Book Club: Chapterhouse Dune (Part 7)

Summary

Gom Jabbar: Book Club – Chapterhouse Dune (Part 7)

Podcast: Gom Jabbar: A Dune Podcast
Episode Date: March 6, 2026
Hosts: Abu & Leo
Episode Focus: Deep-diving into Chapters 19–21 of Frank Herbert’s Chapterhouse Dune—examining character philosophies, thematic revelations, and the evolving crisis of the Bene Gesserit and the Honored Matres.

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Episode Overview

This episode of Gom Jabbar’s Book Club explores Chapters 19 to 21 of Chapterhouse Dune, dissecting pivotal moments for Odrade, Duncan, and Mirbella. The hosts discuss the increasing pressure on the Bene Gesserit, Odrade’s revelations about the Honored Matres’ psychology, and the mirrored flaws of both organizations as they confront extinction. Abu and Leo emphasize the episode’s meta-literary elements, where Herbert places the reader within the existential unease of his characters.

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Chapter Summaries

Chapter 19: Odrade’s Burdens (04:58–14:15)

• Setting: Odrade, Mother Superior of the Bene Gesserit, contemplates the Sisterhood’s dire predicament from her office and later in the orchards.
• Political Tension: The Bene Gesserit are fracturing; Odrade narrowly survives a vote of no-confidence largely due to her heretical leadership style (08:49).
  • Notable Quote:
    “One of the votes in support for Odrade came from the proctor Praska... And Odrade told her that it’s good to be alive.” – Abu (08:49)
• Discussion with Balanda: Large segments of the Sisterhood doubt Odrade. Balanda informs her of the failed coup and ongoing unrest.
• Desperation Plan: Odrade considers “Extremis Progressiva”—the Sisterhood’s last-resort plan, scattering their memories and abandoning their cohesiveness for survival (06:50).
  • Joke: “Pulling a real Oprah. Everyone look under your chairs. You've got my memories…” – Leo (07:08)
• Internal Realization: Odrade, reflecting on intel from Mirbella, recognizes that the Honored Matres are incapable of self-doubt or recognizing mistakes.
  • Notable Quote:
    “They aren’t capable of even considering that any actions they take are a mistake...” – Abu (12:27)
• Symbolism: Odrade’s musings on cows in the orchard highlight her new understanding of the Honored Matres (13:00–14:15).
  • Memorable Quote:
    “Eat your grass. It’s what you’re supposed to do... I have seen through the heart of our enemy this night, and I pity them.” – Odrade (paraphrased by Abu, 14:03)

Chapter 20: Duncan, Teg, and Mirbella—Lessons and Loss (14:15–31:36)

• Location: No-ship training room—Duncan undertakes Teg’s Gola awakening, observed by Mirbella.
• Duality: Duncan, himself a Gola, faces the existential discomfort of awakening another Gola for the first time (15:38–17:15).
  • Notable Quote:
    “It’s a level of simpatico between them that has never happened before.” – Leo (15:41)
• Manual Versus Instinct: Duncan is expected to follow the Bene Gesserit’s awakening protocol but deviates, sensing a better way due to his own experience (16:05–17:25).
• Philosophical Storytelling: Duncan tells Teg a story about a dog and clams, using it as allegory for their treatment by the Sisterhood (“We’re just dogs for the Bene Gesserit,” Leo, 17:26).
• Mirbella’s Transformation: Mirbella, once wild and violent, is slowly internalizing Bene Gesserit values and mourning her lost Honored Matre identity (20:51–23:09).
  • Notable Quote:
    “You can miss something without wanting it back.” – Leo quoting a singer-songwriter (21:53)
• Honored Matre Origins: Mirbella reveals that the Honored Matres' brutality was shaped by generations of subjugation, hinting at a culture born from enslavement (24:34–26:50).
  • Important Quote:
    “The slave makes an awful master.” – Mirbella, cited by Abu (24:53)
• Duncan’s Homework for Teg: Duncan assigns Teg work to foster memory recall, symbolically reinforcing ties to his old life (“put up a chewy sign in the kitchen. You know, home is where the heart is,” Abu, 28:31).
• Climactic Questioning: Duncan wonders aloud about new methods for awakening Golas (“I need to find a better way. There’s got to be a better way to do this.” – Leo, 30:15).

Chapter 21: Duncan’s Vision Intensifies (31:36–39:41)

• Vision of the Old Couple: Duncan now sees his recurring visions outside the usual setting; their face dancer-like qualities are more defined and unsettling (32:17–33:21).
  • Notable Quote:
    “These are not blurry half flashes... he is starting to see, like, fucking 4K into these visions now.” – Abu (33:12)
• Meta-References: Abu and Leo marvel at Herbert’s uncharacteristically detailed descriptions, highlighting the surreality of Duncan’s vision (32:20–33:12).
• Face Dancer Connection: Duncan intuits that the “old couple” are emblematic of the great enemy the Honored Matres fled in the Scattering (39:20–39:41).
  • Notable Quote:
    “He’s deduced that the two... face-dancer grandparents that he keeps seeing... are probably that great enemy...” – Abu (39:21)

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In-Depth Analysis & Takeaways

1. Psychological Core of the Honored Matres (42:29–47:33)

• Realization: Odrade concludes the Honored Matres act with impunity, unable to consider the possibility of error—an existential rigidity born from a history of trauma.
  • Memorable Quote:
    “Disregard consequences. It never happened.” – Odrade (44:36)
• Survival Mechanism: The Matres' “aspirational level of self-confidence” is less hubris and more survival instinct, learned from prior subjugation.
• Bestial Imagery: Their reactivity likens them to terrified, cornered animals—powerful, but brittle in the face of change.

2. Mirroring the Sisterhood: Shared Flaws (47:33–55:30)

• Bene Gesserit’s “Refined Arrogance”: Their success and subtlety have bred bureaucratic complacency, making them as inflexible as their enemies.
  • Meta-Comment:
    “Thousands and thousands of years of survival has created this institutional arrogance.” – Leo (52:02)
• Changing Times: Both groups are unable or unwilling to adapt rapidly in the face of unprecedented threats; their strategies, though once effective, now spell disaster.
  • Analogy:
    “We see that yes, they were cornered, they fought like hell to get out and they succeeded... But they are also now... looking down the barrel of the Honored Matres extinction.” – Leo (48:41)

3. The Leadership Dilemma (55:30–62:57)

• Odrade’s Impossible Role: Struggling between tradition and innovation, Odrade embodies the Bene Gesserit’s only hope for evolutionary survival.
  • Notable Reflection:
    “Do you throw all humanity... into an unknown tomorrow by your own singlehanded decisions?” – Leo (62:58)
• Emphasizing Impermanence: Both organizations are blinded by the assumption of their unending relevance—highlighted by the lack of an answer when asked, “What happens if the Bene Gesserit fails?” (61:58).

