Dune: Part 2 has finally hit theaters. While the sequel wraps up director Denis Villeneuve’s adaptation of the original Frank Herbert novel, it’s looking more and more likely that it won’t be the last movie in this series. For one thing, Villeneuve has been hard at work writing a screenplay based on the sequel book Dune Messiah. And for another, Dune: Part 2 just had the best box office opening since 2023’s Barbie, suggesting Warner Bros. will want to keep mining that precious, precious spice.
We’ve already broken down the ending of Dune: Part 2 and where it leaves characters like Timothee Chalamet’s Paul Atreides and Zendaya’s Chani. But what happens next? What is Dune Messiah about, and why is it such an essential addition to Paul’s story? Why does it appear as though Villeneuve isn’t planning a straightforward adaptation of Messiah? We’re going to take a closer look at what happens next in the series. We’ll start out with the basics of Dune Messiah before getting into full plot spoilers at the end. Just beware of major spoilers for Dune: Part 2 and the book Dune Messiah ahead!
The Emperor Paul Muad’Dib
Like the original novel, Dune: Part 2 ends with Paul usurping the Imperial throne and wedding himself to Florence Pugh’s Princess Irulan. Not all the great houses of the Landsraad are ready to recognize Paul’s claim to the throne, but that’s where Paul’s massive army of fanatical Fremen warriors comes in. Paul fears the holy war he’s about to unleash, but that being said, based on his prescient visions, he believes that war is the best thing to help ensure humanity’s long-term survival.
Dune Messiah picks up about 12 years after the events of Dune, in a time when said holy war has claimed more than 60 billion lives. Paul presides over the Imperium from his throne on Arrakis, and very heavy is the head that wears the crown. Paul’s spice-induced abilities have only grown since the events of the first book. He’s plagued by visions of possible futures, and he finds it harder and harder to make choices or exercise free will when he can see the inevitable end result of every action.
Paul is burdened by the cataclysmic cost of his holy war, having lost full control of his fanatical army of Fremen. At the same time, Paul’s prescience shows him that this holy war is not the worst outcome for humanity. His ultimate goal is to ensure that humanity flourishes rather than falls into stagnation and ruin. This process of saving humanity from itself eventually becomes known in the books as “The Golden Path,” and it’s a burden Paul finds increasingly hard to bear.
The Conspiracy Against Paul Atreides
Paul may be the Emperor in the era of Dune Messiah, but as you’d expect, not everyone is thrilled with his rule. Even some among the Fremen begin to question their Lisan al Gaib. Early in the book, a group of Fremen are shown meeting on Arrakis and conspiring against Paul. They lament the loss of the old Fremen way of life. Being exposed to vast amounts of water on faraway planets definitely doesn’t help.
It isn’t just the Fremen who conspire against Paul, however. The book also introduces a secret cabal that includes members of the Bene Gesserit (including both Charlotte Rampling’s character Reverend Mother Gaius Helen Mohiam and Florence Pugh’s Princess Irulan), the Spacing Guild and the xenophobic sect known as the Tleilaxu. Because Guild Navigators are so hideously transformed by spice that they bend time and space around themselves, this group is able to use the Navigator as a sort of cloaking device against Paul’s prescience.
In truth, though, Paul knows more about the plots against him than he lets on. For example, he knows that Irulan has been secretly poisoning Chani with contraceptives. Paul refuses to consummate his marriage to Irulan but does desire a child with Chani, who is still his faithful concubine (as we’ll discuss in a bit, this is one element that will likely change for the movie). Paul allows Irulan to continue sabotaging Chani because his oracular visions have shown him that Chani’s pregnancy will inevitably end in her death. He can see this terrible tragedy looming over him, yet he can do little to affect the future beyond delaying the outcome.
The Return of Jason Momoa’s Duncan Idaho
Decades before Game of Thrones came along, Dune gave readers a true Red Wedding moment when House Atreides is betrayed and massacred by the Harkonnens and their Sardaukar allies. Several of the key characters in the book up to that point are killed off, including master swordsman Duncan Idaho. But one thing that becomes increasingly clear when reading the Dune books is that death is no barrier to familiar characters returning.
Case in point - Messiah features the surprise return of Duncan Idaho. To keep the Red Wedding comparison going, he’s basically the book’s answer to Game of Thrones’ Lady Stoneheart. Idaho is resurrected by the Tleilaxu as a ghola - an artificial, silver-eyed clone implanted with the memories of the original Duncan. This version of Duncan calls himself Hayt. The Tleilaxu give Hayt to Paul as a gift, though Paul doesn’t need prescient awareness to know Hayt is not a person to be trusted.
Right off the bat, Hayt’s presence hurts Paul’s standing among the Fremen. Despite their high regard for the original Duncan, they view gholas as unholy facsimiles of the real thing. Hayt is also sent to seduce Alia, leading to a lot of sexual tension between the two characters (again, kudos to Villeneuve for aging up Alia’s character here).
How Does Zendaya's Chani Fit In?
Even though Dune: Part 3 is years away at this point, we already know the movie won’t be an exact adaptation of Dune Messiah. That’s because Part 2 leaves one of the principal players in a very different place.
