"New Canon" Inconsistency Concordance
Posted: 10 Jul 2009 12:13
This topic will list all the inconsistencies found on this board in the Dune prequels, sequel and "interquels". Feel free to PM me (or the mods) if the info is incorrect.
DUNE DISCUSSION FORUM FOR ORTHODOX HERBERTARIANS
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Shaddam in HOUSE ATREIDES wrote:"He didn't like to think of the gnomelike men; religious fanatics, the Bene Tleilax were intensely secretive and did not invite guests."
Jessica turned away, faced the painting of Leto's father. [...] She clenched her fists at her sides, glared at the painting. "Damn you! Damn you! Damn you!" she whispered.
This also seems to indicate the man was a cruel man, not the humorous friendly father type described in HOUSE ATREIDES.Jessica spoke, shattering the moment. "Besides, Wellington, the Duke is really two men. One of them I love very much. He's charming, witty, considerate... tender--everything a woman could desire. But the other man is... cold, callous, demanding, selfish--as harsh and cruel as a winter wind. That's the man shaped by the father." Her face contorted. "If only that old man had died when my Duke was born!"
HARMONTHEP: Ingsley gives this as the planet name for the sixth stop in the
Zensunni migration. It is supposed to have been a no longer existent satellite
of Delta Pavonis.
~Dune, Terminology of the Imperium
Castle Caladan in DUNE:THE NEXT DAY, a calm and sunny morning, Leto stood next to Rhombur at an open window, admiring the quays at the base of the promontory. The ocean spread out like a blue-green prairie, curving off to the distant horizon.
Jessica crossed to the window, flung wide the draperies, stared across the river orchards toward Mount Syubi.
The Reverend Mother Gaius Helen Mohiam sat in a tapestried chair watching mother and son approach. Windows on each side of her overlooked the curving southern bend of the river and the green farmlands of the Atreides family holding, but the Reverend Mother ignored the view....
The only time Castle Caladan is anywhere near the sea, is in the David Lynch movie... and in PAUL OF DUNE.Jessica stood facing the south windows. She saw and yet did not see the evening's banked colors across meadow and river. She heard and yet did not hear the Reverend Mother's question.
Lasguns in DUNE:"He fired a near-invisible bolt of white-orange fire from the lasgun..."
The authors have corrected their error by HOUSE HARKONNEN."Paul pointed to the violence above the distant cliff--the jetflares, the purple beams of lasguns lacing the desert."
Don't you know anything about the Battle of Corrin, the great betrayal, the Bridge of Hrethgir? How a cowardly Harkonnen ancestor almost cost the humans our victory against the hated machine-minds?
According to DUNE (Terminology of the Empire) it was a space battle that took place twenty years after the Butlerian Jihad was over:Through battle and high peril, the Atreides family has never to my knowledge committed any treasonous or dishonorable act -- all the way back to their heroism and sacrifice at the Bridge of Hrethgir during the Butlerian Jihad.
JIHAD, BUTLERIAN: (see also Great Revolt) -- the crusade against computers, thinking machines, and conscious robots begun in 201 B.G. and concluded in 108 B.G.
CORRIN, BATTLE OF: the space battle from which the Imperial House Corrino took its name. The battle fought near Sigma Draconis in the year 88 B.G.
In HOUSE HARKONNEN the authors explain away this discrepancy with this:"They know you're a Harkonnen! It'll be in their breeding records: Jessica out of Tanidia Nerus by the Baron Vladimir Harkonnen.
The problem with this is; why doesn't Jessica call her by her real name later on, when she has OM?The girl must never know her heritage, must never suspect. Even on the
secret Bene Gesserit breeding charts, Mohiam was not identified by her Sisterhood-adopted name, but by her birth name of "Tanidia Nerus."
Leto II in GEoD wrote:He was a fat, monstrous..." "He was a seeker after sensations," Moneo said. "The fat was a side-effect, then perhaps something to experience for itself because it offended people and he enjoyed offending."
speaking of Rabban in Dune wrote:There was yet some rigidity in his fat, but it was obvious to the eye that he'd come one day to the portable suspensors for carrying his excess weight.