4. The Meta-Literary Experience (68:12–73:28)

• Herbert’s Immersion Strategy: The narrative’s circling thoughts and slow pace intentionally make readers experience Odrade’s (and the Sisterhood’s) inertia and anxiety.
  • Notable Quote:
    “Frank Herbert wants us to be in Odrade’s shoes—not just from a narrative standpoint, but emotionally.” – Abu (70:46)
• Balanda as Reader Surrogate: The character Balanda represents the impatient reader, demanding action and clarity, only to be left just as in the dark as Odrade.

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Notable Quotes & Moments

• On the Honored Matres:
  “No censure possible... You might just as well berate a cow for eating grass.” – Abu quoting Herbert (12:08)
• On Bene Gesserit Stagnation:
  “The Bene Gesserit... suffer from a more refined, more sophisticated—basically the same fucking attitude.” – Leo (51:18)
• Meta-Reflection:
  “It is a risk to say I’m going to annoy and bore the shit out of my reader... because my characters are feeling that.” – Abu (70:46)

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Timestamps for Key Segments

• Odrade’s Realization (about the enemy’s mindset): 12:22–13:11
• Mirbella on the Honored Matres’ origins: 24:32–26:57
• Duncan’s mind palace introspection: 34:49–37:40
• Meta-discussion—reader as Balanda: 68:12–73:28
• Spice Morsels Segment: 74:50–88:36

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Spice Morsels (74:50–88:36)

Les Majeste (75:08–83:24)

• Definition & Real-World Context: Treason, or even implied disrespect, to a sovereign. Modern Thailand enforces very harsh penalties for it.
• Dune Relevance: Duncan referencing it (“are we just dogs to them?”) slyly critiques both the Honored Matres and the Sisterhood’s fear-based hierarchies, risking “Les Majeste” against the Bene Gesserit itself.

Donnie and Marinette – The Blue Brandy of Caladan (83:32–88:36)

• Canonical Origin: Favorite drink of old Miles Teg—a blue brandy from Caladan.
• Speculation & Humor: The hosts imagine cosplay with blue brandy and uncover the word’s etymology, linking it to nautical French (marinette = “little sailor”).

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Conclusion & Homework

Summary: Abu and Leo underline the deeply introspective, almost paralyzingly reflective aura of these chapters—arguing that Herbert’s narrative style forces the reader into Odrade’s shoes, making us feel the gravity of leadership under existential threat. The flaws and failures of institutional thinking—be it violent or bureaucratic—are laid bare.

Next Episode Assignment:
– Read Chapters 22–24 (stop at “Get in tune. Don’t think, do it.”)
– Prepare to dig deeper as the pace is poised to accelerate and answers are (maybe) on the horizon.

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Final Thoughts

• Empathy for Odrade: The hosts urge readers to have patience with a leader in an impossibly fraught situation.
• Call to Action: Listen, reflect, and maybe mix yourself a blue brandy before tackling the next dense, philosophical stretch of Dune.

“There is no real ending. It’s just the place where you stop the recording. But this podcast is always one step beyond logic.” – Leo (92:08)

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For more, join the conversation at Gom Jabbar Patreon, merch store, and email. And remember: Whoever controls the podcast controls the universe. See you on the golden path!

Transcript

[A]

Shouldn't I trust Frank Herbert?

[B]

Within limits. You will learn and appreciate. For now. I warn you, sci fi authors work under a system of organized distrust. Have they taught you about democracy?

[A]

Yes, sir. That's where you vote for it.

[B]

That's where you distrust anyone with power over you. The patrons, Mickey Mouse. The patrons know it well. Oh, boy. Don't trust too much.

[A]

Then I should not trust you either.

[B]

It's becoming Mickey Mouse. The only trust you can place in me is that I will do my best to discuss Dune in depth at every opportunity.

[A]

Then I don't care how much it hurts. It just really became Mickey Mousman.

[B]

Oh, boy. Oh, boy. Dude.

[A]

Oh, my goodness. Young Miles Stag is just Mickey

[B]

canonically. That's crazy.

[A]

Foreign. Welcome to Gam Jabbar, your guide to the iconic world of Dune. We'll be exploring the themes, philosophies, and characters found in the sandy depths of this vast universe. From Frank Herbert's groundbreaking novels to the adaptations on film and tv. My name's Abu.

[B]

My name is Leo.

[A]

And Leah. We are back once again in the hot seat.

[B]

Oh, it's so hot. So it's scalding. It's actually not hot. I have this blanket. Yeah, I'm like a little granny. I'm, like, so bundled up. It's great. It's wonderful. But this book is hot and, oh, my God, this book is scorching hot. It's a scorcher. Yeah. Oh, my God, these were some dense chapters and nothing fucking happened. It was, like, so true. The literal opposite ends of, like, name the verbs that were enacted. No verbs. All just vibes thoughts, all vibes, philosophy.

[A]

But so much to talk about. Once again, such a dense and long script that I'm excited to work through. But before we get ahead of ourselves and dive into today's reading, let's knock out some housekeeping. Starting, of course, with our spoiler warning. Folks, you know the drill for these book club episodes. Today's discussion, we will contain no spoilers beyond the pages and books we've covered thus far in the podcast. So as long as you are caught up with the reading, you are good to listen today.

[B]

You are indeed, and as always, a huge shout out to our Kwisatz Haderach level patrons, Daniel Dion, Seth Redding, Greer, Brad Hutchins, Kevin Mohenram, and Roger Young. Oh, good Lord. Oh, I went for a walk the other night, fellas. Looking up at the stars, the snow crunching under my shoes, the trees swaying in the breeze. And I saw you all there, standing, chewing your Cud generously. Just that look of just benevolence in your eyes, all five of you.

[A]

That's what you're meant to do.

[B]

It was horrifying to find five people standing in the darkness when I was expecting to be alone. But listen, I appreciate you nevertheless. You're amazing. Thank you.

[A]

That's right. That's right. That's our way of saying thank you. And of course, our heartfelt thank yous extend to all of our patrons who, as far as we're concerned, can all be standing out under the starlight.

[B]

Join us chewing on some grass. It's cold, but we've got blankets.

[A]

We've got blankets. It's cozy up in here. Thank you all so much for truly supporting this show and helping build the foundation upon which we run this whole damn operation. Frankly, wouldn't be possible without you.

