Dune: Prophecy finale recap & ending explained: A cosmic cliffhanger
HBODune: Prophecy just dropped its super-sized finale, and while it doesn’t resolve Desmond, Valya, and Tula’s story, it sets up a tense second season – and a mysterious big bad.
Last week’s episode was revelatory for Desmond Hart: we found out he’s the first Bashar of the Sardaukar, House Corrino’s fearsome military regiment; and his mother was a Sister who abandoned him as a child… and her name is Tula Harkonnen.
However, while Desmond may have been the show’s biggest mystery, there are other plates spinning we need to consider: what will happen to Javicco and Francesca, will Natalya betray the Emperor, and what will become of the Sisterhood if Lila tells everyone about Dorotea’s murder?
It may be 82 minutes long, but Dune: Prophecy’s finale is pretty breathless – and it ends on a familiar planet.
Dune: Prophecy confirms Desmond is Tula’s son
HBOAfter Episode 5’s climactic tease, the finale confirms that Tula is Desmond’s mother – but she didn’t abandon him (more on that later). In the opening scene, she hears voices, “You abandoned your child, he’s your child, he’s your blood, you should have never followed Valya.”
We cut to a flashback; specifically, the moment Valya murdered Dorotea, as witnessed by Tula and two other acolytes. Valya convinces them to tell others that Dorotea took her own life out of grief for Mother Raquella. “Sisterhood above all” and all that.
Tula then confesses that she’s pregnant with Orry Atreides’ baby and she wants to keep it. “Then I’ll support you, we’ll raise it together,” Valya surprisingly vows.
In a later flashback, Valya shows Tula and the other sisters the breeding index. Tula thinks it’s too risky, believing a “mind can’t be controlled forever, artificial or not,” but Valya thinks they could use it to put a Sister on the throne (starting with Francesca imprinting a young Javicco).
Valya also tells Tula that her baby could “shape worlds… your child is destined for great things.”
However, in another flashback, we discover why Tula gave Desmond away. As she holds her son, she says, “My sweet boy, barely in the world and already you know so much sadness. You deserve the chance to chose your own path… be free, not what anyone desires you to be.”
She sends him away with the midwife, who promises to look after him and take him far away – so they swap Desmond with a stillborn baby, so Valya thinks he died at birth.
Nazir dies trying to control her fear
HBOAs Tula and Nazir try to get to the bottom of the Sisterhood’s shared nightmares and the virus, they realize that “fear is what it’s feeding off of”, and that it’s a bio-weapon under Desmond’s control.
As it’s a physical contagion, they believe they could produce an antiviral and generate a cure – but it means one of them has to face it head-on. Nazir volunteers and triggers an active response, but as she tries to control her fear, the virus overwhelms her.
“I see it, the monster of Arrakis… eyes, I see them. They’re watching him, it’s not human,” Nazir says, further suggesting it’s a product of thinking machines, she burns to death like the others.
Soon after, Tula tells the breeding index’s thinking machine about the virus and what Nazir said. “You’re talking about a thinking machine on a nanoscale,” it tells her, and if she eliminates Desmond, it could stop the attacks. “He wasn’t born a weapon, he was made into one… I’ll go to him” she says.
Natalya arrests Ynez
HBOWe knew in the last episode that Natalya allied herself with Desmond. However, their bond becomes abundantly clear in Episode 6.
Desmond questions Keiran Atreides over the Sisterhood’s connection to the rebellion, but he stresses that he doesn’t trust the Harkonnens – but he also hates Desmond and the Emperor. Basically, he doesn’t give him any useful information.
Later, Ynez tries to free him from the suspension chamber, but she’s caught red-handed by her mother. “You foolish, lovesick girl,” she says, and when Ynez pleads for her mother’s support, she has her arrested. “I wanted to teach you about power, so let this be a lesson,” she says.
Francesca is a victim of Valya’s plan
HBOAfter Episode 5, it’s clear that Sister Francesca is the true love of Javicco’s life, and he was forced to marry Natalya to strengthen the Imperium. The finale picks up with them in bed together, and he offers her a place at the palace; he believes his wife would be happy to “end the charade” and even offers to speak to Valya so they could be together without impunity.
Soon after, Francesca reveals to Valya that both Ynez and Keiran have been arrested. Valya concocts a plan: with Theodosia’s help (it’s confirmed she’s a Face Dancer bred by Tlulaxan geneticists), she’ll rescue the princess until her coronation can be secured… and Francesca will kill the emperor with a meta-cyanide needle. “Javicco has forfeited the right to live out his reign in peace,” she says.
Naturally, Francesca is upset. She honestly believes Javicco would ensure Francesca’s safety and welcome back the alliance of the Sisterhood, but Valya isn’t convinced.
Javicco then confronts Desmond over Ynez’s arrest, but he blames it on Natalya. Javicco reveals plans to send Natalya on a tour of goodwill across the universe to strengthen their ties with the Great Houses, but Desmond sees straight through him – he knows he wants to spend more time with Francesca.
“The Sisters are stoking rebellion,” Desmond warns, but Javicco’s allegiance is to the Mother Superior, despite their differences over the years.