And of course, Alia starts getting fat when she is possesed by the Baron in Children of Dune, and STDs can of course not be transfered through OM.speaking of Feyd in Dune wrote:"Here's one who won't let himself go to fat"
According to CHAPTERHOUSE: DUNE, they do:Shaddam frowned, leaning closer and smelling the sour spice beer on the old
man's breath. "Cyborgs? But they are human minds attached to robot bodies, and
therefore not in violation of the Jihad."
"Cyborgs?" [...] Didn't Idaho know the residue of revulsion left by the Butlerian Jihad even among the Bene Gesserit?
The official explanation:Jessica wrote:We've known each other six years
There is more to the story (fifteen years between HOUSE CORRINO and DUNE), and we will fill in the answers in a planned later volume. While Jessica met Yueh briefly when he was tending Rhombur, the doctor did not come to be a part of the Atreides household, and close to Jessica -- until six years before DUNE.
More than fifteen years have passed. Gurney met Liet then on a different planet, when he was using a false name, and his appearance was different. It¹s not surprising he would not recognize Dr. Kynes.
And in Children of Dune:Not since the day when the Duke's buyers had taken her from the school had she felt this frightened and unsure of herself.
On the official dunenovels website, the authors offered the following explanation:Not since those terrifying days before the Duke's buyers came for her, not since then had she felt such trembling uncertainty about her next moments.
This is of course not a real explanation. Consistent with the original notes is still not consistent with the original books. This meeting scene is nothing more than a deleted scene that was not included in the story for a reason.The Leto/Jessica meeting scene in HOUSE HARKONNEN was actually written by Frank Herbert himself and found in his notes. The events shown in HOUSE HARKONNEN are consistent with the original notes.
Rustling like bats, hundreds of Sisters filled the dining hall, amused to watch the Baron's antics, dodging him as if it were a game of invisible tag. Some crouched under tables; Jessica and Mohiam pressed against the wall. All the women were in silent breathing mode, concentrating on the illusion. No one spoke. They were in plain sight, but the befuddled Harkonnens could neither see nor sense them. The Baron saw only what the Bene Gesserit wanted him to see.
For some reason, in all the original DUNE novels, they never do this again.In preparation for the mass hypnosis that now smothered the Baron and his men, Sister Cristane had allowed herself to be visible to them, so she could lead them into the web. But gradually the guide had faded from view as the Sisters concentrated, focusing their efforts on these pliable victims.
the man who rescued me from a Harkonnen slave pit, gave me freedom, life, and honor
The official "explanation" was later given in PAUL OF DUNE: Apparently, Duncan meant that particular sword was first blooded on Grumman.“My sword was firs’ blooded on Grumman. Killed a Harkon….Harkon….killed ‘im f’r the duke.”
Does greed touch even you, Wellington?
However, in Dune Yueh thinks to himself:A long time ago, my wife Wanna was seriously injured in an industrial accident. I found a specialist in artificial human control functions-very primitive compared with what you have, Prince. He replaced Wanna's hips, spleen, and uterus with synthetic parts, but she could never have children. We had planned to wait… but we waited too long. Of course Wanna is beyond childbearing age now,
The explanation on the official site is:"Why did Wanna never give me children? he asked himself. I know as a doctor there was no physical reason against it. Was there some Bene Gesserit reason?"
Yueh must be a very incompetent doctor?Yueh later learns that Wandra's injury did not, in fact, make her incapable of bearing children -- but the Sisterhood had commanded her not to conceive.
"Do not be deceived by the fact that he was born on Caladan and lived his first fifteen years there."
and in DUNE MESSIAH:The Duke looked at him. "This will be your first time off planet," he said.
and in the same book Paul thinks to himself:Despite the special reverence held for Caladan as the place of Paul's birth [...]
There is no reason why Paul would think of some place other than Caladan as his birthworld.Water flowing in the desert! He recalled another kind of water flowing in a river of his birthworld, Caladan.
Considering the passages mentioned above, this seems highly unlikely.Paul was born on Kaitain, but his naming ceremony was on Caladan. He was taken to Caladan very soon after his birth and this has always been considered his birthplace.
