Dune: Part Two is finally out in theaters! The new movie adapts the second half of Dune, Frank Herbert's seminal 1965 sci-fi novel. This is the big climax, so if you thought Dune: Part One was exciting, you haven't seen anything yet.
Dune has been adapted for the screen a few times now, and each time, the filmmakers add, subtract, or edit parts of Herbert's original story. That holds true in Dune: Part Two. Let's go over some of the biggest changes made in the t
1. The time jump
Dune: Part Two picks up where Part One ended: With Duke Leto Atreides (Oscar Isaac) dead, his son Paul (Timothée Chalamet) and paramour Lady Jessica (Rebecca Ferguson), Paul's mother, are living among the Fremen, the native people of the desert planet of Arrakis. Previously, the Atreides were one of the most powerful houses in the Imperium, and were in charge of mining Arrakis for valuable spice. But their house was brought down by a conspiracy hatched by the vile Baron Vladimir Harkonnen (Stellan Skarsgård) and Shaddam Corrino IV, the emperor of the galaxy (Christopher Walken). So Paul and Jessica are now in hiding, biding their time so they can get revenge.
Pretty early on in Dune: Part Two, Jessica becomes a religious leader among the Fremen after drinking the Water of Life, which we find out later is a liquid taken from the body of a baby sandworm that's been drowned in water. The Water of Life is suffused with spice, and anyone who drinks it is plagued with visions and heightened awareness. Jessica survives the ceremony, but there's a catch: she was newly pregnant with her daughter Alia when she drank the Water of Life, which had some weird consequences that we'll get to later.
To start, the ceremony is a little different in the movie than in the book. In the book, Jessica drinks the Water of Life in front of a thousands of Fremen, whereas in the movie she's in a cave with just a few women, while more Fremen wait outside. More importantly, after she becomes a Reverend Mother, the book jumps forward a few years in time, to catch up with Paul and Jessica after they've gotten accustomed to living with th Fremen. We know this because, in the book, Paul's little sister Alia is already born and walking around by this point, whereas Jessica is still pregnant with her by the end of the movie, just further along than she was when she drank the Water of Life. That means that Dune: Part Two takes place over the course of just a few months, whereas in the book, the same events take place over years.
Speaking of Alia, she represents the biggest single change in Dune: Part Two. Click below for more: