Dune 2's iconic black-and-white sequence was almost removed by studio interference

One of the most visually stunning and talked-about scenes of Dune: Part Two initially received pushback from studio Warner Bros. Discovery, revealed cinematographer Greig Fraser. Adapting the second half of Frank Herbert's novel Dune, Dune: Part Two introduced Austin Butler's Feyd-Rautha in an eerie black-and-white sequence. As we see the ruthless Harkonnen walk out to engage in gladitorial combat against drugged and sedated opponents, the screen gets scorched of any color by the black sun over the planet of Giedi Prime, the Harkonnen homeworld.

Director Denis Villeneuve previously told Moviefone that he wanted the stylistic look of the planet to suggest the decadent, oppressive nature of the House Harkonnen. Fraser recently told Screen Rant how the studio reacted to the idea. "This is the first real shoot that we were gonna be doing onstage that was going to be shown to the studio. It was a bit of a bold step that we decided to shoot in this format because the worry was that, effectively, people who were not there would watch this footage and go, 'What the heck is that?'"

Once the Warner Bros. executives saw the footage, Villeneuve and Fraser started getting phone calls with requests to "fix it." But they stuck to their guns and kept the sequence monochromatic, and now it is one of the most iconic antagonist introductions in modern cinema.

"Suddenly, we're on phone calls going, 'Can we fix that? Can we fix it in post? Can we add color? How do we resolve this?' But we made a choice and just went, 'Well, we've made a choice. It's black and white, no color, we can't make it color. There's no way back,'" Fraser said. "So that, for me, was probably the biggest — I wouldn't say challenge, the biggest consideration, where we had no way home."

Those kind of visually imaginative sequences helped Dune: Part Two stand out and rake in a healthy profit. Dune: Part Three is currently in the works.

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