In HOUSE ATREIDES Piter deVries dies soon after Paul is born:"That's not my question," the Baron said. "You'll recall that you predicted
the Bene Gesserit witch would bear a daughter to the Duke. You were wrong, eh,
Mentat?"
"I'm not often wrong, Baron," Piter said, and for the first time there was
fear in his voice.
The swift kick snapped the Mentat's neck like dry kindling. Piter de Vries fell dead to the floor
New gholas do not recall things from previous gholas' lives. The Piter in DUNE must therefore be the same ghola that made the wrong prediction"Send a message to the Tleilaxu," [the Baron] growled. "Have them rush me another Mentat."
but nowhere does it say these were 'magical' powers.a time of sorceresses whose powers were real
In this book:"Tio Holtzman was one of the most productive Ixian inventors on record. He often went on creative binges, locking himself up for months on end so that he could work without interruption. Sometimes upon emerging he required hospitalization, and there were constant concerns over his sanity and well-being. Holtzman died young -- barely past thirty Standard Years -- but the results of his efforts changed the galaxy forever.
-Biographical Capsules, an Imperial filmbook"
"A clean-shaven man with shoulder-length gray hair, Holtzman appeared to be in his late middle years. His hands and fingernails were clean, his clothing impeccable and ornamented with stylish designs and badges."
The star Alpha Centauri B is our Sun's galactic neighbour, only 4.2 lightyears away. Why did the machines conquer Earth, but not the star-system right next to it?ECAZ: fourth planet of Alpha Centauri B; the sculptors' paradise, so called because it is the home of fogwood, the plant growth capable of being shaped in situ solely by the power of human thought.
Unfortunately, this does not explain how prescience prevents a lasgun/shield-explosion.Norma herself has certain untapped powers of prescient manipulation -- she's not even aware of them yet in THE BUTLERIAN JIHAD. In all other instances, lasgun and shield both explode.
The Butlerian Jihad ends in B.G. 108. But in this book the last machines are not destroyed until the Battle of Corrin in 88 B.G, twenty years later.BENE GESSERIT: the ancient school of mental and physical training established primarily for female students after the Butlerian Jihad destroyed the so-called "thinking machines" and robots.
In THE BUTLERIAN JIHAD, we learn:The battle fought near Sigma Draconis in the year 88 B.G.
But Sigma Draconis is not a red giant, it is an orange dwarf. It is unlikely that this star will become a red giant in just a few thousand years, just in time for the Butlerian Jihad... sourcehe and his fellow Titans reached Corrin after an interstellar voyage of nearly two months. ... The cymek moved out onto the paved boulevards under the enormous baleful eye of the red giant.
It’s not air pressure that buoys the navigators. They float because there is no artificial gravity in their chambers, and on a planet their mobile chambers have suspensor fields to keep them floating.When the air pressure was no longer sufficient to buoy him, the Navigator collapsed to the floor of his tank. Weakly, he raised his webbed hands and demanded answers in a voice that was little more than a gasp. The Guildsman and his companions offered no explanations.
Worms do not create the spice. Sandtrout create the spice in spice blows.Liet added, "Already, small worms in the desert belt have created priceless amounts of
melange just waiting to be mined.
Duncan in this book:"The Sisters will now imagine I'm at least a potential Kwisatz Haderach. Another Muad'Dib. Bullcrap! As you're so fond of saying, Duncan. Neither of us would risk that. We know what he created and we're not stupid!"
"Truly, I am the Kwisatz Haderach!" He wished Miles Teg could have been there with him.
Obliterators create a fiery blast of immense heat. How does that change the magnetic field of a planet? A magnetic field is generated by the rotating core in the centre of a planet. It doesn't make any sense.Waff knew exactly where he was going. Before coming to Rakis, he had dug up the old charts, and because the Honored Matres' Obliterators had altered even the planetary magnetic field, he had carefully recalibrated his maps from orbit.
No education? pray? In a Bene Gesserit handbook? That’s the complete opposite of Bene Gesserit philosophy! From DUNE (Terminology of the empire):No education, training, or prescience can show us the secret abilities we
contain within ourselves. We can only pray those special talents are available in
our time of greatest need.
