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Dune 2018 (19,20,21...)

As Wayoung just laid out, that only happens in the story once or twice. Dune really isn't an action packed adventure story. There's like three one-on-one duels in the whole book. Everything else either happens off-screen or is an out and out melee.

And off screen works well for movies ;)

Did you watch Game of Thrones start to finish? Second season had a supposedly big battle that lead to an unexpected Stark win - the show did it offscreen and only showed the aftermath because they didn't have the money. Fast forward a few seasons and after GoT became a massive hit - the battles they could do then were amazing and vast because HBO poured some real money into the show after they were confident they had a hit show.

Now with Dune we will surely see these big battles that are only glanced in the book - the first battle of Arakeen when the Harkonnen/Sardaukar defeated the Atreides ( good chance to showcase Sardaukar combat supremacy when fighting Atreides in preparation for later when they start fighting Fremen and get whopped themselves), Pauls desert guerilla campaign and in the second battle when he retakes Arrakis as a whole (plus the various small battles and personal fights).

I agree with JD that it will get quickly boring of BG trained fighters just mow through their opponents - once or twice is ok to showcase these abilities but as movies are a visual medium overdoing it would be detrimental.

I have confidence in Villeneuve to be able to strike a balance and have the audience understand the escalating combat skill from standard army fighters to Sardauker to Fremen and then Paul, each time ramping up the level.
 
The big battle takes place over some jump cuts in a dream sequence in the miniseries. It was much more about Yueh's betrayal.
 
TBH, some of the more spectacular one-on-one fight scenes are written in later books - specifically the one I can remember in Heretics of Dune - when the Miles Teg is interrogated using a T-Probe, and it unlocks almost superhuman skills / reaction times... boom!

That scene took my by surprise when I first read it!

As much as I love the first book, I’m hoping further movies are produced based on the remainder of the saga.
 
That it doesn't dwell too much on the action is to the book's credit. Fewer things are more tedious than reading an action scene, so when Herbert does it, he does it sparingly and makes it count. Being a visual medium I of course fully expect the movie to show way more in terms of the spectacle. That said, I also expect it to hew to the spirit and tone of the books, which kept the perspective very much at ground level, from the character's POV: -

Paul and Jessica meeting up with Duncan as in the distance, massive numbers of Sardaukar air forces rake the desert with lasbeams in a desperate attempt to find them (and get a subatomic detonation to the face courtesy of a shield left buried in the sand) Thuffir taking refuge in the shield wall with a few house guard survivors, to take stock of the sheer scale of the assault and negotiate an entente with a band of Freman to get them out all while the battle still rages on in the basin below.

I hope the film shows some restraint and doesn't indulge in extended omnipotent POV battle sequences and keep the perspective with the character where it matters and keep the action as the backdrop the the drama, not the drama itself.
TBH, some of the more spectacular one-on-one fight scenes are written in later books - specifically the one I can remember in Heretics of Dune - when the Miles Teg is interrogated using a T-Probe, and it unlocks almost superhuman skills / reaction times... boom!

Nothing "almost" about it. That was some straight-up comic superhero shenanigans.
 
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If the movie was made in the late '90s or early '00s I can almost guarantee you they would have.
 
That it doesn't dwell too much on the action is to the book's credit. Fewer things are more tedious than reading an action scene, so when Herbert does it, he does it sparingly and makes it count. Being a visual medium I of course fully expect the movie to show way more in terms of the spectacle. That said, I also expect it to hew to the spirit and tone of the books, which kept the perspective very much at ground level, from the character's POV: -

Paul and Jessica meeting up with Duncan as in the distance, massive numbers of Sardaukar air forces rake the desert with lasbeams in a desperate attempt to find them (and get a subatomic detonation to the face courtesy of a shield left buried in the sand) Thuffir taking refuge in the shield wall with a few house guard survivors, to take stock of the sheer scale of the assault and negotiate an entente with a band of Freman to get them out all while the battle still rages on in the basin below.

I hope the film shows some restraint and doesn't indulge in extended omnipotent POV battle sequences and keep the perspective with the character where it matters and keep the action as the backdrop the the drama, not the drama itself.


Nothing "almost" about it. That was some straight-up comic superhero shenanigans.

All i want is to sit in the theater and wait for Jason Momoa/Duncan Idaho say "Let's fight like demons!" - i still get goosebumps everytime i see it in the trailers and i'm ready to be blown away by some bonkers fighting that will follow :D
 
But it's a lot more exciting than the people who use it taking their opponents out in one hit. This is a big blockbuster, so they're going to want their big fight scenes to last more than a few seconds.

The Weirding Way is only going to be used by Paul and Jessica initially, but in the second film, it'll be used by all of the Fremen against the Sardaukar and the Harkonnen (and yeah, it'll be better than seeing the ridiculous weirding module just blast people dead-people who might be wearing shields that will convert said blast to a subatomic detonation!)
 
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And it's correct - in the Dune universe it's called the Holtzmann Effect and it only applies to Lasguns vs. Shields (not that the book ever had "Weirding Modules" so it's a moot point).
 
I've honestly never really thought about it, but the "slow blade penetrates the shield" thing could indeed mean that a sonic weapon could get around it, since it's basically just a matter of frequency modulation. Not that the movie did a good job of communicating this, nor is it any substitute for the kind of fundamental training used in the book.
 
Well, if you can hear someone through a shield, or breath room air through a shield, then by definition that opens the door for the possibility that a sonic weapon might be able to murder someone inside a shield. The vulnerability of a shield being permeable to gas molecules makes a biochemical weapon a much more promising path to exploit, though.
 
So, did anyone get any of the action figures/Pops?

The pops were supposed to be out Oct 15 in Canada, but I checked on my pre -order on the weekend and the guy at EB Games said he didn't know what was up, they never recieved them, but they were never officially delayed.

The action figures aren't supposed to be out until the end of Nov here but I see tweets of people in the US finding them in store at Target.
 
I just checked Amazon and it says the Funko Pops won't be out until December 5th.
 
So my pre order for the Funko Pops has been changed from pickup Oct 15 2020 to Aug 16 2021.

My McFarlane Toys figures are still scheduled for Nov 27.
 
My local comic book store messaged me, my McFarlanes figures will be available on the 25th. Gonna wait until the set I ordered from Amazon come in before unboxing any though, see of any boxes have damage and open those.
 
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