Before 2021, Dune was, in many ways, a lot like The Lord of the Rings was prior to the year 2001. Like Tolkien’s epic stories of Middle-earth, it is undeniable that Frank Herbert’s Dune saga was influential and pivotal in the history of science fiction. Not only did Herbert’s first three Dune novels penetrate a larger readership outside of science fiction circles, but the themes, world-building, and pure originality were like nothing else in the genre before. You can’t out-Dune Dune, which is why the saga has remained so singular since 1963, when the first installment of “Dune World” was published in Analog.
But important and singular are not the same as mainstream and popular. Before 2021, with the release of Dune: Part One, relative to other sci-fi franchises (like Star Trek, Star Wars, or Doctor Who), Dune still felt niche. While the 1984 David Lynch film had a cult following, and the books have never been out of print, it was hard to say whether a new mainstream film based on Dune would succeed on a larger scale. But it did. Sort of. And five years later, Denis Villeneuve’s first Dune film remains both glorious and a strange example of a new status quo when it comes to sci-fi and fantasy epics. Because for all of the brilliance of the Villeneuve Dune films, the movies are extremely safe, and in retrospect, a little bit too dull to carry the true spiciness of Dune.
