When I heard that DUNE 3 would be released on December 18 of this year, the first thing that came to mind was neither Frank Herbert nor Timothée Chalamet.

Almost thirty years ago, it was the Dune II game, which was contained on four floppy disks. I first learned about DUNE not through the novel, but through this game.

I didn't even know why spice was important. I was just moving harvesters around on the sand, building bases against AI.

However, I later realized that this game was actually the one that opened the door to the entire RTS genre.

Dune II is not just a game adaptation of the Dune novel.

This game brought together all the elements of resource gathering, base building, real-time unit management, and fog of war into a single framework, which we now take for granted in RTS games.

It's already common knowledge in the industry that Blizzard's Warcraft was made by directly copying the assets from this game, and Westwood themselves refined this formula when they later created Command & Conquer.

If there is a long lineage leading to StarCraft becoming the king of PC gaming, the name at the top of that list is Dune II.

With global sales of just over 250,000 copies, it wasn't a massive hit by the standards of the time, but this one game spawned a multi-billion dollar industry over the following decades.

Perhaps because of that nostalgia, when Denis Villeneuve released Dune Part One in 2021, the Arrakis I had encountered as a child in pixels was beautifully brought to life on screen.

Despite the pandemic, it grossed over $400 million, and Part Two, set for release in 2024, has already reached $280 million in North America and $715 million worldwide, making it the seventh highest-grossing film globally in 2024.

With a production budget of $190 million, the film returned a profit of 276 percent on its investment. It won Oscars for sound and visual effects and was nominated for Best Picture.

To be honest, I didn't expect this franchise to become this big.

I really didn't think Hollywood would embrace the idea of adapting a philosophical, slow-paced original sci-fi novel into a two-and-a-half-hour art-house blockbuster.

And now, Part Three is on the way. The official title is Dune: Part Three. The source material is Herbert's 1969 work, Dune Messiah.

Principal photography began last July in Budapest and wrapped up on November 11, and post-production is currently underway.

Interestingly, the director shot most of this film on 70mm film.

Only the desert scenes were filmed in IMAX digital, as Villeneuve wanted to capture the unique harshness of digital.

The cinematographer has also changed from Greig Fraser to Linus Sandgren. The music will once again be composed by the master Hans Zimmer.

Robert Pattinson has joined the cast as the assassin Skytale, and Jason Momoa's son, Nakoa-Wolf Momoa, will make his debut as Leto II, the son of Paul and Chani, which is also a point of interest.

Anya Taylor-Joy will appear as Alia Atreides, Paul's sister. Taylor will be referred to as Abomination in this film, and she will be portrayed as a powerful figure with prescient abilities, sharing the memories and knowledge of countless ancestors even before her birth.

I expect that there will be many intriguing reasons for this third installment.

As Villeneuve himself stated, if Part One was contemplative and Part Two was a war film, then Part Three will be a thriller, a more solid and tense movie. Those who have read the original Messiah will know that this novel is about the hero deconstructing himself.

The chilling rupture of Paul Atreides, who has become the Messiah, facing the fact that the holy war he initiated has taken the lives of billions across the universe. Chalamet himself mentioned that Paul becomes his own worst nightmare, and Zendaya noted that the years have not been kind to anyone in Dune. The emotions this film will leave on an audience addicted to the hero's journey is truly the point worth watching.

It's also amusing that the release date of December 18 directly clashes with Marvel's Avengers Doomsday. There are already whispers of a "Dune Day" like "Barbenheimer."

Both films have solid fan bases, so I don't think there will be a cannibalization effect. Rather, that week at the box office is likely to become the biggest festival in the film industry this year.

It's touching to see that the universe I first encountered on floppy disks thirty years ago is now continuing to grow on IMAX screens and 70mm film.

When I sit in the theater in December, I will probably catch a whiff of that dusty smell again.