[B]

That's so true. So that out of the way, today's episode, let's go over the kind of what you can expect. This is a book club episode. Nothing should be too surprising. We are going to go with a summary of today's chapters. Then we'll dive into a takeaway, and finally, we'll wrap up with some yummy, yummy spice morsels. Both of which with a French kind of a. Like a French kind of approach to

[A]

their real butterfly, real deal butter, not that fake shit we have in the States here.

[B]

Yeah, real butter indeed. But before we get to that, real butter and all, let's take a quick break. When we're back, we're going to jump into our chapter summaries.

[A]

Welcome back, folks. Let's begin today by summarizing the assigned reading, starting with chapter 19. So our first chapter today rides along with O'. Draid. Ever heard of her greatest mother superior to ever grace the Bene Gesserit?

[B]

She's the best. She's so good, huh?

[A]

And this is. This is a riveting chapter, folks. You will never guess what Odrade is up to in these. In these pages.

[B]

I can't. Is she, like, in her office thinking?

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Oh, nailed it.

[A]

She, in fact, spends this whole chapter either in her office thinking or in the orchards walking around and mulling over the honored madre threat and what to do about it as leader of the Bene Gesserit sisterhood. And that's chapter 19. Okay, moving on. Chapter 20.

[B]

That's the summary of this.

[A]

Just kidding. Just kidding. There's so much to talk about in this chapter. As usual, it is chock full of some dense ideas from Frank Herbert. So in this Summary. Let's touch on some of the most important moments and call them out.

[B]

Let's do it.

[A]

So from the very top of this chapter, it is clear that Leo, things are looking grim. The outlook is not good for the sisterhood. Odrade's thoughts are racing as she mulls over the same questions over and over again. What to do about the honored matre, how to move, move against them, how to understand them, etc. Etc. And at one point, she even ponders whether it's time for the sisterhood to enter something called Extremis Progressiva.

[B]

Oh my gosh. Is that like an insurance policy?

[A]

That does sound like a great and expensive insurance policy.

[B]

Yeah, I can't afford that. That's out of my tax bracket for sure.

[A]

It's not an insurance policy. In fact, it is sort of the final gambit of the Sisterhood for survival. They would share their memories as far and wide as they could among the Reverend Mothers and then scatter, scatter across the universe in some last ditch effort to survive.

[B]

Pulling a real Oprah. Everyone look under your chairs. You've got my memories and you've got my memories and you get up, they'll go fuck out and leave.

[A]

That's right. That's right. Really last ditch stuff, you know, like this would be giving up on the sisterhood and just hoping someone out there makes it in the universe and survives. Yeah. That is where things are. It's bad, it's dark.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

While all of this is happening, Balanda, who's just like sitting across from Odrade staring at her.

[B]

Incredible.

[A]

Really incredible stuff. Balanda tells us that large portions of the sisterhood are beginning to question Odrade's leadership. And in fact, they've apparently just now taken a vote on whether or not to literally oust oh Jade from her position as Mother Superior. Wild stuff. All of this is happening off page, to be clear.

[B]

Yeah, like the most riveting season of like a political show. Completely off, off page.

[A]

We're just getting reports from Balandin to Emily on what's going on.

[B]

Comes in. It was one vote. Okay, show us. Show us the vote. Show us the room.

[A]

Crazy stuff is happening off page. But as you're saying, Leo o' Draid does manage to remain in power. Just barely. Barely ekes by with enough votes in support for her. And in fact, one of the votes is quite notable. One of the votes in support for o' Draid came from the proctor Praska, who you'll recall from the last book club episode was the Proctor that Odrade startled with the laughter as she walked by her in the hallway. And o' Draid told her that it's good to be alive.

[B]

Yeah. Like a moment where it was clear o' Draid was kind of just covering for being lost in her thoughts and being a little too. But even just that quick pivot, you know, And Valanda treats this moment like, did you literally laugh at a proctor? Like, and what the fuck are you doing?

[A]

People are worried about you, Odre.

[B]

People are questioning your sanity.

[A]

And.

[B]

And yet, and yet Praska was the tie breaking vote.

[A]

That's right.

[B]

And yet something about that moment reminded Praska of like, fuck, yeah, maybe it is good to be. Maybe that's the kind of leadership we need. Who just laughs sometimes, you know, just, yeah, why not?

[A]

We see some of that heresy bleed, you know, the trickle down effect of Odrade's heresy to the other sisters in the organization.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Maybe Praska is starting to believe a little bit about living life.

[B]

Like, yeah, just being in the fucking moment. Praska, like, whatever Praska was doing, gone. Because Praska's like, the Reverend Mother Superior is cackling to herself. Like, I'm, you know, there's an. There's definitely a sweet immediacy there. And I really, I love that moment. And I love that Frank brings that moment back and goes, look, Odrade is actually holding onto her seat of power through her heresy and through her heretical attitude.

[A]

Right. That.

[B]

That so upsets Balanda, representative of the careful plotting. We have to go to the archives to see what we do next and that sort of thing. It's so rich.

[A]

Yeah. It's a small detail, but an extremely important one for sure. Now, as the chapter continues, Balanda and Odrade return to the topic that is on everyone's mind. The Honored Matres, they discuss what potential strategic moves are at their disposal. What should they do? Should we attack the economic hub of Gamu? Maybe shut down the economy? Should we attack Junction? The Honored Matre really seem to be building a stronghold there. They discuss a number of different moves and strategies at play. And through this discussion, we learned that the Touj, if you'll recall her from last episode, the Touj has been sent off to set Odrade's trap for the Honored Matre. That crazy plan that they came up with from last episode, but we have yet to hear back. The TUJ has gone radio silent. And that, of course, is another reason for concern for the Mother Superior.

[B]

She's like, did I just send that dope woman to her death. I love her. Is she dead now because of me? It's possible.

[A]

I've been left on red and it's making me break out in a sweat.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Now, as we wind down this chapter, eventually Odrade retires from her office and goes to her sleeping chambers. But her thoughts are still broiling and she's basically unable to sleep. She imagines the Spider Queen. She continues to think about the Honored Madre, et cetera. We learn from this moment that Odrade's conversations with Mirbella actually have yielded a lot of very useful information about the Honored Madre. And Odrade is beginning to really piece together how their enemy thinks, what their enemy's worldview is. Spider Queen's people went beyond arrogance, far beyond. No censure possible. You might just as well berate a cow for eating grass. The cow would be justified in looking at you with its moonstruck eyes, inquiring, isn't this what I'm supposed to do? And quotes.

[B]

Good. Frank is having fun with this, and I love it. I love it so much.

[A]

Yeah. And it's in fact this line of thinking as Odrade is kind of weaving her way through these thoughts that lead Odrade to a huge realization. And we're going to talk much more in depth about this realization in our takeaway later in the episode. So let's put a pin in that discussion for now. But the gist of it is that she realizes that the Honored Maitre aren't capable of even considering that any actions they take are a mistake. They're incapable of conceiving of their own mistakes. Fundamentally, at their core, it's like an

[B]

aspirational level of self confidence. I'm like, I'll do something. Get top marks and be like, yeah, but it was probably fucked up somehow, I don't know.

