Photo-Illustration: Vulture; Photos: Warner Bros., Attila Szvacsek/HBO
Like Princess Jasmine trapped in Jafar’s gigantic hourglass, drowning in sand, we’re back in the world of Dune again. HBO’s latest big-budget IP gamble Dune: Prophecy premieres on November 17, taking over the slot of its last big-budget IP gamble The Penguin and fulfilling similar prequel responsibilities as this summer’s big-budget IP gamble House of the Dragon. Dragons, birds, worms: Is HBO’s premier Sunday-night slot going for a “we bought a zoo” thing?
Set more than 10,000 years before the events of Denis Villeneuve’s Dune and Dune: Part Two (together an adaptation of Frank Herbert’s seminal 1965 novel), Dune: Prophecy focuses on the beginnings of the…