‘Dune: Prophecy’: The Rise of the Spice Girls

Do you hear that? It’s the sound of another epic sci-fi franchise busting its way onto the streaming scene just in time for the holidays, and it’s a doozy: Dune: Prophecy, the prequel series to the once-again popular Frank Herbert saga of interstellar politics, mind-bending drug trips and mountain-sized carnivorous worms, is now available for your spiced-up pleasure over on Max, in which we finally get a deep dive into the clandestine world of the Bene Gesserit sisterhood. 

For fans of the Dune-iverse, lack of content ceased to be a genuine concern some decades ago, when Brian Herbert picked up his father’s mantle and began churning out spice world books en masse. Some have been better than others, and certainly better than the later work of series creator Frank Herbert, who made some…interesting choices during his final years, including things like bio-engineered dogs used as massage chairs and human/sandworm hybrid god people.

Yeah, Papa Herbert definitely took the child locks off the weirdness cabinet in his last few works, to put it mildly. Brian the scion, however, eventually steered the franchise into more familiar and accessible territory by delving into the backstories of the various “great houses” and major players of the saga, penning a series of novels with co-writer Kevin J. Anderson that might be the most compelling works in this universe to date, exploring everything from the Machine Wars to Mentats and, of course, those infamous sandworms. 

Following the massive success of Denis Villenueve’s recent two-part adaptation of Dune, it’s not surprising that TV execs would want to capitalize on the revitalization of a franchise. But where to start? House Atreides seems like a no-brainer, right? Or maybe House Harkonnen, or even House Corrino? Nope, it’s all about girl power this time. For some reason, the network formerly known as HBO decided to go with a take on “Dune: Sisterhood,” for the franchise’s debut into the world of modern network TV streaming. 

By all accounts, it was something of a risky call. On one hand, there’s a lot of juicy mystery surrounding the nature and history of the Bene Gesserit sisterhood, the weird “space witches” who serve as “truth sayers” for all the powerful houses in the Imperium, and who, behind the scenes, have been clandestinely working for millennia to cultivate royal bloodlines in hopes of one day creating the Kwisatz Haderach, the universe’s ultimate uber-mensch. On the other hand, the long con by the sisterhood to control the Imperium doesn’t immediately seem as compelling as, say, a war against sentient machines in which the very existence of humanity hangs in the balance. Not my first choice, but okay, let’s see what you got, Max.

Ten Thousand Years Ago, In A Galaxy…

With the first three episodes now streaming, Dune: Prophecy has, on the outset, many of the quintessential hallmarks of big budget HBO epic fantasy and historical dramas like Game of Thrones or Boardwalk Empire. It’s visually stunning, with special effects, costumes and sets that immediately reveal the massive amount of cheddar Max dropped on this joint. But all that window dressing is for naught if the story doesn’t keep us invested, and to that end the series is off to a solid start, especially for fans of the books who know their gholas from their gom jabbars.

Prophecy takes place roughly ten thousand years before the Dune series most of us are familiar with, ie. Paul Atreides and the Fremen’s great jihad against the Imperium and all those fancy houses of power. At this point, we’re barely more than a century past the great Machine Wars in which humans prevailed against the thinking machines, eventually making their manufacture or usage a mortal crime. Sadly, we only get to see a glimpse of that war in the series prologue, and it’s every bit as Terminator-esque as you’d hope. But for now, the Imperium is still recovering from that war and mostly engaging in the same sort of high court and capitalistic human machinations that make for good, standard palace intrigue stories.

The Emperor (Mark Strong) has his hands full with his daughter’s arranged marriage to a ship-building magnate’s pre-adolescent son, in hopes that those ships will help him control some unrest on Arrakis, which of course is the only place in the known universe that produces spice, a combination of space-time rocket fuel and galactic LSD that propels both interstellar travel and the Imperial economy. And, of course, in the background of all these political moves is the sisterhood, whose members serve as lie-detecting consiglieres for the great houses and their leaders, and who ultimately shape the opinions of the power brokers to serve their own ends.

This is where, for Dune nerds like this writer, this series really shines. We get to see a kind of origin story of the Bene Gesserit, although they have not as yet adopted that name for their monastic collective. For the first time, we see their home planet, a rainy and depressing place called Wallach IX, where the sisterhood trains young acolytes in their ways. It’s kind of like a cross between a boarding school, monastery, and ninja assassin academy, in which young women train in arts both martial and political, as well as scientific.

Here, we meet the young Valya Harkonnen (Jessica Barden), a brilliant and formidable student whose ambition is matched only by her cold viciousness, as well as her seemingly softer sister, Tula (Emma Canning). We watch in flashbacks as the two sisters break free from the freezing Harkonnen homeworld to not only take control of the sisterhood, but also to wreak bloody revenge against their mortal enemies in House Atreides, who branded the Harkonnens cowards and traitors for their activities during wartime. Not to spoil anything, but let’s just say that episode three has a lot in common with Arya Stark’s vicious retribution on the Freys in Game of Thrones.

Decades later, the more mature Valya (Emily Watson) and Tula (Olivia Williams) steer the sisterhood in the direction of their late, beloved Reverend Mother, the first to begin compiling a royal genetic database in the hopes of manipulating it over centuries and, in essence, controlling the universe by proxy. There’s some strife along the way with some sisterhood zealots, a less compelling side-story, but more importantly is the current situation involving the aforementioned royal wedding, and, more importantly, the arrival of a mysterious stranger from Arrakis named Desmond Hart (Travis Fimmel). Fimmel was fantastic in the overlooked and underrated series Raised by Wolves, and he’s no less captivating here as a kind of enigmatic space Rasputin who survived a sandworm attack with some very special (ie. very murdery) superpowers, as well as a few worm bones to pick with the sisterhood. 

Intriguing, but slow

As it stands, Dune: Prophecy is off to an intriguing but slow start, however that simmer could stand to boil over in wildly entertaining fashion down the line, assuming the writers don’t totally fumble. You could say the same for House of the Dragon, which had a similarly mixed reception on its debut and is now widely praised as it blossoms into an orgy of bloody dragon war (also, actual orgies). Per HBO tradition, the cast is largely a talented ensemble, and it’s wonderful to see Watson and Williams in roles they can sink their teeth into. The younger cast – all genetically blessed and often shown in various states of undress, because this is HBO – does a fine job of playing their more mature counterparts. Barden is a particular standout here, and I’m guessing she’ll have a fine career ahead of her following her powerful performance as young Valya.

The biggest catch of this new, ambitious sci-fi venture by Max is that it’s greatly unfamiliar to everyone but serious Dune geeks, which might alienate a broader general audience if the writers and show-runners don’t put the Maker hooks into them by midseason. But if you, like me, are one of those geeks, you’re in for a good time. When we see Valya use “the voice” for the first time, it’s one of many pointing Leo meme moments for us, and that kind of fan service is a real reward for our investment in the franchise.

It also treats us to a special look inside the “spice agony” experience undertaken by potential Reverend Mothers, which takes the series briefly from sci-fi to straight-up supernatural horror, which is wonderfully terrifying, if you’re into that sort of thing. Time will tell if more casual viewers will flock to the series en masse, but for now, at least, Dune: Prophecy is definitely gearing up to be an “extra-spicy” holiday treat.