[A]

Yeah, yeah. It's a level of narcissism that truly never been seen before. And of course, this revelation. Odrade was already never about to get any sleep here. This revelation kind of seals the deal. She jolts back up and is like, all right, fuck this, I'm not going to sleep. She has an assistant get make her like a 5 hour energy tea or something. She chugs that shit and goes out into the orchards in the middle of the night for a walk, a place that she often goes to think things over. It is a calming place for her to be. And so to wrap up this chapter, she comes across some cows in the orchard and speaks aloud to Them. She spoke aloud to the cattle clustered by the fence. Eat your grass. It's what you're supposed to do. If a spying watchdog chanced on that remark, Odrade knew she would have serious explaining to do. But I have seen through the heart of our enemy this night, and I pity them. End quote. That's where our chapter end, folks.

[B]

Frank's really firing on all cylinders. And I know this because I've read this before and I'm reading it again and still going. I know there's something that I'm missing and I'm so excited to get it. You know, like, he's clearly working with lots of layers. It's great. Well, that carries us into our second chapter. Second chapter today is chapter 20. We are with Duncan and Child Teg in the training room of the no ship. Duncan has begun his slow but steady preparation of TEG for his awakening process. This big question mark, it seems too early. All the mini Jesuit are saying it's too early. But odraid knows that time is against them. They need it now. They need Tag's mind now more than ever. Especially if they're going to go into the Spider Queen's lair on Junction. They need Tag's intel now. Throughout this chapter, Duncan's mind is split. He's thinking as much about the old Bashar, his teacher, this fatherly figure who looked so much like the old duke who woke him up, who. Who brought his memories back as much as he is also thinking about the child in front of him, seeing the kind of parallels also reflecting on the very weird quality of being a Gola awakening. Another Gola, which I think this is the first time we're ever seeing this.

[A]

Right? I don't think that has ever happened,

[B]

which is very cool. I think that's great. And for sure allows for a level of simpatico between them that has never happened before. Golos are always a project for some people. But Duncan's like, I know what this you're going to go through and it's going to hurt and it's going to be awful.

[A]

I know that mental and physical pain intimately in a way that no one else who would ever awaken you could tell you about. It's unique.

[B]

It's so unique, in fact, that while he is in many ways Mirbella is watching part of this process, she thinks she's like, he's following the manual somewhat. The Bene Gesserit manual on awakening of ghola's original memories, which is a fucking insane book title. Imagine you're Walking into someone's house, you see that on the shelf, you're like, on Awakening, a goal is memory. Why are you doing that often enough to have a book?

[A]

Wow.

[B]

Wow.

[A]

Should I check this out? Four stars on Goodreads.

[B]

That's shockingly well written considering the dry subject matter. And there's diagrams. Oh, those are not safe for work. Oh. So he is following that manual to, like, almost to a T until he isn't. And there are moments when he diverges from that. And. And there's this big question that Merbella has, but also that we have as the reader where we don't know why he's diverging from the sort of prescribed task. And maybe it's that he is also a ghola and understands that there is probably a better way to do this. I can't help but think about Leto II and Ganima looking at the way that the Bene Gesserit have been handling abomination and going, there's gotta be a better way to do this.

[A]

Ah, such a good point.

[B]

So we have this outsider who's going to. I get that this is how they know to do it. I think that they've overlooked something.

[A]

Great point.

[B]

Yeah. And as Curtis points out, he also shares a story about his dog who hates clams. A dog that he once had who hates clams because it's spit in the dog's face. And then he just ate a bunch of clams. He was so funny. It was great. And Tag understood the story and was like, so we're dogs. And he's like, yeah, yeah. Sorry to tell you, kid, we're just dogs for the Bene Gesserit. He's like, oh, boy. Oh, boy. So anyway, I thought that was a mouse. That was a mouse.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

The art style was always a little bit ambiguous. So Duncan's lessons are ranging from intellectual to physical. He's giving him ideas, but he's also showing him, like, fighting methods. Because the more in sync this child is with the old Bashar, in theory, I guess, the easier it'll be to break through that barrier and become the old Bashar. And it's during that story of the clam spit dog that Mirbella actually joins them. And Duncan shares that that story is as much for Mirbella as it is for Teg. Throughout this, we get this impression. I get this impression that Duncan doesn't like seeing Mirbella, this person that he's, like, bonded to sexually, fading into just another Bene Gesserit Reverend Mother. I think he sees some of the sort of stagnation within the sisterhood. And that like far away, removed, not present with him in this moment look on her face that she gets. And he has those thoughts, oh, that's what she's going to look like as a fully Reverend Mother. Interesting. I don't like it, you know, so I also, I think this lesson is also for her saying, you know, you might love your new sisterhood and you might be grateful to o' Draid for X, Y and Z. But keep in mind, we're all dogs. Even they're, they're, they're watchdogs to one another. We're all dogs. It's dogs all the way down. The whole universe is just dogs on dogs on dogs. Now Mirbella throughout this chapter is also lost in her thoughts. Right, right. By the way, this read through. I'm shocked at how steady and slow but also like consistent Mirbella's transformation is. Every time she appears on page, I feel like she's more a Reverend Mother, she's more Bene Gesserit. And it's weird to think of her as like the feral, wild, sex crazed, murderous person that she was in Heretics right now. She is nearly like a Lucilla or like a, like a Tamerlane or, you know, she is, she is very much like a Bene Gesserit character. It's kind of interesting. I wonder how much Frank's writing of her was. Was as careful as it seems.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

But she is grappling with the loss of her culture, the loss of what it was like to be an Honored Matre. Right. The thrill of being a part of this unstoppable force that no one could reckon with. And like short sighted, sure, but you got to fuck all the time. And you just had streams of boys that you're like, oh, I'd like a. Bring me another man. And then you just did. And then you could go kill some people and it was great. And now she's like learning history and she's all shacked up with this one guy and yeah, he's great at climbing rocks, but he's out here being like, we're all dogs. Like it's not, it's not the life she envisioned.

[A]

Right.

[B]

The young Honored Matre envision for herself.

[A]

Yeah, it's that sort of painful bit of self reflection that the Honored Matres seem capable of doing right. And I really appreciated that from Merbela's perspective here we got a bit of the grief that she's feeling about her former life. She wants to be a Bene Gesserit to be clear, she's not, like, pining to go back to being an honored Matre or anything, but that doesn't mean there isn't some sort of grief of the death of her old life there and still clearly lingering feelings. Like, there is a rush to always being on the winning team. Right. And now she no longer is, and she is grappling with that fact that she's still kind of has feelings about her past life and desires still aligned with that, but she is now recognizing the dangers in those desires in a way that many honored mantra are maybe never trained to do.

