161: Dune: Part Two - The Kwisatz Tabarnak (with Jacob Bacharach)

Junk Filter

The author Jacob Bacharach returns for a sequel to our Junk Filter episode about Denis Villeneuve’s Dune, with a look at his long-awaited Dune: Part Two.

Villeneuve said in interviews that he thought of Frank Herbert’s novel as an allegory for the French Canadians under the thumb of the authoritarian government of Maurice Duplessis that used the Catholic Church to subjugate the Quebecois people before the Quiet Revolution of the 1960s. Jacob and I use this allegory as a jumping off point to extend the metaphor: are the Bene Gesserit the Catholic Church? Are the Fremen the FLQ? And is Paul Atreides the saviour of an independent Quebec, the Kwisatz Tabarnak?

Plus: Jacob and I discuss the charms of Dune: Part Two including how the movie differs from Frank Herbert’s novel, the arrival of Christopher Walken as the Emperor qnd Austin Butler as Feyd-Rautha, and our MVP Javier Bardem as Stilgar. Plus: Josh Brolin’s homoerotic ode to Timothée Chalamet, the dreaded Dune Popcorn Bucket, and a look at some of the galaxy-brained responses online from people who thought Paul was supposed to be the hero of the story.

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Follow Jacob Bacharach on Twitter and visit jacobbacharach.com

Trailer for Dune: Deuxième Partie (Villeneuve, 2024)

Action: The October Crisis of 1970 (Robin Spry, 1973) - great documentary from the National Film Board about the rise of the Quebec separatist movement

From New York To L.A. - Patsy Gallant, 1977

A Cerveza Cristal ad stitched into the Chilean cable airing of Star Wars: A New Hope in 2004