Dune: Prophecy, Season 1

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Legendary Television / HBO’s Dune: Prophecy series expands the universe created by Frank Herbert with a prequel set 10,000 years before the events of the first Dune novel, focusing on the origins of the Bene Gesserit sisterhood during the tumultuous period following the Butlerian Jihad. Based on Sisterhood of Dune (2012) by Brian Herbert and Kevin J. Anderson (who also serve as executive producers) and positioned as a prequel to Denis Villeneuve’s Dune movies (2021 and 2024), the series explores the early machinations of the enigmatic order of women whose genetic breeding program and political manoeuvring would eventually shape the destiny of the known universe. The series’ narrative centers on sisters and Reverend Mothers Valya and Tula Harkonnen (played by Emily Watson and Olivia Williams) and their involvement in the nascent Bene Gesserit, tracing how personal vendettas and political necessities transform into the cold, calculated practices that define the sisterhood in Herbert’s original novels. In the course of season one’s six episodes, Valya and Tula must overcome social and supernatural forces that threaten the stability and the political prominence of the Sisterhood: the growing suspicions of Emperor Javicco Corrino (interpreted by Mark Strong), the rift between the Harkonnens and the other Great Houses, the haunting violent legacy of the Sisterhood itself, and a new enemy who seeks to oust them from the Imperium (played by Desmond Hart).

Dune: Prophecy enters a television landscape already transformed by prestige science-fiction series based on classics of the genre, such as Isaac Asimov’s Foundation (Apple TV, 2021) and Liu Cixin’s 3 Body Problem (Netflix, 2024). However, the series positions itself not merely as a television adaptation, as it was the case for previous Syfy-produced series Frank Herbert’s Dune (2000)and Frank Herbert’s Children of Dune (2003), but an expansion of the Dune universe itself by focusing on aspects only alluded to in the original hexalogy as well as in the current cinematic revival of Dune. For this reason, Prophecy is in itself a valuable addition for any scholar working on the Dune universe, particularly when inscribing it in a multimedia framework. Spawning licensed game boards (six, as of 2025), video games (six, as of 2025), graphic novels adaptations and expansions, Dune has established itself as one of the most relevant and successful multimedia franchises in decades, particularly after 2021 Villeneuve’s adaptation, and Dune: Prophecy offers new material to consolidate and expand it.

Within the Dune world, Prophecy’s positioning is particularly significant as the narrative navigates the aftermath of the Butlerian Jihad—humanity’s rebellion against thinking machines and a foundational event in Herbert’s universe. The series contextualises the rise of the Sisterhood precisely as the human response to the banning of the rebellious intelligent machines: faced with the impossibility of omniscience and objectivity, and thus of avoiding deceptions and intrigues, the Great Houses of the Imperium employ—or deploy—the Sisterhood-trained Reverend Mothers as ‘truthsayers’ capable of discerning truth from lies. This post-Butlerian setting allows the series to explore themes of technological ethics and societal reconstruction that may resonate with contemporary political and societal anxieties around artificial intelligence as well as broad epistemological concerns on the relationship between truth, post-truth, and political power.

What distinguishes Dune: Prophecy within the science fiction contemporary television landscape is its deliberate centering of female power structures within an feudal interstellar society. Where Herbert’s original novels presented the Bene Gesserit as an already-established force operating in the shadows of a patriarchal empire, Prophecy examines the sisterhood’s formation as a response to and subversion of male-dominated, patrilineal power structures. The series thereby engages with feminist science fiction traditions established by SF writers like Ursula K. Le Guin, Octavia Butler, Élisabeth Vonarburg, and Margaret Atwood, who, among others, similarly explored how female-centered societies might evolve within—or against—patriarchal frameworks. However, rather than creating a straightforward utopian feminist vision, Prophecy portrays the early Bene Gesserit as morally complex, violent and manipulative, and their accumulation of power as driven more by survival necessity than by altruistic concerns for humanity’s future. In this perspective, the show’s exploration of the Bene Gesserit’s evolution offers particularly rich ground for academic analysis of gender and power in SF.

The Bene Gesserit occupies a paradoxical position, wielding immense influence through their manipulation of bloodlines and politics while simultaneously presenting themselves as merely ‘servants’ (truthsayers) to the great houses. Prophecy illuminates the origins of this strategic self-effacement, depicting how the early sisterhood learns to transform apparent submission into covert domination precisely by being able to recognise—and to effectuate—the distinction between truth and lies. Within this scheme, the series’ portrayal of the tension between the exclusively patrilineal noble houses and the matriarchal Sisterhood raises questions about how women’s bodies and minds become sites of political contestation, and how genetic lineage intersects with gender in determining authority.

Dune: Prophecy is not without flaws. At times, for instance, it sacrifices Herbert’s philosophical depth for more conventional television tropes, such as plainly explanatory dialogues, unnecessary cliffhangers, overuse of dramatic music to signal suspense. At times, it also feels burdened with overly ambitious, almost cinematic, shots. While this provides visual continuity with Denis Villeneuve’s Dune films, Prophecy seems to resort to these techniques in order to complement its lack of interest for material environments the characters inhabit. Where Herbert’s original work meticulously detailed the ecological systems and physical environments of planets like Arrakis, Prophecy offers sweeping cosmic vistas without grounding them in tangible planetary contexts. This environmental disconnection represents a significant departure from one of the most distinctive aspects of Herbert’s universe, where human politics are inextricably shaped by their material surroundings. The series also exhibits the fundamental tension between expositional density and narrative propulsion that characterizes adaptations of Herbert’s work—an inherent challenge when translating the encyclopaedic world-building of the Dune universe into the temporal constraints and visual grammar of episodic television.

Giaime Lazzari is a translator and a PhD candidate in French Literature at Trinity College Dublin, recipient of the Claude and Vincenette Pichois Research Award (2024-2028). His research focuses on language and space in the works of David Bunch, Joanna Russ, Daniel Drode, and Monique Wittig. He previously earned joint Master’s degrees from University of Bologna and Université Paris-Nanterre, with a dissertation on ecology and geophilosophy in Frank Herbert’s Dune. His professional experience includes serving as Junior Lecturer at Université Paris 8 Vincennes—Saint Denis.