As Aretha Franklin and the Eurythmics once said, sisters are doin' it for themselves. A lot happened in the 80 minute season 1 finale of Dune: Prophecy. But a lot of this show and the movies in the franchise based on Frank Herbert's Dune series revolves around people having long, slow, intense conversations in rooms. We can boil down what happened in episode 6 to just a handful of major plot points and reveals. You don't need a thinking machine to sort through them.
Valya and Tula Harkonnen, the two sisters in charge of the Sisterhood that will become the Bene Gesserit, have more or less lost their hold on the Order by the end of the season. The "breeding program" that they run to manipulate bloodlines and leadership in the Imperium is threatened as well. That program, creepy as it may be, is up and running when Paul Atreides started his adventure in Dune. So despite what happens in the Dune: Prophecy finale, it isn't gone for good.
Fear Is The Mind Virus (?)
At the beginning of the episode, Tula continued to run experiments on the dream infecting the sisterhood. The experiment killed her partner. However, they discovered that the virus feeds on fear. Tula is able to use this knowledge when Desmond Hart activates Valya's virus at the end of the episode and ultimately saves her life. While Tula talked Valya through her fear, Valya was on a full journey: half flashback to how she saved her brother Griffin and half vision of the big scary sand worm on Arakkis. Now, I remember from Dune that Lady Jessica had some very specific rules about fear and controlling it. Could this be how the Bene Gesserit came to literally conquer fear? Feels like a fair guess!
The Sisterhood Learns How Valya & Tula Came Into Power
Sister Lila, who is basically possessed by the memory of her grandmother Reverend Mother Dorotea, very quickly solves the mystery of what happened to her and her followers. She reveals it to the other acolytes and sisters: Valya (along with Tula, Francesca, and Kasha) staged Dorotea's death as a suicide and used The Voice to massacre their fellow students who remained loyal to the former Reverend Mother.
After showing the girls the literal skeletons in the proverbial closest (they were at the bottom of a lake), Lila/Dorotea lead the sisterhood to destroy the AI/robot/"thinking machine" powering the breeding project. Is that good? Is that bad? Sisters Jen and Emeline are conflicted, and so am I.
The Empress Accidentally Pulled A Coup D'Imperium
Emperor Mark Strong (a.k.a. Javicco Corrino) had a very, very bad day. He tried to send his wife Natalya away so he could hang with his mistress, Sister Francesca, forever. The Empress was like "nah" and revealed that Desmond Hart was loyal to her, not him. Then, Valya informed Javicco that his entire life had been planned and manipulated by the Sisterhood, that Francesca never loved him, and that she had been ordered to kill him.
Even though Francesca assured him that her feelings were real and she was just following orders, he died by suicide before she had the chance to do it herself as one final, single act of free will. And then the Empress killed Francesca with the same poisoned blade, like, moments after. Okay girl!!!!! Natalya didn't fully orchestrate that takeover, since she was not working with Valya at all, but it did kind of work out for her anyway. Cersei Lannister would be so jealous of how easy that was.
Tula Harkonnen is... Mother?
This turn of events was wild, and straight out of a soap opera in the best way. So, right after they murdered their sisters, Tula faked the death of her son and sent him away. He grew up to be none other than Desmond Hart. Tula discovered this in the penultimate episode, and revealed it to Valya right as her sister was about to cut the thinking machine they'd just discovered had been implanted in his eye. So dramatic! Valya escaped, telling her sister that she could decide what to do with her son. Tula embraced Desmond, and told him who he was to her. But the sweet mother and son reunion was short-lived. Desmond immediately had her arrested. That's low-key meaningless, because Tula could use The Voice to free herself at the opportune any moment. But way harsh, Des!
Valya mentioned that some "hidden hand" also knows how powerful Desmond is, and we did see a mystery person in the shadows during the (gross af) flashback that revealed how the thinking machine was implanted in Desmond's eye. My best guess is that Harrow Harkonnen is behind this. In his only scene, he was looking over some camera footage that could easily have come from Desmond's robot eyeball. That weapon is how he killed a kid and a key member of the Sisterhood, Kasha, in the pilot episode. So whoever is controlling him is kind of a BFG.
Hey, It's The Titular Dunes!
In the final moments of the episode, Valya, Ynez and Kieran arrive on Arrakis. (While Javicco was going through it in more ways than one, the princess and her boyfriend were arrested and then set free by Valya.) The Reverend Mother says that their destiny lies on this planet. The planet with all the dunes? You're joking. Maybe they'll find out more about the actual prophecy there too–the details from Dorotea's grandmother Raquella were pretty vague. Me personally? I would not go to Arrakis. It has worms and bad vibes! But I'm not a character on a Dune show, so fortunately, I will never have to make that decision.
It does feel significant that this little group of outlaw refugees is made up of a member of House Harknonnen, House Atreides, and House Corrino. It took Game of Thrones years to get that kind of teamwork between rival houses going. Ynez's half-brother Constantine, who is now an orphan, is on Arrakis at the end of the season too. He's in charge of the Royal Fleet. I'm not sure what they're going to try and accomplish when Dune: Prophecy returns for season 2, but the chess pieces are set.