[B]

Yeah. I saw a singer songwriter tweet once. You can miss something without wanting it back.

[A]

And it's like, beautiful. Absolutely. Wow. That encapsulates it.

[B]

Beautiful. Or like, we long for the. The whimsy of our childhood, but. But the reality of, like, our ignorance and the way that we hurt people unintentionally and, like, they're like. Yeah, I think. I think it really is. She thinks about it, like, childhood. She's like, I've grown out of that stuff. I've matured away from those beliefs. I don't think I could do them now. But I also see this as, like, I hear from friends who have, like, lives as immigrants who join a country or join a community or they move. I'm about to move to France at some point. So, like, I will probably have much more to say about this in 10. But there's an element of, like, you do give up stuff in order to be a part of the new thing. And so she has given up stuff to be a part of the Bene Gesserit. And Duncan sees it more than anyone else. And it's not all good. Some of it is, like, yeah, maturing. But some of it's like falling into this dogma and falling into this way of seeing things. It's so fascinating. So she's. She's giving us a lot of that insight into her, into her mind. And in fact, she actually, in her thoughts, echoes some of what o' draid has been figuring out on her own, of course, helped by the breadcrumbs that Mirbella is giving her.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Quote, Honored Matres never contemplated defeat. Mirbella felt herself forced to it. She knew Honored Matres were sometimes slain by enemies. Those enemies always paid. It was the law. Whole planets blackened to get one offender. End quote. So, by the way, love that, because I think the end of heretics, where we find out that Teg, Super Teg, you know, decimates the oner Matre's forces. So they blacken and blast the planet with nukes. I have often thought about that, as that is a mark of what Teg did. But this is Mirbella telling us. No, no, no. This is what the Honored Matre do. They will glass a planet to kill one person. And that's how people know not to fuck with them.

[A]

Right?

[B]

So, like that. That's fascinating because it shifts the perspective on the end of heretics a little bit, right? This is not because of how scary Teg was. This is just by the book. They're like, oh, what's that? Oh, he killed. Okay, well, Glassville Planet. Yeah, that's on page three of the manual. So it's only a four page manual.

[A]

Oh, he embarrassed us. Well, we're incapable of losing.

[B]

So kill the whole planet. Nuke the planet. He might have talked to someone about it. Mirbella also reveals something new about the origins of the Honored Matre. And I found this so fascinating.

[A]

This is huge, folks.

[B]

This is you. Brace yourselves. You're not going to be able to buckle yourselves in. It's. It's 9:30pm On a Saturday. Make sure you're wearing a seatbelt. Quote. A terrible pride. It had grown out of being subjugated so many generations before they gained their own ascendancy. Mirbella had tried to convey this to oh, Jade, recounting from history taught by Honored Matres. The slave makes an awful master. Oh, trade said and quote.

[A]

Oh my.

[B]

What? Like, I. I think we had this idea. When you listen to Balanda and Tom, Elaine and you, you look at Shiana who's like, doing these like, sexual things and you talk about like the Honored Matre sexuality. It's talked about as this like slippery slope where you start by unleashing these sexual powers and then you slowly become an Honor Matre. And that is so clearly now just naivety and paranoia on behalf of those Bene Gesserit members. Because in fact, it seems like the Honored Matre have a history of being subjugated and enslaved. And at least based on what we've learned so far in the book, I think it's safe to say by maybe some sort of like new face dancer with their bread futar like killers and their, you know, this is like shaping this picture. They were subjugated and they broke out of that subjugation. And all they knew were violent ends to violent, violent, violent means to violent ends. Violence. Violence on violence. Dogs on dogs on dogs, you know. So this is fascinating. So, so, so interesting. I couldn't help but Notice the way Frank wrote it. History taught by the Honored Matres. How much of this is the storytelling and the theory crafting? How much of this is the Honored Matres going, oh, our. Our journey began when we overthrow those fucking idiots who thought we couldn't, you know, and that's our first victory, was the beginning of us. Maybe it's a much more complicated story than even Murbella does, but we don't have access to that because we have the lens of the historian obscuring the nuance of. Of the tale, you know? Yeah.

[A]

Oh, yeah. And I'm going to pull this one out of the hat.

[B]

Sure.

[A]

I think it's a little bit of column A, a little bit of column B. Oh, shit.

[B]

Mark your bingo.

[A]

And I'm sure there is truth. And. And in fact, I do believe that subjugate it. I. I don't think that is probably a totally falsified account of their history, but how they got to where they are now, I'm sure there's a bit of, like, lore and myth building there that they. That they have told themselves over the years that continues to reinforce their culture and their worldview. And so, yeah, I'm sure the story of the Honored Madre come up is much more nuanced and messy than even Murbella has ever been taught. But I do believe there's a grain of truth here in the fact that they were subjugated and ultimately fought their way out of it through violent means. And that has created the culture of the Honored Matre that we know now and the Honored Matre that Odrade has to face.

[B]

Yeah, yeah, I think you're right. And part of that is also like, oh, Draid doesn't push back. There isn't really that much more discourse on it. And generally that would be the thing where Frank would add in an epigraph or something to cue to us, hey, maybe this shouldn't be taken at face value. So I think you're right. I think there's truth to what she's saying. But in any case, the chapter ends as Duncan and Tag's training for the day wraps up. Duncan gives Teg homework. I wrote that and then was like, oh, it is literally. Okay. It's literally homework. Because what his homework is is to look at a picture of his home and to be like, that's my home. This is my home. I love it. It's my home. That's where I grew up. I love it. It's my home sweet home. Home sweet home.

[A]

Put up a chewy sign in the kitchen. You know, home is where the heart is.

[B]

Live, laugh, live. You know, it's the gola. It's the Gola sign.

[A]

It's the goal of version.

[B]

Live, laugh, die, live, live, die, live, Live, die, live is awesome. Yeah. So home sweet home. That's the goal. You know, it's wine o' clock somewhere. That's his. That's his homework. He has to look at this picture. And again, all of this is to narrow whatever psychological barriers. There are these kind of Gola barriers that are, like, mentally walling off all of his memories. Those have to be thinned. And how you do that is by aligning him with who Teg was and Tag's upbringing. We got some, like, interesting throwaway lines where they, like, have recreated Teg's childhood with, like, a surrogate brother. Like, oh, my God, what the fuck? Who's that actor? Like, who are they casting into these roles? That's an insane job. But in any case, the other thing that happens at the end of this chapter is Duncan clearly a little bit, I don't know, worked up. I got kind of an interesting energy from Duncan at the end of this chapter. He passes Mirbella. Merbella's noticing that he's, like, off course a little bit. She's like, oh, he's not really doing things the way that the handbook says to do things. He passes her and goes, I need to find a better way. There's got to be a better way to do this. Right? I need to talk to Shiana. We need to figure out a better way to do this.

