The Winds of Dune: When they blow, they also suck!

[TheDukester]

... and a train ticket.

[SandChigger]

ZING!!!

OK, let's forge on through this shitstorm, shall we? (When I read at night, I mark suspect passages with mini-PostIts; then as I post them here, I check them off. I currently have about 20 that remain unchecked. )

PROOF THAT KJA DOESN'T UNDERSTAND SHIT ABOUT PRESCIENCE IN THE DUNIVERSE

A few paragraphs before that paragraph where she sees Paul at both ends of eternity in OM:

Instead of answers, Jessica felt questions growing louder in her consciousness, the doubts, the turmoil that lay ahead, the empty and dangerous gulf of an uncontrolled future and the many paths that stretched out for humankind ... possibilities upon possibilities upon possibilities. She knew this was the trap of prescience. Seeing futures did a person no good, unless one could determine the actual future that would occur.

Bullshit. Choosing a future and acting in a way so that it occurs is what determines the actual future. If that last line doesn't prove that he simply doesn't get it, I don't know what can.

(OK, granted, this is presented as something Jessica is thinking. But even if it's supposed to indicate HER misunderstanding, and KJA really knows better wink wink, what is the point of telling the reader that a major character like Jessica doesn't get it? )

REINFORCING POINTS WHERE McDUNE SHIT HAS BEEN INSINUATED INTO THE ORIGINALS

Alia and Jessica looking at Paul & Chani's things in their chambers; Jessica leaves....

Afterward, Alia lifted a sheashell fragment from the table and held the broken piece up against the light from the window. It was an object from Mother Earth, if Whitmore Bludd's story about it was true. He'd given it to Paul as a token of allegiance from Archduke Armand Ecaz. But the sheashell, like Bludd's promise, was broken.

This is a reference to the conch shell mentioned in Messiah:

The remains of a conch shell from the seas of Mother Earth lay on a low table beside the balcony rail. He took its lustrous smoothness into his hands, tried to feel backward in Time. The pearl surface reflected glittering moons of light. He tore his gaze from it, peered upward past the garden to a sky become a conflagration—trails of rainbow dust shining in the silver sun.

And here is the passage in PoD where KJA has a character of his own creation be the one to give it to Paul:

Blushing, Bludd stepped back and said, "I insist it was the other way around, my Lord. Sadly, I am all that remains of a once-great House, just an old warrior with my glory days confined to memory. The recent trip to Kaitain proved a bit too much for the Archduke, and he has retired to his home." Next, Bludd extended a small ornamental box. "However, I brought a gift for you from Ecaz, as a token of my allegiance."

"The box has already been inspected, Usul," Stilgar said quietly.

Paul lifted the lid and saw a pinkish seashell fragment the size of his own hand. Smiling, Bludd explained, "The remains of a conch shell from Mother Earth. See how light dances across the surface. Archduke Armand owned it for years—now it is yours."

Paul ran a hand over the smooth, pearly luster. The touch gave him an odd but pleasing sensation that he was in contact with an article from the birthworld of humanity. He handed the box to a nearby Fedaykin guard. "Have this delivered to my apartments."

OK, it's bad enough that he has to squeeze his own shit in and associate it with an element from the originals, but notice that he fucks up the reference back to his own McDune crap: was it a token of Bludd's allegiance or Archduke Ecaz's?!

Addendum: also, note how he introduces an element of doubt about the authenticity of the shell. Was it REALLY from Mother Earth, or was Bludd lying about it...?!

[SandChigger]

KJA'S ATTITUDE TOWARD THE ORIGINAL FH DUNE BOOKS

The very next WoD paragraph after the one above about Alia and the conch shell is really interesting if you read between the lines:

She put the artifact back down in exactly the same position. Then on impulse, she spun the piece around so that it faced the other way. Making her own mark. These objects were not really sacred, though she would continue to act as if they were. They were just...things.

