“In Blood, DNA Samples” would be more accurate. But sure, let’s go with truth.
Recap
Desmond Hart presents in front of the royal family at the head of a new fighting force that will protect the Imperium, which he will lead as Bashar; the Emperor has decried it. Hart suggests that the Emperor leave the fleet over the planet a while longer as a show of strength. Sister Francesca (Tabu) arrives on Salusa Secundus due to a message she received from Constantine, her son. Ynez is under guard, but Constantine insists on coming into her room to attempt an apology for abandoning her at the Landsraad—he couldn’t stomach disappointing his father after making hi, proud in showing up. On Wallach IX, Sister Jen interrupts their lesson in upset over the lack of transparency from their leaders following the joint dreaming. Tula removes her from class, but not to punish her; she believes Jen is resistant to the dream as she’s never had it, and wants her help with Lila since they were friends. Lila is in a state, screaming and drowning in the voices of her ancestors. Tula asks Jen to keep watch over her.
When Constantine meets with his mother, he tells her that he never sent her a message; he assumed she came because of Kasha, but Francesca didn’t know she’d died. Harrow approaches Hart in attempt to make amends for his accusations at the Landsraad; he blames his aunt’s poor guidance, but Hart insists that not enough—Harrow needs to give something to makes amends. He gets information; Harrow tells him of the underground market, which he claims has been stealing some of his shipments as part of a smuggling operation. Hart says this is only a start, and that Harrow will need to give proof that his aunt is involved in the operation to clear his name. Francesca talks to Valya, wanting to know why she secretly sent for her under the guise of her son. Valya tells her of the reckoning and how the Sisterhood is being sidelined by the Imperium. She asks Francesca to help them in this, promising to occupy Hart while she gets Javicco’s ear, and tells her she may maneuver Constantine into a position as fleet commander. Keiran Atreides tells Constantine off for being late to his sparring lesson and leaves, telling the prince to take responsibility for his life.
Keiran goes to see Mikaela, to warn her of Hart’s impending arrival when he follows up on Harrow’s intel, but she’s unbothered and tells him not to try and become the part he’s playing. She insists that she’s ready for Hart. Jen talks to Lila and realizes that she’s speaking to Mother Raquella. She brings Lila to Tula so that Raquella can help them. Raquella begins analyzing tissue from Kasha’s body and realizes that she’s seen this sort of damage before during the war. Harrow tells Valya that the intel she provided helped with Hart, but that he was asking about the Sisterhood. Valya tells him that the information she gave him will improve House Harkonnen’s standing, and he leaves for Evgeny’s funeral, telling Valya she can stay while he’s gone. Theodosia asks where Francesca fits into this plot, and Valya tells her that she hasn’t yet learned the skill of imprinting on a person so that you can affect the course of their life. Francesca asks Javicco to give Constantine a chance to prove himself. He kisses her, but she stops him, insisting that she didn’t come to drive a wedge between the Emperor and his wife.
Avila tries to take Tula to task for not being present while the school founders in panic. She has a message from Valya and demands to know what is going on in the lab. Though Tula refuses to tell her, Raquella (Lila) emerges and explains that the deaths they’re seeing were caused by an engineered RNA retrovirus. Avila is mortified at what Tula has done, but she tells Avila to stay silent. Hart visits the underground bar and asks Mikaela questions; she feigns ignorance. His men trash the bar, searching everywhere, while Hart tells Mikaela that all he wants is evidence of the Sisterhood’s connection to the rebellion. Keiran is planting chain explosives for Mikaela while this happens, then the two fight their way out of the bar. As they do so, Hart discovers Mikaela’s Sisterhood robes in one of the spice canisters and Keiran sees her use a Sisterhood knife. The explosives go off, taking down the whole complex and Keiran tells Mikaela that he doesn’t want to see her again, feeling betrayed.
Jen demands to know if Lila is just being used for the Sisterhood’s gain, which Tula insists inevitable in this period of crisis. Hart survives the explosion, and Francesca goes to speak to Constantine. He asks her why she had him and then left him with a father who will never be pleased with him. Francesca tells him that his father is driven by fear and the Constantine must seize opportunities when they come. She also tells him that he was born to protect his sister, the future leader to the Imperium. Mikaela is furious with Valya for destroying her years of hard work when she learns that Hart didn’t die in the explosion. Valya gives her passage to a safe house on Arrakis and dismisses her. Constantine goes to the sparring room and finds evidence of Keiran’s rebel activities. He waits for Keiran to come back and pretends to be contrite for his earlier behavior before turning him over to the guards. At dinner that night, the Emperor praises Constantine’s actions and promotes him to fleet commander.