[A]

What could that mean?

[B]

Yeah, it's like. Is it that he has this affection for the child? He. He has this camaraderie with this kid who is so valuable to him personally that he's trying to avoid the kind of horrors of his own awakening. Is it like, what. What is. What is it? And we don't know yet. We have to keep reading. And what does Shiana have to do with it? I was like, what the fuck, Shianna? Why? She's out in the desert fucking up sculptures.

[A]

Yeah, we haven't seen her since chapter two of this fucking book or something.

[B]

She's still in this book. Oh, shit.

[A]

I think she's going to come back in a big way because o' draid also in one of her passing thoughts, was like, I got to go talk to Shiana. I got to go out to the desert. I suspect Shiana's coming.

[B]

Shanna's team's calendar is, like, full tomorrow of, like, meeting with all these people. Belinda wants to talk. Belinda's like, I just want to stare at you for 30 minutes in silence. She's Belinda, please.

[A]

Ugh. The worst kinds of meetings. All right, let's wrap up our summary with a pretty short final chapter today. Chapter 21 is a small one where we are with Duncan once again, and he is knee deep in that vision of the old couple.

[B]

Old couple?

[A]

That crazy vision that he's been having.

[B]

Oh, my God.

[A]

And what's notable about this time is that this vision is taking place outside of the great hole. It's usually triggered when he goes in there. You know, like something about the hold. The combination of that, the energy in that room triggers it. The smell of spice. But this vision is happening outside that hold. So now it's starting to come to him more frequently. Is what I sensed here and coming on more stronger for him. We also get much more details about this vision this time around. Duncan, in fact, describes this old couple in great detail. What they look like, what they're wearing, what tools they have on their tool belts because they're standing in, like, a garden.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

It is incredibly detailed.

[B]

The most details Frank has ever been about anyone ever, about any character. You're telling me about the look in their eyes. I don't even know if half of your characters have eyes, Frank.

[A]

Right. What color are Duncan Idaho's eyes? Has Frank ever written that on the page?

[B]

He said almond shaped at one point and then he said cuck rule, like the sheep wool, like six times. That's it. And now he's like this woman, grandmotherly. She has a grandmotherly air. This guy wearing like this. He's like, car, short, cropped hair.

[A]

Yeah. We have such a detail. Like, if I was a better artist, I feel like I could confidently, accurately draw a photo of these two older folks that Duncan is seeing in his visions. A really detailed description of them, which I think is supposed to signal to us, the reader, that these visions are becoming very sharp.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

These are not like blurry half flashes that he's seeing. He is starting to see, like, fucking 4K into these visions now.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

And what he ultimately sort of deduces is that this elderly couple is giving face dancer vibes. It's not that they are face dancers for sure. It's that he is picking up on strong face dancer vibes from them. And it's at this moment that Murbella, who, if you'll recall, is now more Bene Gesserit than ever, walks into the room, sees him in this trance and Is like, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, babe,

[B]

my guy, you're sitting and sweating. Those are bad. That's a bad combination.

[A]

This is a bad look on the calm eyes. Balanda's gonna be shitting yourself watching you do this, thinking you're the Kwisatz Hatteraick shit. Yeah, yeah. So she, you know, she's kind of like, oh, my gosh, stop doing this. Don't do this. What's going on? Are you seeing that thing again? But Duncan is kind of over it. He's had enough of this, and he's clearly frustrated. He feels like the Benny Tlalaks have fucked with him, which we know they have fucked with many Golas over the years. And he is now like this weird amalgamation of every goal of Duncan Idaho

[B]

he's got all the fucking with accumulated.

[A]

So, yeah, so he's over it. He's like, no, Merbella, babe. I need to figure out what's going on. I need to turn inward.

[B]

And he does, Babe, take three steps back. I'm going into my mind palace. She's like, don't go into your mind palace. He's like, four steps back, babe.

[A]

Four steps.

[B]

This is going to be a real

[A]

trip into my palace. And that's what he does. He goes into his mind palace. He digs deeper into his memories. And we wanted to share. This is a bit of a long passage, but it is beautiful.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

And so we wanted to share it in full. This is what happens when Duncan dives deep into his mind palace. Basically, quote, faces, a succession of masks, different views of this person he called myself. Slightly imbalanced faces, hair sometimes gray, sometimes the jet caracal of his current life, sometimes humorous, sometimes grave, and seeking inward for wisdom to meet a new day. Somewhere in all of that lay a consciousness that observed and deliberated someone who made choices the Tleilaxu had tampered with. That Idaho felt his blood pumping hard and knew danger was present. This was what he was intended to experience, but not by the Tleilaxu. He had been born with it. This is what it means to be alive. No memory from his other lives. Nothing. The Tleilax who had done to him, none of that changed his deepest awareness. One wit. End quote.

[B]

Dude, wow. First, I just want to say that I think that there's this breakdown in a lot of meditative practices. And this is also where I think maybe Frank had learned a little bit. But in Buddhism, there's this idea of you start to question what your self image is, how immutable it is, how unchanging it is. And the idea of masks is so evocative. And the idea that a Gola even would look back on. On thousands of lives as Duncan Idaho and see them as different masks, but looking out from those. Those masks is the one who makes decisions. And that's just beautiful. I mean, it's like such an interesting marriage of like, of real philosophy. But also this is what it means to be alive, is to make those choices, to live with that danger. And yeah, maybe the Tleilax who fucked with him, but they cannot fuck with, like, the deepest part of him. And I was definitely getting, like, Sea Child vibes here where even, like, o' Draid is going. The deepest penetrating gaze of the proctors had no way of discerning that she had this inner core of Sea Child, who unchanged even after her many eras.

[A]

Such a great analogy.

[B]

And so I'm like, oh, maybe this is Duncan's kind of Sea Child. Maybe Sea Child is an apt analogy for Gola, for serial lives or just being present in the moment. It's that choosing. You're choosing something in that moment and no longer all caught up in what mask am I wearing at any given moment? I don't know. It's so beautiful. I'm like, this is a sci Fi book. And yet the thoughts I have after reading are often very in line with like, oh, I've just read a book on philosophy.