In Messiah, Chani is depicted as Paul’s concubine, still 100% loyal to the Lisan al Gaib and desperate to conceive a child that will cement House Atreides’ claim to the Imperial throne. But in Dune: Part 2, Chani breaks away from Paul rather than remain by his side as the new Emperor’s concubine. She’s disturbed by his plan to marry into the throne and opts to return to the deserts of Arrakis. Clearly, Villeneuve has no intention of casting Zendaya’s character as Paul’s faithful and everpresent companion in the next movie.
That’s not to say Chani will simply be out of the picture. We suspect she’s being positioned for a very different role in Dune: Part 3. Chani will likely become the figurehead of those Fremen who resist Paul Muad’Dib’s holy war. She’s not the only one disillusioned with this supposed messiah from another world. We may see her leading guerrilla attacks against House Atreides’ spice mining operations, just as she did against House Harkonnen in the earlier movies.
Conversely, we may see Irulan take on a less antagonistic role in Dune: Part 3. Part 2 goes out of its way to paint Irulan as being sympathetic to Paul, which could be another clue as to the changing story direction of the next sequel. Will Irulan still be part of the cabal plotting against the Emperor? Will Paul still be as resistant to fathering children with Irulan?
And what about the romance between Paul and Chani? Is that dead now, or will we see the two characters drawn back together over the course of Part 3? Is Paul still haunted by visions of Chani’s death? If Dune: Part 3 is at all going to follow the outline of Dune Messiah, eventually Chani will become pregnant. Perhaps her love for Paul will ultimately win out over her commitment to the traditional Fremen way of life.
How Dune Messiah Ends
We’ve covered the major characters and storylines that make up Dune Messiah now, but how does the novel end? Does Paul find a path forward, or is he forever trapped inside the tangle of prescient visions that dominate his life? We’re about to get into full spoilers for the ending of Dune Messiah now!
As Dune Messiah unfolds, Paul begins fighting back against the Fremen conspiracy. One of his Fedaykin loyalists, Otheym, gives Paul a dwarf servant named Bijaz whose perfect recall gives him valuable insight into the conspiracy. However, Otheym is actually one of the Fremen traitors, and Bijaz is himself an agent of the conspiracy against Paul.
Returning to his palace, Paul is blinded when an atomic weapon is detonated nearby. This is bad news, given that blind Fremen are expected to exile themselves into the desert rather than become a drain on their tribe’s water supply. But Paul’s prescience has grown to the point where he can freely move about the world and “see,” so long as he remains in lockstep with his oracular visions. Watching their Lisan al Gaib navigate the world with supernatural sight, the Fremen are even more in awe of Paul than ever.
Chani ultimately dies in childbirth, as Paul’s visions foretold. Bijaz implants a subconscious command in Hayt to kill Paul, one that becomes activated when Paul mourns the death of Chani. However, Hayt successfully resists the command, regaining full control of his memories and faculties in the process.
Paul may have seen Chani’s death, but he didn’t foresee the fact that Chani was pregnant with twins - a boy named Leto II and a girl named Ghanima. Like Alia, the twins are born with full awareness and access to their ancestral memories. With Paul’s path finally diverging from his visions, he becomes truly blind.
Scytale, the Tleilaxu representative in the plot against Paul, emerges from hiding to threaten Leto and Ghanima and blackmail the now-helpless Paul. Scytale demands Paul abdicate his throne and give up his C.H.O.A.M. company holdings. In return, he offers to resurrect Chani as a ghola.
Paul refuses. He manages to tap into his newborn son’s psychic vision, allowing him to throw a perfectly aimed knife and kill Scytale. Bijaz repeats the ultimatum, but the newly loyal Duncan executes him on Paul’s command. Paul then follows Fremen tradition and retreats into the desert to die, leaving Alia and the now-chastened Irulan to raise his children.
With this last act, Paul successfully ensures his family’s future. Leto II will one day rule in his stead. By exiling himself, Paul has broken his hold over the Fremen. He’s shown them he isn’t a god, but just another mortal. The galaxy enters an era of relative peace. But how long will it last? What happens when Leto and Ghanima come of age? And where is Rebecca Ferguson’s character Lady Jessica in all of this? That’s where the third book in the series, Children of Dune, comes in.
Again, there’s really no telling just how closely Dune: Part 3 will adapt the events of Dune Messiah. We don’t know how drastically the plot will be affected by Chani’s decision at the end of Part 2. And there’s no telling what other changes Villeneuve may make in the next screenplay. Like Paul, we’ve seen the future of the Dune franchise, but that doesn’t mean that future will play out as we expect.
What do you think? Will Dune: Part 3 be a direct adaptation of Dune Messiah, or are there more changes in store for Paul Atreides? Let us know your theories in the comments below.
And for more on Dune 2, see why the movie is about Hollywood's current problems and learn why a feel-bad sci-fi movie is just what we needed right now.
Jesse is a mild-mannered staff writer for IGN. Allow him to lend a machete to your intellectual thicket by following @jschedeen on Twitter.
