You feeling alright, Gurney?
The Earl Grey was better before the production of oil of bergamot was taken out of England.
It just didn’t taste the same after the shift.Chai Hulud.
“Oh, do wipe that childish look of confusion off of your face, Kathryn. Whatever the man’s faults may have been, and many they were, his choice of drink was exceptional. You? You’re but a half-step away from boiling kidney and navy beans!”
“Get the hell off my bridge, Q!”
For the first time ever, I’m interested in watching and episode of Voyager. But just this Q episode.
What’s with the Voyager hate around here?
Reminder he was in the movie from the 80s, too. What a shock that was for me years ago.
I must not Lwaxana.
Lwaxana is the mind-killer.
Lwaxana is the little-death that brings total obliteration.
I will face my Lwaxana.
I will permit her to pass over me and through me.
And when she has gone past I will turn the inner eye to see her path.
Where the Lwaxana has gone there will be nothing.
Only I will remain.Lwaxana: “Why there you are, Jean-Luc.”
Picard: “HELP ME!”
My name is Earl Grey.
This feels like a meme about the East India Company.
Is it? I always assumed Dune was about the US vs. Soviets wars on the Middle East.
The name Harkonnen (though Finnish) was chosen because it sounds Russian. However, no, it isn’t really a US VS Soviet story. It’s about systems. It’s about ecology, power, and freedom. If you only read Dune then I can see how you could think that, but the other books give you a lot more information.
Arrakis is terraformed, and this disrupts the ecosystem of Shai-hulud, which destroys spice production. It also destroys Fremen culture, with people teaching what the Fremen were like, but not really knowing.
Paul and, to an even further extent, Lato II are aggressive dictators. They destroys people’s freedom, with the end goal to create people who can’t be predicted who rebel, because that’s the only way (that they can see) to guarantee freedom for humanity.
I addition to this, the Harkonnen are really just there as a subversion. Paul’s grandfather, as he learns in Dune, is the Baron Harkonnen, so he is a Harkonnen. This really destroys any message about it being one side VS the other.
It’s about systems. Paul was systematically bread. The Harkonnen and Atreides were used by the emperial system to maintain control and order (although this failed). The system of ecology keeps Arrakis in balance, and the people live in harmony with it. Systems of control prevent people from being free.
That was an interesting analysis, thanks! I feel it also reinforces my original observation. The East India Company was nothing, if not a system of control that ultimately failed.
Probably, but history repeats itself. That conflict was not the first time the line between business and public interests was muddled with the result of large scale warfare and oppression, nor the last, so the same themes are relevant. And the meme has a very explicit focus on tea.
A delicate native ecosystem is being ravaged to enable mass commerce. Spice = oil.
Yup. At the same time: a messianic hero rises to lead the chosen people.
The East Ferengi Company