Ynez watches her mother leave the dinner in hurt, and heads to the cells to talk to Keiran. She demands the truth and he admits the he betrayed his principles for her because he cares for her, but he does believe he can bring about a better Imperium. Lila talks to Jen, glad that she hasn’t let the Sisterhood down, while Jen insists she’s the best of them. Tula gets Hart’s DNA sample from Valya and begins analysis with the computer. The Empress visits Hart, saying he has been chosen, and that she was once too. She believes that the Sisterhood has stolen all of this from her; Javicco’s trust, her daughter’s love, her power. She asks what they took from Hart and he tells her that he’s the son of a Sister, who gave him up and allowed him to be raised by scavengers. Hart and the Empress kiss and she bids them to rid the Imperium of these “witches” as, on Wallach IX, Tula learns that Hart is a descendant of Harkonnen and Atriedes bloodlines…
Commentary
Okay. So Hart is Tula and Orry’s kid. Little perplexed by how he got any background on his family if she gave him up to a bunch of dubious characters, but I’m assuming we’ll find out how by the final episode. I’m a little worried that they’re going to use him as an example of how powerful the Atreides and Harkonnen bloodlines can be together, and make it a precursor to the eventual crossing of the bloodlines again in Dune, since that was orchestrated by the Bene Gesserit. But what can you do—it’s gonna go where it goes.
At least we’ve now got confirmation that Hart’s powers aren’t magic, but delivered via a coded virus. How he wields this power is another manner entirely, but I’m much more interested in getting an answer to that. I’m also way more interested in him having an affair with the Empress because she deserves this. Someone get this woman the known universe’s biggest martini. She gets no respect.
This episode finally makes good on a lot of what the show has put forth, and results in the most successful chapter so far. The actors are finally getting a chance to stretch their legs and we get all those good tense moments you’d expect from a drama like this. The prolonged end to dinner where Ynez sees her mother’s heart break in realtime, and she watches the Empress leave the table is such a powerful moment of connection that doesn’t even require two characters interacting. There’s so much clarity and pain between mother and daughter here, even if Ynez is the only one to feel it fully. And it spurs her to go have a conversation with Keiran Atreides that I must assume will lead to his freedom.
Keiran thinks he’s been clear and concise about when and how he’s betrayed his principles and what they mean to him, but Mikaela reads him for filth in this episode and she’s right. As another person who’s operating on two sides of a line that cannot be made compatible, she’s far more aware of the cost, and more honest with herself about what she’s been trying to achieve. Her only mistake is in failing to realize that she’s a much smaller player to Valya than she’d assumed.
In the meantime, Chloe Lea runs way with the entire flipping episode in her embodiment of Raquella, which is so flawless and detailed that I fully believed the woman was possessed by dead ancestors. It’s a little silly that only Raquella’s memory is capable of unearthing this virus, but if it leads to performances like that, I’m down. Whatever, give me an entire episode of that.
While the question of who qualifies as the ‘hero’ of any given Dune story is always a wooly one, the script goes a long way in making it clear who we should be railing against once Javicco makes that speech at the start of the episode. He hits “defend our values with ferocity and pride” with all the fervor you expect from dictators, and it scrapes just a little too close to reality at the moment, thanks.
Little annoyed that Hart survived that explosion. Obviously he had to, and I know that the shield belts are supposed to be able to help with a lot, but it was so much explosive. I felt a lot like Mikaela did over that one. And while I appreciate that Constantine needed a win in order to get in good with the Emperor, the idea that Keiran would just leave his rebellion crap lying around in the sparring room is a tough sell. I know he’s not the most put-together insurgent, but come on now.
Francesca is identified by Valya as an imprinter; a particular skillset that the Sisterhood uses for the coercion and seduction of powerful men. This is a thing that Frank Herbert eventually identified in Heretics of Dune (retroactively suggesting that Lady Fenring was an imprinter), and I kind of wish he hadn’t? Again, it’s just another place where it feels as though Herbert wants to give reasons for the power women can have in their relationships with men. Why? I believe that Francesca is that powerful without extra special man trap sparkles.
Are we supposed to believe that powerful men are harder to manipulate, resulting in the need for special skills? Because, uh… please don’t make me laugh. Look at Javicco. That is not a difficult man to wheedle. You just need the right words and big emphatic eyes. (This applies to Francesca and Hart, by the way.)
But the final question I’ve got is whether or not this show is hoping for more seasons. It seems as though there’s a lot to wrap up, and very little time now to do it.
Truthsaying and Visions
- It seems very likely that the new fighting force we see at the beginning of the episode is meant to be the predecessors of the Sardukar, which, again, we really don’t have to make this little micro-era the point where every little thing gets created.
- Raquella claims that the dream is prescience and all the Sisters are seeing this potential downfall for their order, but I keep wondering if the vision is either doing double duty (i.e. it applies to more than one era, which often happens in these kinds of stories), or this is truly a vision about Paul Atreides—or Leto II the God Emperor. Shai-hulud leading to darkness and two all-seeing eyes would seem to fit the bill.
- Last week, I was saying the Emperor should kiss heart, but this week it’s all about Jen tearfully calling Lila “Doe Eyes.” Love Jen, more to the point, but I do worry that she’s got far too much compassion to be a part of the order.
Next week we come to the end of things…
