TV Discussion – “Children of Dune” Part Two

The saga continues, if you live in the U.S.A. (I have to wait until April 13 to see this, dag nabbit!)

5 replies on “TV Discussion – “Children of Dune” Part Two”

  1. It seems great so far.
    The casting this time around is excellent. I think they’re handling Alia’s possession well, although it might seem a bit odd if you’ve never read the books. The inner lives of the preborn haven’t been very well detailed in this installment.

    The Laza tigers: with less emphasis placed on the preborns’ innate talents, I guess Ghani being knocked unconscious makes sense. She doesn’t see what happens next, so there’s no need to explain the twins ability to hypnotize themselves to the point where they can believe an untruth (I am trying to obliquely dodge a spoiler for any who haven’t read the first Dune trilogy.)

    The screenwriter has done agreat job segmenting these books. Having been disappointed by the original Dune movie (Kyle McLaughlin???) I didn’t think these books would adapt as well as they did.

    -Joe G.

  2. Well.
    It looks like when I get back home Friday evening all day saturday will consist of me, a chair, and a TiVo

  3. Final Impression (Parts 1-3)
    Since we don’t have a discussion about part three (probably because fiz is tired of reading about something that hasn’t aired nearby yet), I thought I’d throw out my impressions on it here: Specifically, “dung.” Or “excrement,” if you prefer. I gave the first two parts an “okay” which I already thought was disappointing but part three went out with the weakest of fizzles.

    I’m not going to go into deconstructive detail because, frankly, this installment isn’t even close to worth it. I will note that I’m one of those who actually enjoyed the books Dune Messiah and Children of Dune. The characters meant something to me and I actually cared about what they were going through. In some ways, I felt like Herbert was less mechanical in the second book in particular – it came off as slightly less of a history lesson than the other two – and the third book had some interesting themes about honor, the nature of time and how it can be ruined by precognition, the fremen finding out how they really felt about the desert and how important it was, etc. There were even some decent bits about love, jealousy and that sort of jazz.

    With this third installment of the miniseries, it felt like the whole thing was a mechanical exercise in “self pleasure” but without the pleasure (I’m just prude enough to edit that sentence but you get the gist). By the end, when I should have been feeling good about some reunions, feeling said about some departures, etc. I found myself feeling nothing. When I read the book, I actually cared about what happened to all the principals. (I should note here that I’m an easy mark for tugging of the heartstrings when it’s done halfway decently.) By the end of the miniseries, I didn’t care about the characters on screen at all. I didn’t care about the fremen. I didn’t care about the desert. I didn’t care about the tragedy of losing the majestic worms. I didn’t feel a damn thing except that I had wasted precious time watching all three bits (if I had known what I know now, I would have simply watched the first part and left it at that).

    To summarize, if you like your science fiction vague and all but completely sterile, then by all means enjoy part three of Children of Dune. For those of you who like big scifi stories that have a lot to them, then go get the first Dune miniseries on DVD, watch that and MAYBE catch the rerun of part one (Dune Messiah) of this miniseries. As I said earlier, part two was actually “okay” but I think that part three ruins 90% of any enjoyment you might have gotten out of part two.

    Pitiful. Just pitiful.

    • Re: Final Impression (Parts 1-3)

      Since we don’t have a discussion about part three (probably because fiz is tired of reading about something that hasn’t aired nearby yet),

      It’s because I forgot it aired nightly. I’ll get that forum up ASAP.

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