Well, I just finished Sandworms of Dune. It was complete and utter ****, and I'd like to create a letter to the author(s) that I will never actually send. Here it is...
****. YOU.
Ok Brian, so you took your daddy's story and butchered it with your 2nd grade writing style, but I'll give you credit and say that Hunters of Dune was almost decent. Or at least, it almost got up to twilight standards.
Sometimes I would get a glimpse of old Dune, and it would keep me going, but to be honest, that's the only thing that was good. I mean, it feels like you took the outline that you "inherited," rolled it into a joint after giving it the briefest of glances, smoked about half of it, passed the rest to Kevin Anderson, and while staring at the now hazy computer screen, began to type your wet dreams about robots onto. I mean ****, both books just reek of amateur fan fiction that is only one yiff away from being exactly like the rest of the trash on the internet.
I mean ****, you couldn't even write a plot without using FOUR ****ING DEUS EX MACHINAS IN A ****ING ROW TO END YOUR ****ING SERIES THAT YOU EVEN HAD AN OUTLINE FOR.
Hell, I could excuse the Duncan Idaho "ultimate Kwisatz Haderach" **** because it was implied that Duncan was special during God Emperor of Dune, but damn, you just pulled it out of your *** without any real foreshadowing whatsoever after "Paul" (who I'll get to in a moment) suddenly said HERP DERP I'M NOT THE HADERACH YOU ARE DUNCAN MY MANG! ****, I was actually expecting it to be a better revelation, not some **** that you threw in to make every end happily.
And the face dancers having a kill switch? Damnit, I was expecting the Kwisatz to actually use his powers to hunt them down or something but NOPE! You just threw in a convenient plot device so that you could end the book more quickly. But hey, that what you ****ing get when you try to write a book a year, amirite?
Oh, and Paolo... What the ****? The "evil paul" thing was done way back in the first book with the Baron's nephew; why the hell would you revisit the concept? In fact, everything involved with him and the "search for the kwisatz haderach" felt more forced than a turd after constipation (which, btw, makes me feel better than your books ever did). I mean, the ****ing Kwisatz Haderach wasn't part of any prophecies, he was just a superhuman who could see into the future. I can see Duncan fusing with Erasmus (who was uneeded) to form a bond between robots and humans, but everything leading up to that? It was like you wrote the ****ing ending first and had no idea how to it, so you brought back a ****ton of characters, which is what all the fans always wanted! No, it ****ing wasn't. We wanted an ending that expanded the concept of not relying on a single entity for humanity's fate, but nope! INSTEAD, YOU MADE A ****ING ENDING THAT WENT AGAINST THAT COMPLETELY, YOU DUMB ***.
The Oracle of Time... **** YOU BRIAN FOR EVER COMING UP WITH THIS ****. THIS IS THE WORST OFFENSE THAT YOU COULD HAVE ****ING MADE. I CAN SEE HOW FRANK MAY HAVE THOUGHT UP THE CONCEPT OF A SUPER POWERFUL GUILD LEADER, BUT YOU JUST DECIDED TO GO AHEAD AND MAKE A CHARACTER FROM YOUR ****TY BUTLERIAN JIHAD **** INTO SOME GODLIKE ENTITY WITH NO CHARACTER DEPTH WHATSOEVER. IN FACT, I WOULDN'T BE SURPRISED IN THE LEAST TO FIND OUT THAT SHE WAS JUST PUT IN AND MADE EXTRA POWERFUL (IN FACT SHE EVEN SEEMS MORE POWERFUL THAN SOME KWISATZ) SO THAT YOU COULD CONVENIENTLY GET RID OF OMNIUS! **** YOU FOR PUTTING HER IN; EVERY SCENE THAT SHE WAS IN FELT STILTED, ARTIFICIAL, AND WORSE THAN ANYTHING IN DUNE, OR MOST OTHER BOOKS, YET.
THE LAST PARAGRAPH WAS ALL CAPS BECAUSE THE ORACLE WAS ONE OF THE MOST HATED THINGS FOR ME. **** YOU.
Now let's move on to individual characters, shall we? Dumb ***.
The only ghola who had any actual depth to him was Yueh and his tale of redemption, and I actually sorta liked him. Thanks to your obnoxiously repetitive writing style, I hated several of his scenes that essentially copied earlier chapters, but he was still, sadly, my favorite ghola.
Leto 2 coming back was cool! You know what wasn't? Barely developing him or touching the concept of a ghola who might not want such a tidal wave of memories or guilt. He was one of the most tragic characters in Dune, but at the end of the book, you turned him into some Sandworm controller and essentially killed him off. Hell, I was even sorta excited by the fact that he could somehow turn into a sandworm, but you never really ****ing expanded on that. Dumb ***.
I already spoke about Paul. **** you.
Chani was only there as a filler character, and you know it. **** you.
Jessica had huge potential, but she was whiny and only had one or two interesting scenes AT ALL. **** you.
Thufir could have been cool, but him being a face dancer was so badly done that I didn't enjoy it at all. **** you.
Scytale was barely touched upon and none of Frank's build up with him practicing his whistling for Duncan was used. He just seemed like a shadow of his former self. **** you.
Waff and Uxtal were mostly uneeded, but they both could have been MUCH better. I suspect that Frank had plans for them, but you butchered them to pieces. **** you.
Speaking of Waff, his tale of bringing the worms back to Rakis and the seaworms was horribly done. I'll touch on the seaworms, but damn; you ruined a potentially good character. **** you.
Sheeana obviously was in for some big stuff, if Frank was to be believed! You turned her into some ***** who barely ran a ship and pretty much had no REAL part in the overall plot and could have been replaced by anyone else. **** you.
Alia could have been cool, but nope! She was just used as a handy plot device twice. **** you.
The Baron was barely decent, and there was never any reason for Alia being there. **** you.
Serena Butler was obviously thrown in to advertise for your Butlerian Jihad books. **** you.
Omnius and Erasmus were FACE DANCERS! Frank obviously intended to explain in 7 that they absorbed some ancient robot leader, but you took two ****ty characters from your ****ty prologue books to convieniently explain away the old people. Both characters had no depth, bored me, and honestly never seemed like much of a threat. **** you.
I don't give a **** about talking about the rest of the characters that you butchered like Murbella, so **** you.
Now on to the seaworms and ultraspice.
The seaworms I can understand; they were a way for the guild to finally bypass the Sisterhood for spice, and I applaud FRANK for potentially coming up with the concept. The concept itself is admittedly cool, but you took it and made it into something completely boring and unrecognizable. The whole time I was reading those sections with the seaworms, I honestly put down the kindle and asked myself, "Am I reading Dune?"
The ultraspice? Don't make me talk about that ****. It was so obviously a cop out for your terrible "Kwisatz Quest" that it wasn't even funny. **** you.
I don't even feel like talking about anything else right now, so I'm going to stop with these words:
**** you, Brian and Kevin. There is a special place reserved for you in hell, and I hope that there is lots of pain, screaming, and no escape.
