World Building in Dune

World Building in Dune

May 1, 2017

Hey guys, Professor Bill of Comic Book University here, and I really want to thank everyone who commented and contributed to my last two articles. That says a lot about your love for the Open Legend content and the campaign.

This week I just want to chillax a little and talk about Dune, my hands down favorite sci-fi story ever.

I enjoyed the David Lynch film for what it was, though I’d rather them have not had the weird sound guns. I mean, what was up with that? But the film did a lot right, like the internal dialog was on the nose perfect. All-star cast, great music (long live Toto), it really was fun.

I also really liked the sy-fy mini-series, which led to the “Children of Dune,” and that included the “Dune Messiah” story as well. It was a lower budget than the movie, but it was much truer to the novel. Also, as a mini-series, it gave the story time to breathe.

I’ve also watched “Jodorowsky’s Dune” and I would not have appreciated seeing that just because of the ending he suggested. No room for a sequel. There’s a new version coming out which I’m looking forward to seeing.

But enough of my opinions of the product.

Basically, this was the ultimate world-building story. It’s the number one science fiction book in history (yeah, better than “Time Machine,” “10,000 Leagues Under the Sea,” and even both “Invisible Man” novels).

Frank Herbert built a world where several main characters and armies from other worlds would battle. He built the politics, the economics, the religions, the different factions, and still left everything open. Very little attention was paid to the individual cities, the local populace, most commoners. Eventually the books even explored a changing ecosystem.

Dune was a space opera, or a science fiction soap opera. Think about it, we followed the story of rich elitists who had all sorts of drama with each other. There was betrayal, the doctor was a traitor, common folk barely exist. The only difference is they stabbed each other with Fremen-knives rather than splashing drinks in each other’s faces.

And sandworms. There were sandworms, too.

Although there was high technology in existence, a simple concept of “the static and sand of this world cause those weapons to not work” was all it took to keep the concept low tech. At one point, when they were off planet, the statement was made that the shields that one character was employing would cause a laser blast to generate an explosion that would kill everyone.

Genius! Now we can stick to knife fighting.

Oh, but what about robots and artificial intelligence? Yeah, they exist, but we banned them because of a huge war that was stolen by the Wachowskis. Other people had them, like the mysterious peoples of Ix, but they won’t be in this story.

These books, in my humble opinion, are the best we’ll likely ever see in science fiction. Agree? Disagree? Haven’t read Dune? Wanna suggest something else? Comments below, please. Specifically, what books do you think are the best examples of world building?

Professor Bill
Comic Book University

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