Translation:

On impulse, Kevin twisted the elements of Frank Herbert's Dune stories into the exact opposite of what they were originally. He thought of this as making his own mark. Frank's books weren't sacred after all, although he would continue to act as if they were. They were just...books.

[Redstar]

So when do we stop complaining and write the epic, perfectly legal, fanfiction of our own?

[SandChigger]

Um ... when the Herberts' copyright on Dune runs out?

(How many times can the bastards renew it, anyway?)

[Redstar]

Um ... when the Herberts' copyright on Dune runs out?

(How many times can the bastards renew it, anyway?)

Ugh... Then we'll have people making crappy cross-overs and "reinterpretations" like what happened with War of the Worlds and 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea.

Wait... Didn't somebody already do that?

[SandChigger]

ZING!!!

[Nekhrun]

KJA'S ATTITUDE TOWARD THE ORIGINAL FH DUNE BOOKS

The very next WoD paragraph after the one above about Alia and the conch shell is really interesting if you read between the lines:

She put the artifact back down in exactly the same position. Then on impulse, she spun the piece around so that it faced the other way. Making her own mark. These objects were not really sacred, though she would continue to act as if they were. They were just...things.

Translation:

On impulse, Kevin twisted the elements of Frank Herbert's Dune stories into the exact opposite of what they were originally. He thought of this as making his own mark. Frank's books weren't sacred after all, although he would continue to act as if they were. They were just...books.

This seems to be directed at us. I'm pretty sick of him inserting his commentary at us into these new books. Also note that he calls the conch shell a seashell. Seems like he might have remembered something about a shell, but couldn't be bothered to look up the details.

[Tleszer]

Good thing we have Chig actively the shit back into KJA's ass.

On an unrelated note, I guess Chig's name is still forbidden at DN. Hyron has deleted my sig over there. What's wrong about mentioning a bent blue wang and a green tushie? Apparently, it's wrong if a certain lovable tick says it.

[SandChigger]

FUCK MYRON BERRITT. BAHAHAHAHAHA! I really hope that Hyron character IS KJA making fun of him, rubbing it in. It'll be a cold day in Hell before he ever gets to touch the milk cow's teats.

This seems to be directed at us. I'm pretty sick of him inserting his commentary at us into these new books.

Just wait till he starts returning the joy and fluffing the KJASF pooper troopers by inserting their names into the books.

(If he hasn't already, that is. )

OK ... WHO'S READY TO RIDE DA WILD WORM!!!

A rogue sandworm broke through the moisture barrier that blocked the gap in the Shield Wall, and now the rampaging monster found its way through the narrow passage. It plunged into the squalid settlements that spread outward from Arrakeen like dust seeping through a ragged door seal, and plowed a track of destruction, swallowing entire buildings in monstrous gulps.
...
The city of Arrakeen had considered itself safe. No sandworm had managed to pass through the gap in all the years since Muad'Dib had blasted open the Shield Wall during his final battle with Shaddam IV.

So Stilgar hops into a 'thopter with two Fedaykin, one a pilot, and they fly off to intercept da worm!

There's the obligatory "worm rears up and almost swallows 'thopter" bit, with Stilgar hanging on for dear life in the hatchway—he was just getting ready to jump out onto the worm's back...damn! Then he jumps, he tumbles, he frantically tries to grab hold with the hooks he got from the 'thopter's Fremkit (it was "desert-rigged"), he succeeds, he scores, THE JUDGES GO WILD!!!!!

When he was in place on top of the head, he cranked the next spreader open wider and took up his goad. He jabbed the worm, yelled in an attempt to turn it. "Haiiii-yoh!" He had no reason to believe this beast had ever been ridden before, had ever heard a steersman's call. The sandworm fought back like a nightmare bull, intent on him rather than on the cacophony of tempting noises at the outskirts of the city.

STILGAR! RIDE THE WILD WORM!!!

