad’Dib, compromising it. The Bene Gesserit hope to control spice through Kwisatz Haderach. Paul believes the Fremen are the key to controlling spice. And the Fremen want their planet back and view Lisan al Gaib as the way. 

We see the various ways each party vies for that power. Rabban tries using conventional tactics. Paul and the Fremen use guerrilla strategies. Paul wants power over the Fremen so says all the right things, while Lady Jessica inspires fear to stir up a longing for Lisan al Gaib. Feyd’s far more cruel than Rabban and is more successful on Arrakis because of it. Meanwhile, Gurney reveals an atomic stockpile that Paul references to threaten the Great Houses. 

Power as a motif culminates with Paul’s drinking of the water of life. His fully unlocked prescient ability is pretty much a trump card. He has information no one else does. He knows what to say, when to say it, and how to say it to bring about the exact results he wants. It’s all calculated.

And then Paul’s overall arc in Part Two is a calculated rise to power. He goes from desert mouse to emperor. And not by accident. We hear his plan at the very beginning. Everything is done to bring it to fruition.  

Stilgar and Gurney

For the first half of Dune: Part Two, Stilgar is charming and comedic. He believes Paul’s the Lisan al Gaib and there’s nothing problematic about it. In fact, it’s kind of endearing. He helps Paul. Defends him. And encourages him. The big moment is when Paul straight up says he’s not the messiah, not Lisan al Gaib, and Stilgar twists it to “The mahdi is too humble to say he is the mahdi.” It’s played for a laugh. 

Stilgar is the one who helps put Paul in the position to command the fundamentalists. He’s the hype man who gets everyone else on board. What started out as innocuous and charming ends up leading to a holy war that will kill billions. That “haha” moment shows how fanatics can warp reality to fit whatever narrative they want. And how such beliefs can snowball from innocent to destructive. 

Gurney has a similar role in the film. In Part One, Gurney was just the badass warmaster. So when we find out he survived the Harkonnen attack, that’s great. Paul’s excited. We’re excited. A character we like is back! Except Gurney isn’t just a cool old guy who is good at fighting. He encourages Paul to war. Tells him where an atomic arsenal is. Then delights in Paul’s rise to power. By the end of the film, both Gurney and Stilgar are no longer the fun uncles who get a little tipsy and tell hilarious stories. They’re fanatics who want their leader to go to war. And that can be a confusing thing to process. We liked them. But can we still like them? Should we still like them? Where’s the line?

Chani as Paul’s heart

At one point, Chani tells Paul that “You will never lose me as long as you stay true to yourself.” The movie ends with Chani walking out on Paul. That confirms that he is no longer true to himself. That he has become someone, or something, altogether different. 

What’s different is summarized by Emperor Shaddam when he talks about Leto ruling from the heart. Paul had been doing the same. He had cared about people and wanted to protect them. That was his truth. But Paul as Lisan al Gaib is ready to sacrifice billions to his Holy War. The heart no longer rules. It’s the mind. The calculus. So Chani leaves. And that’s how we know that we as viewers should also think much more negatively about Paul.

Visions 

In our explanation for Part One, we explained how Paul’s visions came from his Bene Gesserit side and represented a budding power. We also talked about their shifting nature and how that reflected Paul’s agency. “He’s not a pawn of fate, on a singular path to some destiny that’s already decided. Rather, he can make choices along the way.” But in Part Two that agency goes out the window. His visions become much more fixed. 

That’s not because of some larger force known as fate. It’s because the Bene Gesserit, Emperor Shaddam, Baron Harkonnen, Stilgar, Gurney, and Lady Jessica all push and pull Paul until he feels he has no other option than to take the water of life and rally the fundamentalists. 

Which comes back to what Frank Herbet said about how “it is the systems themselves that I see as dangerous.” Paul went from an individual who had some choice in the direction of his life to part of a system. And the system strangled his options and drove him to unleash catastrophe. 

Callbacks to Dune: Part One

Dune: Part Two brings Part One full circle in that it has several callbacks to the visions Paul had in that film. Except we see that they played out differently than we expected. 

The most obvious of these is Chani recreating the scene where Paul’s a Fremen warrior in the middle of battle and the vision ends with him stabbing a couple enemies then his face mask comes up and we zoom in on his face. We get a very similar scene during the assault on the imperial stronghold. Chani’s in a similar suit. She does similar moves. And we get a similar shot of her face. 

