If you watched “Dune” because of Timothée Chalamet‘s incredible jawline and delightful curls (same), then you may have went into Dune: Part Two completely unaware of how this whole saga would go down. And if you’re one of those people “who read the book before it was cool,” get the fuck out of here! We get it, you read!!! Congrats.
Warning: Obviously there are spoilers in this article, but I assume you know that because you read the title.
Okay, now that the fun police have left, we can get into the details of what the hell happened at the end of Dune: Part Two. Because how can we appreciate Timmy’s masterclass in acting if we don’t know what the fuck is going on?
By the end of Part One, we know that Paul Atreides (Timothée Chalamet) is, by default, the duke after his father is killed by the Harkonnens. Naturally, this makes young Paul thirsty for revenge. While he’s processing his grief, the native Fremen take him in as one of their own after he proves himself worthy through various trials and challenges (like riding a sandworm). During this time he falls in love with Chani (Zendaya), who is the girl of his literal dreams. Like, for real, he has visions of the future and she was in a lot of them.
Paul’s mom, Lady Jessica (Rebecca Ferguson), is having her own journey with the Fremen while pregnant with his sister. As a member of the Bene Gesserit, she is tasked with taking over as the Fremen’s Reverend Mother, and as part of the tribal ceremony, must drink sandworm bile (for real). The gross liquid is basically super potent spice and allows her to speak directly with her fetus. This is when Jessica starts to go a little nutty and really leans into evangelizing Paul’s prophecy as part of a political scheme.
Paul’s Prophecy As Messiah
There’s two prophecy running parallel to each other during this movie. The Fremen people believe Paul and Jessica are a prophesied mother and son who will bring salvation to their planet. And the Bene Gesserit sisterhood believe Paul may be the Kwisatz Haderach, a male heir who can see across time and space.
Paul is basically Jesus without the walking on water bit. (To be fair, there is no bodies of water on the planet Dune.) He can see the past and the future, which is a power he uses to convince the tribe to follow his leadership.
Dune 2 Ending Explained
After much back and forth about his future, Paul drinks the sandworm bile, otherwise known as “The Water of Life,” which changes him fundamentally. The liquid gives him the ability to see the past and future with a clarity he’s never experienced before and decides that there’s only one narrow way through if he wants to survive: embracing a holy war.
So, Paul rallies the Fremen to attack the Harkonnen and the Emperor with sandworms in this epic battle. Paul gets to taste revenge by personally killing Baron Vladimir (Stellan Skarsgard), the guy behind his father’s death. And kills Feyd-Rautha (Austin Butler) in a knife fight, essentially ending the Harkonnen’s reign over Arrakis. He becomes the new Emperor of the Known Universe, despite the Great Houses refusal to acknowledge it, and sends his Fremen troops to fight again on his behalf. The movie ends with the realization that there’s no running from the future he envisioned in Part One.
Are Paul And Jessica The Baddies?
There are many layers to this question but the short answer is: yes, Paul is the equivalent of Darth Vader, and Jessica is his helicopter mother.
From Chani’s perspective, her situationship promised to always love her and then promptly pledges to marry the Emperor’s daughter (Florence Pugh). But that’s not the only reason she’s pissed at him. Throughout the whole movie, as fundamentalists continue to call Paul “lisan al gaib” or “voice from the outer world,” he swears up and down the last thing he wants is a holy war in his name. Yet, as he rises to power (with the help of his mother whispering things in the ears of the Fremen), he seems to forget this promise. Instead, he embraces the power and uses the people for his personal gain.
So, get it in your head people! Paul is the bad guy. So much so that Frank Herbert wrote the follow-up novel 1969’s “Dune Messiah,” to make it absolutely clear that Paul is not a hero. The book takes place 12 years after the events of “Dune,” where he continues to reign as Emperor and the Fremen’s Messiah. No third movie has been officially announced yet, so we’ll have to wait and see if Anya Taylor-Joy’s brief cameo as Paul’s future sister pays off.
