Referenced By / Dune

References to Frank Herbert's literary series Dune and some of its adaptations.

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Fan Works

• In Captain Proton and the Planet of Lesbians, Buster Kincaid gives the student version of the Litany Against Fear.
  "I must drink beer. Beer is the mind killer. Beer brings the hangover that causes total obliteration. I will scull my beer. I will let it pass through me, till only urine remains!"

Anime & Manga

• Daimos: One of the Baam is named Gurney Halleck. He goes from being Kazuya's enemy to seeing him as a Worthy Opponent.
• In Hellsing (OVA and anime as well), the big portable cannon wielded by Seras Victoria is called "Harkonnen". Also, in the manga and OVA Seras occasionally dreams of a Lawyer-Friendly Cameo of the 1984 film version of the Baron Harkonnen (wearing the same coat) as the spirit of the cannon.

Film — Live-Action

• The name of Jillian Holtzmann from Ghostbusters (2016) is a reference to the Holtzman Effect that makes folding space possible in Dune; her gadgets are used to close a hole between dimensions.
• The nerdy Sherman from My Science Project is shown reading Dune at one point.
• In the opening classroom scene, Javier Perez in Stand and Deliver is shown with the book as well.
• Dune has had an influence on George Lucas for the creation of the Star Wars franchise starting with A New Hope. Mainly, the presence of an evil Empire, the plot-relevant desert planet of Tatooine that is similar to Arrakis, where the Jawas move in giant vehicles similar to the sandcrawlers, Luke's uncle is a moisture farmer akin to a dew collector and Jabba the Hutt (an alien crime lord with wormlike body akin to Leto II) sends his victims to be fed to the Sarlacc, a subterranean monster that has a Lamprey Mouth similar to the Sandworms'. The Jedi Mind Trick is also similar to the Bene Gesserit's "Voice", Luke and Leia learn about their secret lineage to a Big Bad akin to Paul and Alia learning they're grandchildren of Baron Harkonnen and C-3PO mentions the "Spice Mines of Kessel" (which would then appear in Solo) and the Spice will turn out to be an expensive and highly addicting drug in following works. There's also the giant asteroid-dwelling worm from The Empire Strikes Back, akin to the sand worms of course.

Literature

• The Expanse:
  • In Leviathan Wakes a portion of Julies's notes goes, Panic doesn't help. It never helps. Deep breaths, figure this out, make the right moves. Fear is the mind-killer. Ha. Geek.
  • In Babylon's Ashes Holden initially wants to call the new Belter government the "Spacing Guild".
• InCryptid: In Backpacking Through Bedlam, Alice notes that Sally is "walking without rhythm so she won't attract the worm" (actually a giant mole, which may eat giant worms).

Live-Action TV

• Mayfair Witches: In "The Witching Hour", Dr. Rowan Fielding tells Dr. Maya Kang, "Remember, the slow blade penetrates the shield."
• Mystery Science Theater 3000 has long had "Movie Sign," a shout-out to the infamous "Worm Sign!"

Music

• Arrakeen, a French Progressive Rock band from The '80s and The '90s.
• In Fatboy Slim's "Weapon of Choice", a line quotes "Walk without rhythm, it won't attract the worm". It became funnier when the dancer of the music video, Christopher Walken, ended up playing Emperor Shaddam IV in Dune: Part Two.
• Iron Maiden's Piece of Mind originally had a track titled "Dune". It's a shame Frank Herbert wasn't quite so accommodating regarding Dune — so the song had to be renamed "To Tame a Land". This lack of accommodation was "mentioned" by Bruce in the 1983 World Piece Tour:
  "Next song is all about a gentleman who wrote a science-fiction book called Dune(...). He's an American called Mr. Frank Herbert, this particular gentleman, alright? And Mr. Herbert, as it turns out, is a bit of a cunt, actually, because he... among other things, he said that if we called this track that we wrote on the album "Dune", that he'd sue us and stop the album coming out, and all kinds of very unpleasant things... So we had to re-title the track which is on the new album, and we had to call it 'To Tame a Land'."

Tabletop Games

• Lancer has the Karrakin Trade Baronies existing as a massive shout out. A decadent collection of noble houses who champion knightly virtues and whose internal politics are a vipers nest of betrayals, controlled from behind the scenes by a mysterious religious order who are rendered extremely long lived by a rare liquid which also grants prophetic visions while gradually turning the drinker’s tongue and skin blue.
• Warhammer 40,000 is practically built off of Dune references: from the God Emperor of Mankind, to the Navigators Guilds, the rebellion of the Men of Iron causing a ban on Artificial Intelligences, Savants being the equivalent to Mentats, et cetera. Throw a dart at something from 40k’s Imperium, it probably has an equivalent in Dune.