Another is the vision where Chani kisses Paul then stabs him. He explains “I thought I saw my death. Only it wasn’t. I know a knife is important, somehow. Someone will hand me a blade. But I don’t know who, or when, or where.” Part of that refers to the fight with Jamis. Before that fight, Chani does approach Paul and offers him a knife, and Paul has a moment where he recalls his vision—the shot of a knife in a sheath on the ground. That’s just not the whole thing. As Paul initially explains the knife vision to Jessica, we see shots of Jessica in her Reverend Mother outfit. A look she doesn’t have until Part Two. And the moment when Chani stabs Paul? She holds him close. Which is exactly what Feyd does. So even though that vision seemed explained by Part One, it still didn’t fully come to fruition until Part Two. 

The third big callback is the vision of Chani in the dunes, with a bloody knife in hand. After Paul defeats Feyd and pulls the knife from his shoulder, he turns to the Emperor. We get a graphic match to the vision. 

Again, all of these show that Paul had fragments of what was to come but not clarity on it. He couldn’t “see” until he took the Water of Life.

Questions & answers about Dune: Part Two

How does Paul survive his fight with Feyd?

Feyd does stab Paul in the stomach. But Paul did mention earlier that he knew a way that everything would work out. I believe it’s similar to the iconic dialogue from Avengers: Infinity War.

Doctor Strange: I went forward in time to view alternate futures. To see all the possible outcomes of the coming conflict.

Star-Lord: How many did you see?

DS: Fourteen-million, six-hundred and five. 

Tony Stark: How many did we win?

DS: One. 

That one future meant letting Thanos win, initially, which would allow the survivors to go back in time and prevent Thanos’s initial victory. It’s similar with Paul. Paul had to let Feyd think he, Feyd, had won so that Feyd would let his guard down. That created the opening necessary to defeat the superior opponent. 

In Part One, Paul had a vision of how the fight with Jamis might go. So managed to avoid that becoming a reality. In Part Two, his visions are far more powerful. He could know the exact place to stand to receive a non-lethal wound that would then allow him to gain the upper hand.

How does Alia talk to Lady Jessica? What are her powers?

The water of life unlocks ancestral memory in Bene Gesserit and their bloodline. Lady Jessica and Paul are already people, so it interacts with them differently. Alia’s just a baby in the womb , though. In the books, this is called being pre-born. Alia has access to ancestral memory before she’s even fully formed. Her access to not only memory but also prescience gives her the power to communicate with people telepathically. It’s something she does a lot in the books. Both in utero and once born and grown up. 

How do Fremen ride the sandworms? How do they control the direction the worm goes?

In the books, we’re told that the hooks damage the plates on the worm. The worm doesn’t want to get sand in the wound so stays on the surface. 

Apparently, the hooks also control the direction of the worm, kind of like reigns on a horse. That seems a bit more ridiculous to me, given how massive the worms are. Would they actually feel the tug? And why even listen? Unless the hooks cause that much pain? 

Ultimately, it’s probably not something we’re supposed to overthink. But I can’t stop thinking about it.

Does Feyd have pet cannibals?

It seems that way, yeah. 

Does Frank Herbert’s son, Brian Herbert, approve of the movies?

On February 24th, a few days before Dune: Part Two opened in theaters, Brian Herbert posted on Twitter: I saw Dune: Part Two at a private studio screening, and it is gratifying to see my father’s story told with such great care. When the new movie is combined with Dune: Part One it is by far the best film interpretation of Frank Herbert’s classic novel DUNE that has ever been done. 

Pretty strong praise! 

Does Dune: Part Two finish the book?

It does!

Will Denis Villeneuve make Dune Messiah?

Villeneuve did an interview with Time and they included a brief line about Dune Messiah. Quote: Villeneuve’s two films, plus that sequel, Dune Messiah, which has not been officially greenlighted, might constitute a just-right mini-franchise. (“Dune Messiah should be the last Dune movie for me,” he confirms.)

Update: Apparently Hans Zimmer has already started the score for the next movie. He told Variety, quote Denis comes in on the second day of shooting, and wordlessly comes in and puts Dune: Messiah on my desk, and I know where we’re going and I know we’re not done.

But Villeneuve also said to The Hollywood Reporter: I have four projects on the table, currently. One of them is a secret project that I cannot talk about right now, but that needs to see the light of day quite quickly. So it would be a good idea to do something in between projects, before tackling Dune Messiah and Cleopatra. All these projects are still being written, so we’ll see where they go, but I have no control over that.

Now it’s your turn

Have more unanswered questions about Dune: Part Two? Are there themes or motifs we missed? Is there more to explain about the ending? Please post your questions and thoughts in the comments section! We’ll do our best to address every one of them. If we like what you have to say, you could become part of our movie guide!