Javicco then finds Natalya, who’s heard about her imminent departure from Salusa Secundus… and she doesn’t want to go. “You’ll do as you’re commanded,” he says, but Desmond walks in to support Natalya. “For your own safety, perhaps it’s time to let clearer heads prevail… going forward, my counsel won’t be ignored,” she warns.
Valya gets herself arrested and frees Ynez
HBOValya arrives at the palace and quickly gets herself arrested for insulting the emperor. She tells him he’s a “weak man… you traded one puppet master for another,” and that “every decision you ever made, we made it for you… you were only ever an assignment. You don’t matter.’
Meanwhile, Natalya tells Desmond that the Great Houses will authorize retaliation against the Sisterhood if they convince them they plotted to assassinate the High Council. His Sardaukar guards tell him that Valya has been arrested, and Desmond immediately knows that’s exactly what she wanted to happen.
Over in the stasis chamber, Valya kills the guards and frees Ynez. She wants to take Keiran with them too – Valya thinks it’s too risky, but she reluctantly agrees. Theodosia stays behind… disguised as Ynez! Valya tells her that she could die, but Theodosia says it’s what she was made to do. “You have a fierce will, Sister,” Valya says.
By the time Desmond arrives, Valya, Keiran, and Ynez are gone, and Theodosia is nowhere to be seen. An injured guard mumbles something about the Mother Superior, but it’s actually Theodosia using another disguise, and she stabs him in the stomach. He doesn’t fight back, instead ordering the guards to “get this monstrosity up in suspension” while he pursues Valya.
Javicco dies in Francesca’s arms
HBOJavicco confronts Francesca, but she urges that Valya planned to control and kill him, not her. “Save you lies for someone else,” he says, and asks why he shouldn’t kill her. Unfortunately, the imprint will prevent him from harming her in any way.
“It’s a strange thing when you finally realize you’ve never known one moment of freedom… but I can control this,” he says, before stabbing himself with the knife. Francesca tries to help him, but Natalya sneaks up from behind and pricks her neck with the meta-cyanide needle, killing her instantly.
Javicco grabs onto Natalya’s dress in desperate anger, but Natalya scornfully shoves him off, before feigning shock at his death. “The emperor’s been killed,” she screams, as Francesca lies across Javicco’s body – she’ll be framed for his death.
A secret rebellion in the Sisterhood
HBOWhile Valya and Tula are off galivanting in Salusa Secundus, a lot goes down on Wallach IX. Lila (possessed by Dorotea for the whole episode) manages to trick Jen into loosening her restraints so she can find the other faithful.
When she finds Emeline, she asks what happened to Esther-Cano, Avemar, and Gessie… the Butlerian Sisters “who disbanded after Dorotea’s suicide,” she’s told. According to Lila (Dorotea, to be clear), Valya has erased any record of them in the Sisterhood.
Lila revisits the place where Dorotea was murdered and tells everyone that “this order was grown on blood-soaked roots.” She turns a valve, emptying the water from the pond and revealing dozens of skeletons. In a flash back, we see Valya forcing the remaining Sisters to decide if they want to follow her, and those who don’t fall victim to the same fate as Dorotea.
In other words, they take their own lives en masse, as commanded by the Voice. “I will not be silenced again. In the name of all who have fallen, I will return us to our righteous path,” Lila says, before (seemingly) destroying the breeding index.
Valya conquers her fears and Tula meets Desmond
HBOValya, Keiran, and Tula land at a fuel depot in Zimia. Valya tells them to run ahead and she’ll slow Desmond and her guards down (she uses the Voice to make the guards kill each other).
“Desmond Hart, you’ve say you’ve seen my end… show me,” she asks, and Valya’s resistance to his powers makes them both collapse. Part of her brain awakes in a blizzard on an icy lake, where she sees her younger self saving Griffin from drowning (this was the first time she used the Voice).
Ultimately, it’s clear Valya feels insecure (or even guilty) about how calamitous her life has been, and all of the people who’ve been caught in the crosshairs of her plans. Tula finds her and tells her to accept her fears, rather than trying to fight them, and she recovers from the virus.
However, she finds out what happened to Desmond in her vision: he was recovered by a mysterious stranger after the Shai-Halud attack, who augmented his eyeball with nanotechnology using thinking machines. Who is it? We don’t know!
Valya believes he needs to die, but Tula commands her to stop using the Voice and confesses that he’s her son, and that she lied about his death. “You think I’m a monster, Sister?” she asks, and Tula tells her they’re the same: “wolves born to feed with no care for the cost… if my son had the potential that Anirul promised, he deserved a better fate than us.”
Tula wants to save him, and Valya steps back, deciding to focus her efforts on the people responsible for Desmond Hart’s abilities. “The reckoning is still upon us, stalking us from the darkness… if the shadows is where they want to fight, then that is where I shall go,” she says.
Tula hugs Desmond, who embraces her… before having her arrested. Elsewhere, Valya, Keiran, and Ynez arrive on Arrakis. “The path to our enemy begins here,” Valya says.
With Dune: Prophecy over, find out why Denis Villeneuve will never direct a Star Wars movie, read more about the book Dune: Prophecy is based on, and check out our list of the best TV shows of 2024.