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Posted in: Dune, Legendary, Movies | Tagged: denis villeneuve, dune: messiah
Denis Villeneuve: New Directors Could Take Over After Dune: Messiah
Director Denis Villeneuve believes that other directors could continue to explore the world of Dune after Dune: Messiah, but he'll be moving on.
Article Summary
- Denis Villeneuve sees Dune: Messiah as a distinct project from the first two films, not part of a trilogy.
- Villeneuve is scripting Dune: Messiah but hints at passing the torch to other directors for future Dune films.
- Exploration of Dune's universe might deepen post-Messiah, tackling more eccentric themes and narratives.
- While Villeneuve remains coy, Dune: Messiah seems likely, but may not meet the 2026 release due to its scale.
It was unknown to the people involved with the first Dune film and the people who watched it whether or not we would be exploring this world in more than one movie. Unlike other films split into multiple parts, Dune: Part Two was not greenlit until after the first film came out. Once the second film came out, people were, of course, wondering if a third one would come out. Dune: Messiah is a book that also functions as an extended epilogue to the original book. Director Denis Villeneuve has been saying he's been working on a script for Messiah since before the second film came out, and it sounds all but guaranteed that it will be coming out eventually. While people will refer to this as a trilogy, Villeneuve feels different, as he explained in Vanity Fair's "Little Gold Men" podcast.
"First, it's important that people understand that for me, it was really a diptych," Villeneuve said of the first two "Dune" movies. "It was really a pair of movies that will be the adaptation of the first book. That's done, and that's finished. If I do a third one, which is in the writing process, it's not like a trilogy. It's strange to say that, but if I go back there, it's to do something that feels different and has its own identity."
New Director Could Continue To Explore The World Of Dune
After Messiah, the world of Dune continues while also getting increasingly weirder, as it eventually quite literally answers the question of "Would you still love me if I was a worm?" (If you know, you know). Warner Bros. and Legendary have already shown they are open to exploring more aspects of the world with the prequel TV series Dune: The Sisterhood, but Villeneuve knows that his time on Arrakis is coming to an end and believes that other directors could take over should they want to explore the universe further.
"Listen, if 'Dune: Messiah' happens, it will have been many years for me on Arrakis, and I would love to do something else," he said. "I think that it would be a good idea for me to make sure that, in 'Messiah,' there are the seeds in the project if someone wants to do something else afterwards because they are beautiful books. They are more difficult to adapt. They become more and more esoteric. It's a bit more tricky to adapt, but I'm not closing the door. I will not do it myself, but it could happen with someone else."
The next project from Villeneuve is slated for a December 18, 2026, release date, but at the time of writing, we don't know what project that will be. Villeneuve is still playing coy about whether or not Dune: Messiah will happen (we all know it will); there is a good chance it won't be that film released in 2026. That is a pretty quick turnaround time for a movie that will be that big with on-location shoots and a large cast. So we still have time before Villeneuve's time in the world of Dune ends, but the question is whether or not someone is looking to try and adapt the latter books for the big screen. Well, would you still love me if I was a sandworm?
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