The mechanical training dummy in Dune always fascinated me. When I read Dune as a kid, the scene on Caladan in which Paul´s training dummy is described, very much defined Paul as a character for me. It made clear that he did not grow up like a normal child but instead lived under constant threat of being assassinated, always preparing to be ready and fight for his live to his best ability. Not much later, shortly after their arrival on Dune, the scene with the hunter seeker happens and confirms this impression.
I found these three designs for the dummy on https://dune.fandom.com/wiki/Dune_Wiki
The left and middle image are pretty close to the design described in the book if I remember correctly. While the left image shows the dummy in action, with lots of different rotating, hacking and stabbing blades, the middle image shows the dummy in standby, with retracted blades. Both designs were made for the movie adaption by Lynch.
The right image is an alternative approach, deviating from the design described in the book but in a way that fits canon well in my opinion. Suspensors are common tech in the Dune universe, just think of the omnipresent glowglobes that light so many scenes in the story. Therefore, sticking a suspensorglobe into a traing dummy seems like a pretty obvious thing to do. The person standing next to the "Suspensor Drone" is Gurney Halleck. The art is by Mark Zug, created for the Dune Collectible Card Game by Last Unicorn Games.
Really nice writeup!
I wish I'd read Dune recently, but it's been some years, and everything Dune-related sort of blends together in my mind in to an amorphous fog. That's based on reading books 1-4, I think. They weren't hard to read for me, but they contained so many ideas and content that I feel I'd almost need an academic course to put everything in perspective and examine the various themes properly.
Sort of the anti-Star Wars in a way. XD
Actually one of the reasons I love the work of Philip K. Dick is because he introduces all these great, forward-looking ideas in bite-sized chunks. For example, Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep is just a novelette, but it contains some fascinating ideas, such as the Penfield Mood Organ, the Cult of Mercer and the Connection Box, the desperate urge for dwellers to own a pet (even if it's a robot), the whole quandary of what a 'Replicant' is anyway, and so forth.
So to me, both Dune and the Blade Runner world were serious, worthy material to springboard various series and movies, while SW and to a lesser extent Star Trek I question, here and there.
Bah. Rant over.
I wish I’d read Dune recently, but it’s been some years, and everything Dune-related sort of blends together in my mind in to an amorphous fog. That’s based on reading books 1-4, I think. They weren’t hard to read for me, but they contained so many ideas and content that I feel I’d almost need an academic course to put everything in perspective and examine the various themes properly.
Absolutely, I reread Dune every few years and Frank Herberts´s style and ideas impress me every time again.
I was never really interested in SW but I have been watching ST from an early age. ST ist the perfect stuff to run when I just want to chill, it almost became a kind of screensaver for me.
ist the perfect stuff to run when I just want to chill, it almost became a kind of screensaver for me.
OMG, that's great. oO <3
