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Originally Posted by photon
My only big complaint is how they portrayed Jessica. She's supposed to be the one that trained Paul but she comes across as a failing acolyte who can't control her emotions.
I could think of a dozen different things that I may have done different or included in the dialog/plot that would have communicated what's going on, but that's probably a fool's errand. I guess the intent was to have some things happen to reward the book knowledge but done in a way that it's just texture for someone coming in new.
For people who haven't read the books how did the movie feel to you? Was it just a big spectacle but kind of confusing not really understanding where things were going or what's going on? Or did you feel that the movie had a solid understandable plot?
For example:
Does it come across that Paul is afraid of causing/triggering a violent jihad that will consume the empire? Or even that Paul is seeing the future at all?
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I felt his mother was portrayed as a big influence on him. It was clear she was training him in the way of her culture and his voice.
It was less clear to me until near the assassination that she wasn’t the Duke’s wife.
I thought the plot was very clear, albeit some details a bit sketchy, like names and titles. Easy to follow and simple enough at its core. They really hammered home the messiah thing so that was easy to pick up in. It’s basically just Avatar in space. That seemed obvious as soon as they explained the spice and the fact the natives didn’t like the spice cultivators.
Definitely knew he could see the future. Not sure about the jihad. He obviously knew the sand people are not friendly to the empire or the spice cultivators and that he was going to have to go native, so to speak. Although the assassination being the catalyst for that was not as clearly foreshadowed. Not saying it should be, I just didn’t immediately pick up on it that the emperor and the evil dudes were in cahoots. I just knew something bad was gonna happen based on all the foreshadowing about the spice planet and the scenes with the bad guys plotting.
I intentionally didn’t read the book because I wanted to see this movie first. I’ve been waiting a while, since I’ve known this movie was in development for quite some time. Having now seen part one, I’m looking forward to getting all the background and detail for the various characters, factions, customs etc that were glossed over in the movie. Or excluded entirely.