The latest addition to Dune The franchise doesn't want to be a one-off entry. According Dune: Prophecy Executive producer Jordan Goldberg said: “There are so many things to touch on in this universe – our characters themselves are incredibly rich, and their choices, their backstories and their motivations give us great potential for more stories. I hope we can go as far as we can. I mean, the program is called Dune: Prophecy“So we're just beginning to understand how this all comes to be, 10,000 years later, with Paul Atreides.”
Says star Travis Fimmel, laughing: “It's really a period piece, isn't it?”
“It's a futuristic period piece,” Goldberg agrees.
During a recent day of panel discussions with the cast and producers behind the HBO spin-off series, Dune: ProphecyThe curious place of Dune History was a great talking point, especially given the show's exploration of how technology works in this specific time period.
Showrunner Alison Schapker acknowledges that the Prophecy The team was “definitely influenced by Denis Villeneuve's universe; I think it really unlocked Dune for people, keeping it an amazing show, but also very character-driven. So yes, we see ourselves as 10,000 years earlier, but talking about those movies from a distance.
And this means a completely different attitude when it comes to how technology works in this fictional universe, specifically one that faces the consequences of a brutal war between AI and humanity, known for Dune-heads like The Butlerian Jihad. After that hundred-year conflict, the use of all so-called “thinking machines” was prohibited; in Frank Herbert Dune – and consequently, Villeneuve's Dune movies: This technology is considered a relic of the past, as the Butlerian Jihad took place literally thousands of years ago.
However, the characters of ProphecySet much earlier in the timeline, they have a much clearer memory of the brutal battle between the AI and humanity that led to said rejection… as well as a clearer memory of how useful that now-banned technology can be. Cast member Chloe Lea notes that “it was fairly recent that [the war between computers and humanity] happened, in relation to our characters being in the Brotherhood. So I feel like the fear of technology is probably ingrained within us. “It’s probably still pretty fresh.”
Fimmel adds: “Imagine if everyone's phone was taken away from them today. It would simply throw the world into disaster. You have to think for yourself. “You can’t just Google it.”
This is not to say that technology of any kind is off the table. Prophecylike the rest of Dunemakes significant use of “Holtzman” repellent technology to fuel advances such as space travel and personal body shields that protect people from most forms of attack.
“It's a really cool device in the movies and in the books, so it's cool to have it in our world,” Goldberg says. “And what we did with it was extend it to other things. Our hovercraft are generated by Holtzman, we have a prison where people levitate with Holtzman belts. We also have wheelchairs that are levitated by Holtzman. “It's fun to take some of the basic elements, in terms of technology, and try to show how it spreads across our universe.”
Furthermore, humanity, being a fairly adaptable species (at least in Herbert's fictional universe), advances in new ways. “The interesting thing about our program is that when you exclude people from technology in this way, you get a little bit of stagnation,” Goldberg says. “How does humanity react to that?” DuneThe answer to that question, he continues, is that “all of these different schools, the Brotherhood being one of them, jump into the fray to lead what will be the next human evolution.”
The Brotherhood, a female-led order dedicated to guiding the future of humanity, will eventually evolve into the Bene Gesserit, a powerful collective of women with supernatural abilities acquired through rigorous training. However, even in the Brotherhood's early days, its members have developed the ability to detect lies, among other abilities.
Not being able to rely on technology, suggests cast member Jade Anouka, “means our focus is much more on our bodies and our abilities.” Anouka plays another Brotherhood disciple and describes the training she and her fellow acolytes receive as a way to unlock “the abilities that we have within us that are so powerful: to actually focus, look inward and say, okay, We can teach.” that you learn to control your body at a molecular level and that you can actually read people.”
Before ProphecySchapker had been an executive producer at HBO. western worldwhich also did “its own spin on artificial intelligence.” So I was very involved in the current debates and kept them attentive.”
Going from working in western world and his deep-seated concerns about the evolution of AI, he says, “toward a world on the other side of our conflict with artificial intelligence, and actually dealing with the consequences, ramifications, fear and suspicion of banning machines, and also to know what is between that in the Dune universe, a really big cost to humanity to give up their agency like that… It's mind-blowing and wonderful.”
Schapker noted that the recent resurgence of interest in Dune “It couldn't be happening at a better time, because here we are, rushing to translate our thinking into machines, for better or worse. It is a pertinent time to ask questions and I think that Dune “It's raising a whole series of questions about where that could lead.”
Star Jodhi May agrees. “It's not necessarily new, but the way it fits with what we're going through now and what it means for us on a day-to-day basis [level] It's really prophetic. [Herbert] he was really ahead of his time in what he talked about: the dangers of what it means to invest in synthetic or mechanical. To the extent that we strip ourselves of authority and self-determination.”
Dune: Prophecy premieres Sunday, November 17 on HBO and Max. Sign up for a Max subscription here.
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