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Headscratchers / Dune (2021)

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    Duncan and spitting 

  • Why did Duncan not warn Duke Leto that Stilgar may spit in front of him and that it's a sign of respect, and not an insult? This misunderstanding could've easily gotten someone killed.
    • Due to his short time with the Fremen he had probably not ever actually seen this kind of display, and only inferred its meaning from what he knew of the Fremen culture; he clearly sounds like he's improvising his thanks to Stilgar in order to defuse the situation.
    • Even if he knew of the gesture, he might not think Stilgar would use it as an opening greeting, either because he thought Stil might be a bit more savvy about potential Culture Clash issues, or (more likely) knowing Stil well enough to know he's not easily impressed.

    Soldier and hunter-seeker 

  • How did the bricked-in Harkonnen soldier operate the hunter-seeker? When he's uncovered by Hawat and the rest of the security team, there's no sign of any remote-control equipment and it looks like he's been dead for a substantial amount of time. It's entirely possible that the hunter-seeker could have been a completely autonomous drone, but the soldier explicitly *had* to be sealed in for some purpose, presumably to release it and/or burn through the wall into Paul's room.
    • The soldier is wearing what looks like a VR headset and is entangled in wires that presumably connect to some type of controller that he used to operate the hunter-seeker. And he most likely committed suicide upon failure.
    • It's also implied, in the novel at least, that the Harkonnen soldier is a scapegoat, and Dr. Yueh was operating the hunter-seeker. In the book, the plot was to have an attempt on Paul's life that would fail but look like it was genuine, because the Atreides would expect such a thing, both putting them on their guard but in the wrong direction and lulling them into a false sense of security (that threat was dealt with, there can't be too many more). The bricked-up soldier was to make it seem like they'd caught the assassin, when they had not (because the assassin is actually The Mole, and the assassination attempt wasn't genuine).

    Strength of shields 

  • Shields in the novels are implied to be impregnable to such an extent that it is a waste of effort to shoot ranged weapons at foot soldiers - conventional artillery is only used to seal troops inside caves by demolishing the entrances. The film portrays shields as much more susceptible, e.g.: a thrown sword will bounce off a shield but still force the person inside the shield back (so some kinetic energy is transferred); shields can be penetrated by slow-falling bombs in a matter of seconds; and shields can be shorted out by a single hit from a conventional projectile, as seen when Duncan steals the ornithopter. Any of these changes would mean that simply shooting at infantry would be quite effective even with the film-version shields up, as they would still be knocked of their feet or have their shields shorted out.
    • Well, the novel stated that shields weren't perfect protection, even aside from the "slow blade" weakness. It's noted that shields in the desert attract sandworms and drive them into a killing frenzy, and that no man wearing a shield has ever survived such an attack. Now, granted, sandworms are possible the most destructive thing in the setting, but clearly, somehow they're able to kill a shielded person through brute force. It just might be that none of the existing ranged weapons are capable of delivering raw kinetic energy in that range, for whatever reason.
    • A bullet actually doesn't have much more kinetic energy than a strong punch, it's lethal because it concentrates all that force down to a tiny point. It's quite reasonable that a shield can absorb several bullet hits in a row with minimal effect, but can be overwhelmed by being hit with sufficient force and mass.
    • It's also worth noting that this is a setting where all the major parties are, at least in theory, part of the same Empire. Outright war like we seen in this movie is an aberration, most fighting is done through assassins, bandits, and saboteurs. As such, the kind of brute-force weapons you need to break shields (machine guns, bombs, etc) would be rarely employed.
      • That actually is even backed up in universe in that there hasn't actually been open warfare in the Dune universe for a very long time. Like all the major houses have standing armies but a running theme seems to be that they don't seem to have much actual large scale military experience. Plus the use of actual military equipment (high-caliber machine guns, artillery etc) seems to be foreign to many commanders as there hasn't been many engagements that went beyond small scale skirmishes with infantry in most of their military careers.
    • The strength of shields in the movies seem to be significantly toned down to how they seemingly are portrayed in the books. As mentioned with kinetic energy transfer being much more apparent in the films and the shields seemingly having more weaknesses and even being taken down through sheer force. In particular the films seem to treat shield strength as stronger or weaker depending on the type of shielding. With personal shields and small vehicle shields being far weaker than larger vessel ones. A potential reason could have been for adaptation reasons as the novels treated shield functionality vaguely with a not particularly elaborated "Holtzman effect" that seemed almost mystical in its operation. The films treat them as more like solid energy shields with limits to how much force and stress they can take. Likely in keeping for the more grounded take the films, thus depicting shields with strength limits in a more realistic manner.

    AA guns and shields 

  • Related to the above - During the attack on Arrakeen city, the defenders are shown using AA guns to shoot down Harkonnen ships. How do those projectiles circumvent the shield rules, and if they can destroy ships, why doesn't anyone ever use similar weapons on people?
    • Maybe the projectiles are shield-driller missiles, like the shield-piercing bullets we see?
    • The unshielded ships seemed to be going significantly faster than the shielded ones - it may be that in atmosphere a ship can't power a shield above a certain speed. It would make sense to have both shielded and unshielded ships in an attack - shieldpiercing missiles/bombs HAVE to travel slow before impact to penetrate, they could probably be easily dodged by dropships moving at top speed. Mixing both slow shielded and fast non-shielded ships makes sense, as it forces the defender to have both anti-shield, and anti-fast ship defenses, and spend extra time having to identify which weapon is effective against which.
    • Equipping warships with energy shields, in the universe where lasers detonate shield protected target with a power of nuclear explosion, is counterproductive to say the least.

    City shield and worms 

  • We're told that shields attract worms and send them into a killing frenzy. We're also told that the city is shielded, and that the shield protects the city from worms. So...which is it? Do shields attract worms, or do they keep them away?
    • The "Shield Wall" is not an energy shield, it's the literal wall that protects the city.
    • Sandworms can't tunnel through solid rock, only open sand basins. The Shield Wall is a geological formation in the north of Arrakis that is home to most of the planet's non-Fremen population (and a good chunk of the Fremen as well), simply because the sandworms can't go there.

    Caladan conquest 

  • During Paul's vision of his galactic war, there's a scene with a conquered Caladan. But why would he need to conquer it? Doesn't he as the Atreides heir still rule Caladan?
    • House Atreides had to give up Caladan to take Arrakis. That was the point of the trap, getting them away from their stronghold. Someone else owns Caladan now.
      • But Jessica's plan at the end of Part 1 is to return to Caladan. If the Emperor gave Caladan to someone else, presumably they would be loyal supporters of the Emperor, making Caladan hostile territory. And even if the new owners are ambivalent to the Emperor, they would have more reason than other houses for being unwelcome to the Atreides: They wouldn't want the old owners of their new fief showing up and threatening their ownership.

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