OK, seriously, that bit about the "steersman's call", that's just FUCKING STUPID. The steersmen didn't call to the worms, the fucking worms weren't domesticated and didn't understand voice commands. And besides, how could they even hear (=sense the vibrations in the air of) a human voice when moving? The steersmen called to the other Fremen. Stupid. But it gets better! He eventually wrassles it under control (reminded me of the bullshit worm battle from whichever Legend book it was in) and heads it back toward the Shield Wall hole and open desert...

The creature shot through the broken qanat barrier, flinching as it squirmed over the line of moist sand. Looking down, Stilgar saw that the qanat had been smashed, and the water it contained had seeped out into the desert. From this height, he could not tell if this particular worm, or something else, had initially destroyed the canal barriers.

OK, this is FUCKING STUPID as well. If a worm could destroy a qanat (worm sense water, water bad, water HURT worm, BAD water BAD, worm turn away!), then the people of Arrakeen were idiots for feeling secure (see above) and the fact no worm had attacked the city like this before is simply INCREDIBLY GOOD FUCKING LUCK.

Gawd, how much stupider can it get?!

[SandChigger]

BRING OUT YER DEAD!!!

...But Jessica spotted something in the background of the high-resolution image that the Qizarate had either not noticed, or never intended to report upon. She enhanced the view, zeroed in on several large, unmarked ships that hovered at the edges of teh bloody field.

There, small-statured men scurried out of transport vessels to comb over the slain, discarding many corpses, marking others. Handlers came afterward with suspensor-borne pallets and loaded bodies aboard, stacked them like split logs, then carried their grisly harvest back to the unmarked vessels.

"Gods below, those are Tleilaxu. Handlers of the dead retrieving corpses."

Because, you know, the BT were always small and gray.

(These particular BT are selecting ghola-candidates for Shaddam's Star Wars army. )

[A Thing of Eternity]

Lame.

[Sev]

Gawd, how much stupider can it get?!

Read on, and I'm sure they'll be many more scenes that KJABH obviously thought would be 'kewl' so they get thrown into the pot regardless of pitiful ineptitude. Forget worms running rampant, lasgun attacks at the theatre et al - I'm waiting for a heighliner crashing onto a planet!!!

[Serkanner]

I am taking bets on naming the book in which two heighliners WILL crash into each other. My bet is on the very next one: "Drone of Dune".

[DuneFishUK]

Throne of Dune will feature two mega-heighliners crashing into a planet, and Leto of Dune have three ultra-heighliners creating a new planet through their combined psychic-tleilaxu genesis-field and Paul's body is finally laid to rest on the new planet...

[Tleszer]

Sigh. Why can I see that happening?

[SandChigger]

Me, I'm still holding out for some kind of psychic communication between the Twins and Grandma Jess.

No sign of it yet, though.

(Speaking of Heighliners, there's some travel/communications stuff that's sure to set Thang off again. I'll post quotes at lunch time. Stay tuned!)

[Skibum]

Ah! Will see more of the Rogo Transmitter? You'd think such a powerful invention created by genius ixian like C'tair Pilru would reappear! Maybe we'll see him again too.

[A Thing of Eternity]

(Speaking of Heighliners, there's some travel/communications stuff that's sure to set Thang off again. I'll post quotes at lunch time. Stay tuned!)

Man, that's like the bat signal to me. Bring it on, and AToE will SMASSH!

[SandChigger]

Ah! Will see more of the Rogo Transmitter? You'd think such a powerful invention created by genius ixian like C'tair Pilru would reappear!

Not in name at least, but that's not too far off the mark on this one.

OK ... so Duncan and Gurney are trying to find Bronso (to make Duncan's wife happy) and because Gurney and Jessica had seen Wayku stewards passing out Bronso's tracts on a Heighliner, the two decide to look for the Wayku who helped them find Paul and Bronso years earlier (during the vagabond interlude). They board a Heighliner and demand to see ... some documentation ... to which Duncan applies his Mentat gongfu:

An hour went by, then two, then three, while Gurney waited patiently. Finally, Duncan rose behind the pile of documents on the table. His ghola face held a satisfied smile, though his metal eyes were unreadable. "I've found him, Gurney. I know which ship carries Ennzyn. We will command the Navigator to divert this vessel so that we may intercept it."
...
[The next next section, about seven paragraphs later]

THE HEIGHLINER CARRYING Ennzyn was forcibly delayed in orbit above Balut, its next stop, and the Guild offered no explanations to the numerous passengers aboard. As soon as the second Guildship arrived, Duncan and Gurney shuttled across, aided by Guild security.