Video Games

• Armored Core VI: Fires of Rubicon: The game’s plot revolves around a war being fought on a desolate planet between two powerful corporations, essentially standing in for the Great Houses of the Landsraad and their private armies, for control of an extremely rare and valuable resource, while said planet’s native inhabitants try to fight off both factions.
• Civilization: Beyond Earth: Arid worlds are said by the developers to have more Siege Worms than other planets, a reference to Dune.
  • Further developing this, the achievement for killing one is "Walk Without Rhythm".
  • An in-game quest for defeating a Siege Worm makes it seem like Shai-Hulud in all but name. The flavour text is very Moby-Dick, though.
    • And in Rising Tide, a Harmony unit that leashes a siege worm specifically earns the "Shai-Hulud" achievement.
• Crying Suns is set in a Dune-esque setting consisting in a galactic feudal empire with warring noble houses. It also contains Face Shifters, sandworms, a planet named "Ghanima", and the player character is a clone of someone named "Idaho".
• In the first class trial of Danganronpa V3: Killing Harmony, some of the "white noise" for when Miu claims that the victim's corpse moved on its own, reference the Litany Against Fear.
• The Fallout series features an Intelligence-boosting drug/candy named "Mentat".
• In Half-Life 2, the Combine employ rhythmic Thumpers to repel sand-burrowing aliens.
• Homeworld: Deserts of Kharak is set on the titular desert planet that is only habitable at the poles. Traversing the desert requires massive vehicles and deep in the sands lie the stillsuit-wearing religious fanatics of Kiith Gaalsien.
• Kingdom of Loathing's level 10 quest involves wandering the desert and learning to ride sandworms by catching them with a pair of hooks. "You" decide to leave rather than join the tribe upon learning that the process of becoming a fully-fledged Worm-Rider is a long and tedious process. There's also a random encounter with a gnome in a stillsuit (which processes the wearer's sweat and breath into "a thick, gravy-like substance" that deals Sleaze damage instead of drinking water).
• In Littlewood, the pieces of a sandy-colored furniture set are named the Dune Bed, the Spice Chair, and the Sand Worm table.
• Mass Effect's Thresher Maws are huge, vicious Sand Worms first encountered on a desert planet. In Mass Effect 3, one is summoned to fight a Reaper by a machine that creates a rhythmic thumping noise.
• In Subnautica and its sequel, Subnautica: Below Zero, you can craft a Stillsuit as a piece of equipment. It reduces the rate at which your thirst decreases by reclaiming your body's water, much like in the original books. Below Zero also adds the Thumper, which is used to distract giant ice-burrowing worms. just like the ones in the book.
• Terraria: In hardmode Underground Desert you can find Sand Worms called Dune Splicers.
• World of Warcraft:
  • In the "Vanilla" game and Classic, one of the bosses in the Temple of Ahn Qiraj raid, Ouro, is a Sand Worm and drops a piece of gear called "Jom Gabbar". It's a joke on the Bene Gesserit's poisoned needle, the Gom Jabbar, with first letters switched.
  • In Mists of Pandaria, the final boss of the Terrace of Endless Spring, the last and most difficult of the starting tier of raids for this expansion, is the Sha of Fear, a being that feeds off of and causes fear. The achievement for defeating the boss on Normal or Heroic without any raid members becoming feared from Dread Spray or Breath of Fear is called "The Mind-Killer."
• Xenoblade Chronicles X features a Sand Worm-style enemy type called a Sabula. Two particularly massive ones called Atreides, the Distinguished and Gesserith, the Wileworm form an optional postgame Dual Boss encounter.

Webcomics

• The Order of the Stick: When the Order are lost in the desert, Belkar is chugging a mysterious spice he got from a merchant, which gives him bright blue eyes and turns out to summon a purple worm (a real D&D monster). Two strips later, he's reading the book (and, being Belkar, apparently rooting for Baron Harkonnen).
  Belkar: No, no, no! Don't lean in, he's got a poison tooth!
• Questionable Content:
  • I must not laugh. Laughter is the Marten-killer. Laughter is the little death that brings about total obliteration by an enraged Faye...
  • After Marten's Mom, on the way out, gave Faye a final warning about how things were going to be.
    Marten:I think today went pretty well. Mom seemed to like you
    Faye: Sheesh are you kidding? Today was like the test of the Mom Jabbar.
    Marten: That was simultaneously one of the best Dune references and worst puns I have ever heard.
  • #949
    Faye: No boy enjoys comparative analysis of his parts and an Arrakian sandworm while he's in the act.
  • When Hannelore has a Pregnancy Scare, she suggests she might have been artificially inseminated to create the Kwisatz Haderach.
  • Steve and Marten's discussion of Marten's facial hair turns into a discussion of Dune cosplay for Halloween. Steve wants to go as Sting playing Feyd-Rautha.
  • When Hanners storms into her mother's office and scares everyone else out with just a few words their reaction invokes the book, which Jeph lampshades in the comment for anyone who didn't get it. ("DUNE JOKE")
    Accountant 1: She has the Voice!
    Accountant 2: The Weirding Way!
• Goats: Phillip says the Litany against beer
  Jon: Toothgnip and Diablo have your girlfriend tied up and oiled down.
  Phillip: I must drink beer. Beer is the mind-killer. Beer is the little death that brings total obliteration. I will face my beer. I will permit it to pass over me and through me. And when it has gone past I will turn the inner eye to see it's path. When the beer has gone there will be nothing. Only I will remain.
  Jon: I'll be hiding in the corner.

