By With “Dune: Part Two” now a raging critical and commercial success, what’s next for the franchise?
Director Denis Villeneuve seems intent on doing “Dune Messiah” as a film at some point, but before then we’re set to get something else – the HBO prequel series “Dune: Prophecy”.
Previously titled “Dune: The Sisterhood,” the series went into production in late 2022 and several months of work was completed when Warner Bros. Discovery hit stop on the production and opted to creatively overhaul it.
“Chernobyl” executive producer Johan Renck, who had been attached, was out whilst creator Diane Ademu-John stepped down as co-showrunner. Additionally, actress Shirley Henderson was out.
At the time of the reports a year ago, it was said Renck’s auteur approach and desire for a visual look akin to the Villeneuve films didn’t mix with HBO Max’s vision for the series.
Speaking with The Playlist recently to promote the release of his new Adam Sandler-led astronaut drama “Spaceman,” he confirmed he’s not involved in “Dune: Prophecy” at all beyond an executive producer credit:
This is what kind of happens sometimes. I’ve been through similar things before. Like I said before, I’m not tremendously interested in episodic television as a director. Anyway, it’s been many years since I was involved in that [show] in any shape or form.
He adds the reason he got involved was that he was a massive fan of the David Lynch “Dune” which is so “absurd, bizarre, weird, dark, and twisted”.
He confirmed early on the show “doesn’t have to have anything to do with the Villeneuve movies, this is its own animal, and we can do whatever we want with it so that’s where it started.”
Then he says the whole plan for the show changed course, and he understands that is the nature of television so has no real hard feelings about it:
“There was a lot of stuff that was going on, but no one can be held responsible, or showrunners that got exchanged, and the original idea of the story completely changed course also because it used to be called, ‘Dune: Sisterhood,’ and then it changed names and became a completely different thing. Again, that’s something that can happen in episodic TV, and it’s just like, either you are okay being in and functioning in that environment of that kind, but it never has been or will it be something for me.”
At last report, the series is set 10,000 years before the ascension of Paul Atreides in “Dune” and follows the Harkonnen Sisters as they combat forces that threaten the future of humankind and establish the fabled sect known as the Bene Gesserit.
Filming on the series was concluded in December with the show expected to air late this year or early next year.
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