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Title: New Dune Prequel 'Dune: Prophecy' Premieres on HBO and Max

Link: https://entertainment.slashdot.org/story/24/1...

A new six-episode Dune series premiers tonight on HBO and Max - a prequel to
the Denis Villeneuve-directed Dune movies set 10,000 years before the birth f
Paul Atreides. The Hollywood Reporter writes that it "draws on source
material from the 2012 novel Sisterhood of Dune by Brian Herbert and Kevin J.
Anderson, and Frank Herbert's 1965 novel Dune, the origin of the Dune
universe." Cord-cutters can stream Dune: Prophecy online without cable on
Max, with subscriptions starting at $9.99 per month through both Prime Video
and the Max website directly. Amazon offers a seven-day free trial to the Max
channel. Those who want to watch Dune: Prophecy online without a traditional
cable service can also get Max as an add-on to existing streaming services,
including Hulu and DirecTV Stream. The San Francisco Chronicle describes the
series as "">all palace intrigues, agonizing deaths and magical mind games."
Taking a further cue from the network's top-rated Game of Thrones, this show
indulges more sex and nudity than the Dune movies allow. It could be argued
that elements like this introduce a liveliness often missing from the
portentous big-screen behemoths, marking an improvement. Another fun touch
here: Many characters are constantly baked. Set a millennium before Frank
Herbert's novels and the films' events, and a century after humans overthrew
their "thinking machine" overlords, the psychoactive "Spice" from the desert
planet Arrakis is already the most valued substance in the universe. It's not
only vital for spaceship navigation and to expand the mental powers of
sorceressy sisterhoods like the Bene Gesserit, it's the club drug of choice
for younger members of the galaxy-ruling Great Houses. As ever with "Dune"
business, control of the Spice trade fuels much of the conflict and character
motivations. Of which there are just enough to keep things interesting
without becoming confusing... While the show can't match the outsize visual
scope of Denis Villeneuve's films, it does pleasingly approximate those vast
alien landscapes, Brutalist edifices and high-ceilinged chambers on a TV
budget. For those who find Villeneuve's formal gigantism oppressive, the
series' more human scale might be another welcome change of pace... There may
not be an original thought in this "Dune" product's Spice-soaked head, but it
is one professionally put-together piece of this sort of entertainment.
"Tasked with making more material with less money and time, Prophecy cannot
hope to equal Villeneuve's aesthetic accomplishments," writes Variety. "But
at its best, the show does justice to the intricate politics and ethical
debates that form a cornerstone of Frank Herbert's fictional universe... The
primary Dune plot finds many echoes throughout Prophecy..." On the other
hand, Vulture argues the six-episode series is "stuck in prequel quicksand,"
even calling it "an act of cowardice and abdication of creativity" (while
also noting moments where it "feels like it's stretching itself to be
something other than what we expect..."

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

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