Web Original

• The Onion has Ask A High-School Student Who Didn't Do The Required Reading. When talking about Dune, he makes it clear that he saw the 1984 film instead of reading the book when he says that David Lynch is the author instead of Frank Herbert, says Paul learned to fight from "a guy who reminded me quite a bit of Captain Picard," and describes Baron Harkonnen as "This fat guy with insane acne."

Web Video

• Bennett the Sage:
  • In the Vampire Hunter D: Bloodlust review, Sage hearkens to the "[...] the likes of which God has never seen" line in the film...and punishes himself by drinking from a bottle of Dawn detergent.
  • In the MD Geist review, Sage starts to say the "Fear is the mind-killer" line, but is interrupted by The Nostalgia Critic threatening him at gunpoint. Rob Walker breaks in to finish the line, and is chased out of the room by the Critic. In the review's "Nuts and Bolts" video, Bennett and his friend Marc Swint talk about how Doug Walker had gotten sick of Rob and Spoony overdoing Dune references, which led to his appearance in this review.
  • A few more nods are given in his review of Hyper Doll. First, the thumbnail of the video has Sage riding on the back of a giant worm in a Fremen stillsuit. Then when said worm appears in the show itself, Sage can't help play the Dune (1984) theme full blast.
    Sage: *covering his face with his arms* Don't look at me right now!
  • While recapping the second episode of the Bubblegum Crisis sequel series Bubblegum Crash, Sage mocks how Obviously Evil the episode's villain, Dr. Yuri, is by saying he looks like "Feyd-Rautha Harkonnen^note complete with a picture of Sting from the 1984 film if he were playing Loki from Sandman." That said, he spends the rest of that episode's recap calling Yuri "Loki" rather than "Feyd".
• In this video, Old Norse specialist Jackson Crawford translates the Litany Against Fear into Old Norse. He uses a rather free translation at some points to better fit Old Norse poetic conventions.
• LinksTheSun made a couple videos about the franchise:
  • One Coin Lecture^note Books review. Those are non-comedic videos, contrary to most of his content — including his other Dune-themed videos contained a mostly positive review of the series' first novel.
  • The first Dune novel was also the focus of a Le Pire Editeur du Monde episode^note A comedic series about an inept publisher discussing with a soon-to-be famous author (beside Frank Herbert, there were also JRR Tolkien, Agatha Christie, Oscar Wilde...), and concluding the novel they submitted will never be successful.
  • He made a 50/50^note One of his recurring shows, which consists in a film's detailed summary followed by a review of five good points and five flaws sorted by how prominent they are about the 1984 film. The video's prologue is a humorous summary of the film's chaotic preproduction introduced by a parody of Irulan's expospeak introduction. The review itself is globally negative, Links notably considering the film suffers from both an excess of Infodump and being almost incomprehensible to neophytes despite being full of Infodump.

Western Animation

• Earthworm Jim: Peter Puppy often tries to keep himself calm by reciting the first few lines of the "Litany Against Fear."
• The Grim Adventures of Billy & Mandy: Someone on the show must have been a fan of Dune, because it gets more shout-outs than you'd expect from a children's show.
  • The episode "Mandy the Merciless" was a straight-up parody of God-Emperor of Dune, with Mandy in the Leto II role, Billy in the Duncan Idaho role, and Grim still as Mandy's servant. Spice is replaced with cinnamon, which spice is said to be similar to in smell and texture.
  • In "My Fair Mandy", one of the events in a school beauty pageant turns out to be the gom jabbar.
    Mindy: It burns! (removes hand from the box)
    Pirate judge: Arr, that'll cost 'er some points. (other judges nod)
  • At the end of the episode "Scary Poppins", Mandy uses the Bene Gesserit Voice to command the neighborhood adults to attack the nanny.
  • The Secret Snake Club's second attempt to summon a big snake involved a thumper.
• Rick and Morty: In "The Rickshank Redemption" someone unseen says at one point "He who controls the pants controls the galaxy!", paraphrasing Dune's "He who controls the spice, controls the universe".
• Scooby-Doo! Mystery Incorporated: The grand finale of the series has the character Nova (another talking dog — more or less, and Scooby's girlfriend) recap the Myth Arc of the series in the prologue. She does this by standing before a starfield, exactly like Princess Irulan in Dune (1984); even her first few lines are a direct reference:
  Nova: A beginning is a delicate time. Much more so an ending. Know then that, this is the year 10,191.
• South Park: In "Turd Burglars," the microbiome of Tom Brady's feces contains the Spice Melange (in an Astronomic Zoom a sandworm on the surface of his turd is seen). Kyle gains luminescent blue eyes and has visions in reference to Paul Atreides and the awkward inner monologues from David Lynch's 1984 adaptation are spoofed.

Real Life

• When University of Kansas paleontologist Rhiannon LaVine had discovered a half-a-billion-years-old fossil of a never-before-seen species of annelid, she named it Shaihuludia shurikeni, referencing the franchise's famous Sand Worms. She told CNN that "It was the first thing that came to mind, because I'm a big ol' nerd and at the time I was getting really excited for the Dune movies".

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