OK, you see the problem there, right? If the Guildship Duncan and Gurney are on is diverted to intercept the one Ennzyn is on, wouldn't theirs be the first ship to reach his? So how the fuck would they know at Balut to delay Ennzyn's ship BEFORE Duncan & Gurney's arrived? Though none is mentioned explicitly, you would have to assume some sort of instantaneous communication device or method. No?

In the section between the two containing the quotes above, Bronso removes a tracking device from the neck of his mother, whom he has spirited away from the clutches of the BG on Wallach IX (more about that later ... and yes, more lurid mini-tornadoes!) and brought to ... Carthag. (Yes, Alia, the Qizarate, Duncan and Gurney, nine hundred Mentats recruited by Duncan, hell, the whole bleeding Imperium are on the lookout for this guy and where does he head to but ... Arrakis!) Later, a Reverend Mother named Udine comes to Arrakis to curry favor with Alia with information, and tells her about Tessia's rescue:

Alia laughed sharply. "Bronso freed a captive from the Bene Gesserit Mother School?"

Udine was not amused. "He is quite clever, and elusive, as you well know. We do not yet know his allies, nor how he spirited her away. However, you can find Bronso through Tessia—and we believe she is on Arrakis."

"Why do you say that? What is your evidence?"

"While Tessia was in her coma, we implanted certain diagnostics within her. One of them was a device that can be used as a locator." Udine handed over a small data plaque. "The tracker coordinates indicated Arrakis, and we have every reason to believe that Bronso is with her."

OK, how much more blatantly Star Wars can this get? Can't you just see the BG techs looking at a map of the galaxy with a light indicating the tracker position blinking over "Arrakis".

Unless you assume some kind of instantaneous transmitter, again, the human trackers would have to be on the same ship as Tessia (or at least nearby within the same star system) in order to pick up the signal. Otherwise it would take YEARS for the signal to get anywhere.

Even though he does not mention it explicitly, I think it's pretty obvious that KJA is assuming some sort of communication method that provides instantaneous communications between star systems.

[Redstar]

Alia laughed sharply. "Bronso freed a captive from the Bene Gesserit Mother School?"

Udine was not amused. "He is quite clever, and elusive, as you well know. We do not yet know his allies, nor how he spirited her away. However, you can find Bronso through Tessia—and we believe she is on Arrakis."

"Why do you say that? What is your evidence?"

"While Tessia was in her coma, we implanted certain diagnostics within her. One of them was a device that can be used as a locator." Udine handed over a small data plaque. "The tracker coordinates indicated Arrakis, and we have every reason to believe that Bronso is with her."

OK, how much more blatantly Star Wars can this get? Can't you just see the BG techs looking at a map of the galaxy with a light indicating the tracker position blinking over "Arrakis".

Unless you assume some kind of instantaneous transmitter, again, the human trackers would have to be on the same ship as Tessia (or at least nearby within the same star system) in order to pick up the signal. Otherwise it would take YEARS for the signal to get anywhere.

Even though he does not mention it explicitly, I think it's pretty obvious that KJA is assuming some sort of communication method that provides instantaneous communications between star systems.

Not only that, but I find it a little distasteful to imagine the BG are willing to plant a machine inside the human body. Sure, it's not entirely against the prescripts of the BJ in relation to artificial intelligence, but it does merit comparison to the BG attitude towards in vitro fertilization: both are practices used on animals, and "tagging" a human seems outside their behavior at this time.

And is Tessia a BG? (The name suggests it to me) I find it even more difficult to believe them doing such a thing to someone that passed the Gom Jabbar and is clearly not an animal.