- The Bene Gesserit Acolytes' Handbook
From DUNE (Appendix II - The religion of Dune):BENE GESSERIT: the ancient school of mental and physical training established
primarily for female students
The Bene Gesserit, who privately denied they were a religious order
In DUNE Paul summons a worm:The fleshy rings of the separate sandworms began to merge and metamorphose into a
much larger form. The differentiation among the creatures became less distinct; the rings
united, joining into one incredible sandworm: a behemoth greater even than the largest
monsters from legendary Dune.
Half a league is about 2500 meters. Seven 40 meter long worms can not transform into a 2500 meter worm.Presently he saw the faraway outline of the creature's track against the dawnlight and
realized he had never before seen a maker this large, never heard of one this
size. It appeared to be more than half a league long, and the rise of the
sandwave at its cresting head was like the approach of a mountain.
Leto II in GEOD:Administrator Gorus groaned. "Will they never stop?"
"No." Murbella scowled at him for forcing her to state the obvious. "They are thinking
machines."
Machines always fail... given time.
When did power corrupt Leto II? He held true to the Golden Path even though he knew it meant his death. No significant thing he ever did was from corruption, just part of the necessary plan.But power had eventually corrupted Leto II. How, then, could Duncan handle this even greater burden?
Now the golden path is a mistake? And why would following a single charismatic leader suddenly be OK again?Leto II's vision of the Golden Path had fragmented humanity so that they no longer followed a single charismatic leader, and now Murbella had to repair that damage. Diversity might once have been a path to survival, but unless the numerous worlds and armies could stand together against the far greater foe, they would all perish.
Yes, everything the god emperor did was the wrong thing to do.Leto II in SANDWORMS wrote:My father refused to make the choice I did - refused to pay
the price in blood for the Golden Path, but I thought I knew better.
Ah, how arrogant we can be in our youth!”
He never called himself the ultimate Kwisatz HaderachWhen Leto II envisioned his Golden Path, he foresaw the direction that
humankind should tale, but he had blind spots. He failed to see that he was not the
ultimate Kwisatz Haderach.
- Bene Gesserit fact-finding commission
The "explanation" for this error is given later on when Irulan asks Paul about the book "The Life of Muad'Dib":The Duke looked at him. "This will be your first time off planet," he said.
The problem: in DUNE, the "first time off planet" quote is in the main body of the text, not in the "Life of Muad'Dib" epigraphs. This means the entire original DUNE novel must now be considered propaganda. That is of course ridiculous.“You told me you had never left Caladan before your House moved to Arrakis. Whole parts of your youth have been left out.
“Painful parts.” He frowned at her. “But, more importantly, irrelevant parts. We’ve streamlined the story for mass consumption, just as when you wrote that I was born on Caladan and not Kaitain. It sounds better that way, doesn’t it?”
In this book:"Later, during Muad'Dib's jihad, an exiled Hasimir Fenring—himself a failed Kwisatz Haderach-acquired the dagger. In a vile plot, he stabbed Muad'Dib deeply in the back. Some say that he died that day from the wound, but that Heaven sent him back among the living, for his work was not yet done. In a miracle he returned to us."
In that instant, Count Fenring moved like a coiled viper, his muscles trained and retrained with years of practice as the Emperor's most reliable assassin. Fenring yanked the Emperor's dagger out of Marie's body and drove the blade deep into Paul's chest.
Paul never left Caladan before the move to Arrakis.The Duke looked at him. "This will be your first time off planet," he said.
In GOD EMPEROR OF DUNE:At a session of her Regent's Council, by unilateral decree, Alia amended the long-standing rules of the Great Convention that applied to atomics. Previously, Great Houses had been permitted to keep their warheads, which could be used only under strictly defined defensive circumstances. Henceforth, as a temporary emergency measure, no one except the Imperial Regent herself could possess such weaponry.
But how to pry the dangerous warheads from entrenched Landsraad families? To begin with, she set up an exchange program, under which noble houses could trade their family atomics for large rewards of spice, voting shares in CHOAM, or other perquisites. In the weeks following the Regent's decree, many Great Houses dutifully surrendered their atomics, hungry for cash and spice after the hardships of the Jihad. Atomics hadn't been openly used in warfare against rival families in millennia anyway.
