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As with any sequel, part of the appeal of the first trailer for Dune: Part Three is seeing all the familiar faces. The teaser gives us new looks at Paul and Chani, now older and weathered from the former’s role as Emperor. We see Lady Jessica’s face, covered in tattoos, and what appears to be the face of Duncan Idaho, somehow alive after his death in the first Dune. But the most interesting face is that of Robert Pattinson, who plays a suspicious new character.
Pattinson plays Scytale, a Face-Dancer who serves a key role in a conspiracy formed against House Atreides. Scytale is a mysterious character, one whose true nature and purpose are opaque to everyone. Yet, the trailer forces us to ask, “Is Scytale a hero or villain?”
Directed once again by Denis Villeneuve, who co-writes the script with comic scribe Brian K. Vaughn, Dune: Part Three adapts Dune Messiah, the second book in Frank Herbert‘s series. Set approximately twelve years after the first book, Messiah finds Paul seemingly all powerful because of Muad’Dib’s Jihad, and able to enact his vision for the future of humanity. However, a conspiracy rises against Paul, with roots that extend even into his inner circle.
One of the main players in that conspiracy is Pattinson’s character, Scytale. Scytale is a Face-Dancer, the term for shapeshifters within Herbert’s world. Shapeshifters are certainly nothing new to genre fiction, the unique history of Dune‘s reality requires a bit more explanation. Because Dune takes place several millennia after the Butlerian Jihad that destroyed all advanced computers, technology evolved differently.
Where the Bene Gesseret, the order that includes Paul’s mother Jessica, cultivated religious practices that gave them abilities such as the Voice and finger-talking, the Bene Tleilax practiced genetic modification. Eventually, the Bene Tleilax developed complete control over their bodies, allowing themselves to change their makeup on a cellular level, essentially shapeshifting.
Face-dancers aren’t completely new to those who only watch the Dune movies and haven’t read the books. Sister Theodosia, the Bene Gesserit acolyte played by Jade Anouka in Dune: Prophecy was a Face Dancer, who used her abilities to advance Valya Harkonnen’s (Emily Watson) plans. As seen in that show, Face Dancers are a pariah among the larger society, an issue that only grows worse in the 10,000 years between that show and the events of the first Dune movie.
Thus, when Scytale enters the story, he has good reason to doubt Paul’s empire. As such, Scytale serves an important thematic role for Dune: Part Three. Herbert wrote Messiah, in part, as a rejoinder to those who saw Paul as a more or less straightforward hero. In Messiah, the critique of charismatic leaders is more obvious, making Paul feel more morally ambiguous.
It’s hard to make your readers mistrust your main character. It’s all the harder for movie audiences watching glamorous Hollywood stars to criticize the actions of the protagonist, especially when he’s played by Timothée Chalamet. Fortunately, Pattinson is the ideal counter to Chalamet. A magnetic and handsome performer in his own right, Pattinson has built his career around his ability to play against type. From Tenet to The Batman to Mickey 17, Pattinson knows how to embody people who are weirder than they seem, who shouldn’t be fully trusted.
Does that ability mean that Scytale will be a villain in Dune: Part Three? The answer depends in part on how we view Paul, but it depends just as much as on what we see when we look at the face of Scytale, a face that’s always changing.
Dune 3 arrives in theaters on December 18, 2026.
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