[SandChigger]

Yeah, Tessia is a BG, but not an RM.

Bronso sneaks onto Wallach IX with a gaggle of Face Dancers...

I can't be bothered with more of this shit at the moment. Later!

[SandChigger]

Oh for fuck's sake:

Lady Jessica stood in her chamber with the familiar packing wardrobe open before her. Its sides bore the stickers and date stamps of transport authorities, showing the many planets and star systems she had visited since the time she first left Wallach IX as a young woman to become the concubine of Duke Leto Atrieides. Jessica had seen a great deal since then, had experience suprieme joy and profound tragedy.

Gawd that's both stupid and nasty. Probably deserves to be copied over into the bad writing thread as well.

I first thought that one thing's probably for sure, that pantophobe BoBo Herb didn't write that, because of the travel by air/space aspect. But then again, the wardrobe with stickers is more an image of the travel of a more primitive time, like by boat, which Ole Bobes would know more about. (He and Jan took a cruise to Europe just a year or so ago, remember?)

I have to wonder, though, whether the luggage of aristocracy would be shtuckt with stickers and stamps....

Sigh.

[GamePlayer]

Oh for fuck's sake:

Lady Jessica stood in her chamber with the familiar packing wardrobe open before her. Its sides bore the stickers and date stamps of transport authorities, showing the many planets and star systems she had visited since the time she first left Wallach IX as a young woman to become the concubine of Duke Leto Atrieides. Jessica had seen a great deal since then, had experience supreme joy and profound tragedy.

What the fuck? Does he even realize the kind of image that sentence evokes? I'm imagining Jessica dressed as some hobo from a Looney Toons waiting at the train station. What a tool!

[SandChigger]

Oh, it gets better before it's over. Trust me.



OK, back to Bonzo saving Mama Tessy from the Planet of the Bints!

FACE DANCERS ON WALLACH IX: AIN'T THAT A PARTY?!

Now, after being on the run for years, he had managed to slip a few Face Dancer infiltrators onto Wallach IX, if only briefly, and his spies had discovered the information he needed to know, where his mother was, and the security arrangements surrounding her.

All that remained was to implement a plan. The four Sisters and the other two men with him were Face Dancers. His Face Dancers.

Um ... wasn't there something about FDs smelling funny? Maybe sorta like this fucked book, which smells strongly of SHIT. Which is what the FDs and Bronso are slinging, since they're masquerading as gardeners!

The Mother School gardens were a parade of spectacular colors, with geometrically laid out shrubberies at odds with wild and unruly botanical displays. Mother Superior Harishka, so it was said, had a penchant for exotic flora harvested from other planets. Such unique plants required a great deal of maintenance and specialized care, which could be provided only by offworld experts.

Oh ... just fuck it. So they mulch and plant and await their chance...

During those agonizing hours, Bronso cast surreptitious glances toward the outbuildings, saw whirlwinds whipping up, great gusting breezes that rattled the tall skeletal trees, winds strong enough to scatter pebbles. A cluster of transient tornadoes circled one particular buiding, eerie dust devils and pale, swirling winds that appeared and disappeared. His Face Dancer spies had reported strange weather distrubances in the vicinity of Tessia's conservatory, but they could provide no explanation.

So they get her...

The blurred funnel of one of the transparent tornadoes appeared behind her, and a second gained strength, but Tessia seemed unconcerned. The whirlwinds circled and dissipated as she hurried over to the waiting dump box. The Face Dancers clustered close to shield her from view.

They dress her in a protective suit and she puts herself into a trance and they seal her in with used mulch and debris for taking away...

As soon as the dump box was sealed and Tessia secured, the tornadoes vanished. The air fell still.

So KJA never comes right out and says that it's Tessia causing the tornadoes and weird weather ... but then he really doesn't have to, does he? But by not coming right out and saying it, he avoids the necessity of providing some sort of explanation for it. Clever, huh?

Yeah, like a bullshit snake oil salesman.