The families didn't give their atomics to Alia. Leto was responsible for removing all of the Family atomics, years later....Idaho said. "I presume the Great Convention against atomics is still in force and working well?"
"Working even better since we searched out all of the Family atomics and removed them to a safe place," Leto said.
in DUNE: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.
The steersmen didn't call to the worms, the worms weren't domesticated and didn't understand voice commands. The steersmen called to the other Fremen."Ach, haiiiii-yoh!" he shouted in the traditional call. The left-side
steersman opened a ring segment there.
In a majestic circle, the maker turned to protect its opened segment. Full
around it came and when it was headed back to the south, Paul shouted: "Geyrat!"
The steersman released his hook. The maker lined out in a straight course.
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 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.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.
In the original DUNE books, Bene Gesserit are able to detect a facedancer immediately.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.
There is nothing in DUNE that indicates suspensors operate by displacing air (or anything else).The rugged red-walled canyon opened into a sheltered valley, far from prison settlements or Shaddam's domed city. On schedule, the Tleilaxu corpse ship settled on the hard-packed ground, stirring a haze of rusty grit with a roar of suspensor engines.
But it's suspensors that support the Navigators in their tanks, not the gas.The captive Steersman Edric had wielded the power of the Spacing Guild and carried the political weight of an appointed ambassador, but his safety depended on civilized restraints that meant nothing to Stilgar. Smashing the tank had been simple. When the spice gas drained away and the Steersman flopped about like a spindly aquatic creature cast up on a hostile shore, Stilgar had gripped the mutant's rubbery flesh and snapped the cartilaginous neck. He had taken no great pleasure in it.
Paul also calls Caladan his birth world in Messiah, I just read that bit this morning. He was thinking it, not saying it.. don't see why he'd need to lie about his planet of birth in his thoughts.Schu wrote:@ House Corrino & anything else with young Paul being anywhere other than Caladan:
In Dune, Leto says that this is Paul's first time off planet when they travel to Dune/Arrakis. This is later explained away as a doctoring of history by Irulan, as instructed by Paul, thereby de-canonising the Original novels.
Because they're all just flawed histories, and Irulan could dictate Paul's thoughts (and wanted to portray herself as a flawed whiney illogical bitch because she was a masochist or something.Mandy wrote:Paul also calls Caladan his birth world in Messiah, I just read that bit this morning. He was thinking it, not saying it.. don't see why he'd need to lie about his planet of birth in his thoughts.Schu wrote:@ House Corrino & anything else with young Paul being anywhere other than Caladan:
In Dune, Leto says that this is Paul's first time off planet when they travel to Dune/Arrakis. This is later explained away as a doctoring of history by Irulan, as instructed by Paul, thereby de-canonising the Original novels.
waouh!!dunaddict wrote:Paul of Dune
[*]In HUNTERS OF DUNE:In this book:"Later, during Muad'Dib's jihad, an exiled Hasimir Fenring—himself a failed Kwisatz Haderach-acquired the dagger. In a vile plot, he stabbed Muad'Dib deeply in the back. Some say that he died that day from the wound, but that Heaven sent him back among the living, for his work was not yet done. In a miracle he returned to us."[/list]In that instant, Count Fenring moved like a coiled viper, his muscles trained and retrained with years of practice as the Emperor's most reliable assassin. Fenring yanked the Emperor's dagger out of Marie's body and drove the blade deep into Paul's chest.
Ghola. Next...Leto wrote:I did not know there were "official" explanations of such things (how did they explained the death of the Shaddam's wife?).
'cause in Dune, she's alive .... and, if it's not mentionned, I'm sure that Peter will kill the Empress, just for a kid...
hmmm.Redstar wrote:Eh. I'd look for something that can't be so easily explained away.
As above, I was thinking altered history. Fenring stabbed Paul in the chest, but to make him seem more cowardly they made it in the back for propaganda which then made it into the history books.SandRider wrote:hmmm.Redstar wrote:Eh. I'd look for something that can't be so easily explained away.
The only explanation I can see is that Keith is careless,
doesn't read over his dictation, and the editors @Tor
are idiots.
I think it's a great example of the careless way Keith "writes" ...