[A]

I couldn't agree more. And I think the Sea Child comparison, Leo, is brilliant. I think you're spot on with that. And I definitely can see that at play here, that Duncan is getting in touch with what o' Draid would call her own inner Sea Child. And he is now getting in touch with that here C. Duncan or something. All right, let's wrap up this chapter and today's summaries. This chapter, chapter 21 ends as Duncan comes back out of his mind palace. And he's like, babe, you can take four steps forward again, babe, and let's talk. And in fact, he directs. He's talking to Mirbela, but he directs his comments at the Kamas. He knows who's always watching and listening. And he basically hints at the revelation that he's come across at this point. He's deduced that the two quote unquote, face dancer grandparents that he keeps seeing in these visions now are probably that great enemy that the honored matre have been running from. They are the jury that condemned the Honored Madre and forced them to run from that unknown universe out there in the scattering and return here. To the old imperium. And that's huge. That is a huge dot to connect that. I don't think anyone in the sisterhood has yet to connect.

[B]

Yeah, Dortugla, the Touj, as we call her affectionately, was talking about these people, the handlers of the Futars, being face dancer, like, having the vibes, but none of the markers.

[A]

Right.

[B]

So I. I feel pretty comfortable saying that, like, maybe these are the same sorts of people. I mean, I don't imagine the standard handler has this sort of like space and time bending, godlike ability to peer into Duncan's room with their silvery pokeball that shrieks at Duncan, you know, like, it's a very weird moment. And I. I do get the impression that these two are in a different league, but, man, we are really. Again, Frank is scratching the unknown in such an interesting way. Six books into this series where we are so comfortable with things like Golas, we're like, yeah, golas, whatever. Chair dogs. We're getting used to them a little bit. But then you have, like, yeah, anything. All of the details from the scattering are all so bizarre. It's. It's. It's great. I love it.

[A]

Yeah. All right, well, that wraps up our chapter summaries for today's assigned reading. Chapters 19, 20, and 21. Folks, let's take a quick breather, but don't go anywhere. When we come back, we're going to dive into our takeaway and talk about this huge, huge revelation that o' draid has about the honor madre. We'll see you in a minute. Two good and coffee creamers are made with farm fresh cream, real milk, and contain 3 grams of sugar per serving. That's 4 40% less than the 5 grams per serving in leading traditional coffee creamers for a rich, delicious experience. Whether you enjoy your coffee hot, cold,

[B]

bold, or frothy, two good coffee creamers make every sip a good one. Two good coffee creamers. Real goodness in every sip. Find them at your local Kroger in the creamer aisle.

[A]

Close your eyes, exhale, Feel your body relax, and let go of whatever you're carrying today. Well, I'm letting go of the worry that I wouldn't get my new contacts

[B]

time for this class.

[A]

I got them delivered free from 1-800-contacts. Oh, my gosh, they're so fast.

[B]

And breathe.

[A]

Oh, sorry. I almost couldn't breathe when I saw the discount they gave me on my first order. Oh, sorry. Namaste. Visit 1-800-contacts.com today to save on your first order.

[B]

1-800-contacts. Welcome back, everybody. Oh, I hope you enjoyed your break. Let's get into our takeaway today and our takeaway looks at. Oh Trade. Poor, poor Odrade. Such an unenviable position.

[A]

Right, girl, get some sleep.

[B]

Get some sleep, Odrade. Stop chugging the five hour energies. So throughout this book, right, we've talked at length about how Frank is using the Honored Matre as this sort of mirror that he's holding up to the Bene Gesserit. And that in many ways kind of justifies their almost comedic brutality and evilness, like they are comic book villains. But that becomes kind of a poignant thing to think about when it is also clear that they are so similar to the Bene Gesserit in so many ways. I will admit that at this point, because we've talked about it a few times, it starts to feel heavy handed. I'm like, all right, Frank, we fucking get it. Frank. I say that having fully missed it the first time I read the book. But nevertheless, today we wanted to take some of these new details that have come up in today's chapters and look at a new angle of all of this, especially in the light of oh Trade's revelation and what got her out into the field with the cows, right?

[A]

Yeah, definitely. And I think it's multifaceted, like, yes, the Honored Matre hold a mirror to the Bene Gesserit. That's the broad stroke of this whole book. That could be our takeaway every single episode, basically. But there's always reasons to revisit because within that takeaway there's just all these really, really important details. And I think today there's a number of details from Madrad's revelation that are worth touching on.

[B]

Yeah, agreed.

[A]

So let's start with Odrade's revelation here. From her thoughts, we get this incisive observation about the Honored Matre from her a right to rule. It did appear to O'Drade that these women insisted on such a right. No, they assumed that their rightness must never be questioned. Never. No. Decision's wrong. Disregard consequences. It never happened.

[B]

It never happened.

[A]

End quote.

[B]

That's crazy.

[A]

It's crazy.

[B]

I'm like this. Disregard consequences. You have to. Sometimes if you're about to do something, you just have to go, yeah, whatever happens, happens. Like, I just got to do it. Yeah, it never happens. Fucking insane.

[A]

Wild. Right now, of course, this is the train of thought as we talked about in our chapter summary earlier. This is the train of thought that jolts her out of bed, gets her chugging that monster energy tea and leads to the realization that the Honored Matre are unable to even conceive of making mistakes. They simply cannot and will not accept that they are capable at all of making mistakes. And what I found especially interesting is the fact that this revelation is paired with Mirbela's thoughts in chapter 20, where she talks about the subjugation of the Honored Matre. Because for me, that really clicks two pieces of the puzzle into place. The Honored Madre are this way. They are aggressive and reactive and incapable of believing themselves of making a mistake because that is how they survived. That is the source of their come up out of their subjugation.

[B]

Right? Right.

[A]

That's, to me, is very clear from Rubella's thoughts. And what's interesting is that Odrade realizes that despite this dominating position the Under Matres have in the old Imperium, right? They are just sweeping this galaxy.

[B]

Left, Gone. Gone. Arrakis, Gone.

[A]

Junction your Spacing Guild. Fuck them. We blew them up. It's our planet.

[B]

We are there now. This is my throne.

[A]

They're dominating on. On paper, they're dominating, right? They're. They're putting up numbers, right? But when you look deeper and when you have this realization that Odrade has, you come to realize that the Honored Matre are using violence and being reactive and aggressive in the same way that a cornered animal might. A cornered animal that is driven at its core by terror and instinct. And it's because of this, like, fear driven rigidity that they have within their sisterhood that the Honored Matre are unable to change or evolve. This is their mo. This is their culture. They're so steeped in it that they can't escape it. This is just what they know how to do. Damn the consequences, right? Disregard the consequences. It never happened. That's how they survived out there in the scattering. And that's what they're doing here in the old Imperium. That's a pretty huge revelation for a Dre to realize that this group at its core is terrified of something and driven almost entirely by that terror.

