If you've seen last year's Dune you'll know that it ends on something of a cliffhanger, having only adapted about half of Frank Herbert's epic novel. Thankfully, in spite of its Covid-compromised release, we will be getting the concluding instalment of Denis Villeneuve's sci-fi masterwork, and Stilgar himself, Javier Bardem, has just provided a progress update.
"I’ve read the new draft," he told an event audience at Cannes, "and I think they’ve done an amazing job of putting together the pieces in a way that is going to surprise people. They won’t be surprised [by what happens], obviously, because they’ve read the book, but they’ll be surprised by the way they put it together. I was very moved by it. It’s a movie that is full, and you can feel the weight of it, and at the same time [you can enjoy] the spectacularity of it. [I can’t wait] to go back to the desert with those people, and I’m so happy to go back with Denis, who is one of the greatest directors ever."
The longer-term future of Villeneuve's Dune-iverse remains to be seen. The director has suggested that he'd ideally like to complete a trilogy, with the third part covering the event's of Herbert's (much shorter) sequel Dune Messiah. There's also the matter of spin-off TV series The Sisterhood, about the witchy Bene-Gesserit order, destined to stream on Warners' HBO Max service. That one's still in development, with The Haunting of Bly Manor's Diane Ademu-John replacing John Spaihts as showrunner last year, and Chernobyl's Johan Renck set to direct the first two episodes.
But before all that, Dune: Part Two starts shooting in Budapest shortly, with new recruits including Christopher Walken as Padishah Emperor Shaddam IV, Florence Pugh as his daughter Princess Irulan, and Austin Butler as Feyd-Rautha, the devious nephew of Stellan Skarsgård's Baron Harkonnen. The movie is currently scheduled to arrive on 20 October next year.