thinking about Paul's agency a lot and. this scene got to me.
if you only look at the first book in the series, it's a tragedy in the classic sense. it's Paul fighting his future and his past with a futility that's heartbreaking. trying not to become the thing he fears and then becoming it.
because book Paul can't win.
not against the grandfather whose hunger for leadership he inherited, not against his mother who raised him for power. not against his father who clearly lays out Paul's path on Arrakis in a few desperate words to his son: become the lisan al gaib, guerilla-warfare your way back to ruling. the only love Paul knows speaks the language of power and control.
Paul inherits what he will become.
and then there is the spice that opens his mind but what he sees isn't enough to guide him. and his quasi-mentat powers can't help him because they are disconnected from his heart and soul. and the Fremen culture he eventually becomes part of, well. putting the tribe above everything else, killing your way to leadership, constant war and violence... his fight with Jamis, his initiation into Fremen life, is itself an act of violence. and heavily manipulated by Jessica who watches the fighting machine she helped create kill a man she helped weaken for the kill.
the Villeneuve films take a different approach overall, not just with the Jamis fight. Paul is less of a 'machine' and 'product' in the films and especially Leto a much more loving influence.
Film Paul has more of a fighting chance. His agency is painted in a different light.
but I can't unread Dune and I can't unsee book Paul's doomed attempts to escape his past and future. I watch the films and root for him and I feel he never had a chance.