[B]

But it's completely unconscious. Because even the notion of fear implicitly contains the possibility of not getting away. And at this point, it's all unconscious. They've just fallen into this trap. But I love what you're saying too, because, yes, being. You know, I think we even got multiple lines about a cornered animal. And life, when threatened, finds a way to revitalize, you know, the trees. The harvest of the fruit trees was even more ripe because the Desert is growing. All of these different analogies come together in this book and in the previous book where we see that yes, they were cornered, they fought like hell to get out and they succeeded and they are now very, very powerful. But they are also in now in the Imperium. Dama's looking down the barrel of the honored Matres extinction. It's a ways off, but she still sees, she sees a need for the Bene Gesserit science and she can't recolor the animalistic instinct.

[A]

Right.

[B]

And it's this over commitment to an old strategy that did get you far, but now needs to pivot and now needs to say we now need to be more subtle and be more long term thinking and think beyond just the immediate now because we're not cornered anymore. We're no longer in that disadvantaged position. At least not at this exact moment. Maybe when they go back to the scattering and they're packed with the fucking amphibious slaves and the sentient tree houses and the fucking whistle ball pokeball face dancers. Yeah, that's gonna suck. But like, you know, you'll get there tomorrow. Like you don't have to worry about that today.

[A]

Yeah. And that change, that evolution, it's not easy, right? Nobody's saying it's easy. It's painful and messy and chaotic.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

But Dhamma is out here trying and clearly o' Draid is out here doing much the same for the sisterhood.

[B]

I was going to say, like, how often in our own lives do we do something and find something that like works for us and then we carry that a little bit too far and we just do it for too long or we're like, oh man, I'm the dude. Like, I think I like really liked anime when I was in middle school and like in elementary school and everyone else did too. And I was like, yeah, I'm gonna make my whole personality anime. And it worked. I had a bunch of friends who liked anime. And then I dyed my hair a bunch of fun colors. And my friends were the sorts of people to be like, oh, this guy's so fucking cool. And then I had my hair shoulder length black because I wanted to be Japanese when I went into high school. And go fucking figure, I wasn't like, I didn't benefit from some like, you know, having friends like being cool. And I like, that is a, that is like a microcosm example of you do a thing and it works and it's really hard to let go of. But there is a better solution.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Even if you know Whatever the thing is, right, and then I became a voice actor is also true. So it all works out, folks. Lean into anime. It'll teach you the way.

[A]

Nani na na na na.

[B]

Do not tempt me. All of this of course leads us to the most obvious comparison and the one that we've been making. This whole book club series, which is the same that we're talking about, can be said for the Bene Gesserit. These last two books and of course the entire history of the Bene Gesserit. It Odrade, through inspecting and thinking about the Honored Matre is being forced to confront the idea that the Bene Gesserit suffer from a more refined, more sophisticated. Basically the same fucking attitude.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Like yes, they survived in the shadows. They, they manipulated, they pulled strings. Everyone's a puppet. Everyone's someone to be manipulated and controlled. And that worked for so long. Being subtle, moving slowly, being careful. And now that they're being faced with a catastrophic cataclysmic threat, they are unable to shake their slow moving bureaucratic ways and they are looking down the barrel of their own extinction. It's insane. They assume time after time Blonda's out here going whoa, whoa, whoa, before we get too far into this conversation, let me pull up the archives. Let me just. Whoa, before you do anything, we should

[A]

have one more meeting about this.

[B]

Maybe one more schedule another one to one touch base before we get to the. Let's have a meeting about which meetings we need this month because I'm getting a little confused. It's fucking crazy because also we are hearing from Odrade any minute now, no ships might appear in the sky and the Benny judge done.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

And Blonda's like we shouldn't be doing things too hastily. And o' draid's like what, you want us to rush Belanda? What the fuck do you like? It's an insane. I don't know that like thousands and thousands of years of survival from the Bene Gesserit and relative success for the Bene Gesserit has created this institutional arrogance in the Sisterhood. It's not in the same brutal terms as the Honor Matre. It never happened. We've never fucked up, but it kind of is. And now they also assume that there are long term planning like can't fail. They can't even picture a universe in which they've gone extinct. And of course, how could they? They have 300 follow up plans that span the next 600,000 years. But at the end of the day, they are still Losing a war and things are not going their way. And we are watching their old strategy fail.

[A]

Right.

[B]

Like another piece of this, I think, is. Is right now, the Bene Gesserit are relying on a few factors that are unprecedented. Right. Shiana, who can control the worms. Duncan, who's maybe Gola of thousands of Golas. Never happened before. Tag, who was Sonic the Hedgehog when he died. And six, eight. So hungry and is now a child. And Mirbela, an Honored Matre, becoming a Bene Gesserit. Wow. And a heretical Reverend Mother Superior who was only made that because their Reverend Mother Superior was fucking murdered in the middle of. It's like this is a time of unparalleled, unprecedented things.

[A]

Yes.

[B]

And most of who I'm talking about, Tag, Duncan, Mirbela, even Shiana to a degree, because they're not exactly sure still what her vibe is. These are all massive unanswered questions, and yet they are like the cornerstones of the plans for how to get out of their current situation. And they don't fully understand them. And I'd like to point out that Tag and Duncan Blonda keeps suggesting they kill them. She's like, christ, I don't. They confuse me. They're weird. I don't. Oh, they make me uncomfortable. Kill them.

[A]

Kill the Gola.

[B]

Kill the goal.

[A]

I'll put a meeting on your calendar for tomorrow. I'll talk about it.

[B]

I'll put it on the. I'll put a meeting on the meeting for the. We'll talk about talking about it tomorrow. It's fucking crazy because, again, like, oh, J recognizes how important these people are. She's giving Duncan unparalleled access to information. She's using them as her mentat. She understands that these unanswered questions might be the key to the survival tomorrow. But, like, God, it's fascinating to watch the bureaucracy. I get the same feeling as when I was watching Chernobyl, where you're watching people who know that something needs to be done, but no one wants to do it, and Odrade's the only one doing anything. And even Odrade is, like, not really sure what she's supposed to do. It's fascinating to me.

[A]

It's fascinating stuff. And again, such a mirror to the Honored Matre's inability to also change in the face of an unprecedented universe and an unprecedented enemy.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

The Honored Madre might have overcome whoever subjugated them out in the Scattering, but now they're facing off against the Sisterhood, someone they've never faced off against. And it's all new and uncharted territory for them as well. And yet they're unable to evolve. And I think what's also interesting here is that even if, say, the Bene Gesserit were right all the time and had just figured everything out in the universe, they haven't figured out everything from the scattering.

[B]

They're right.

[A]

They're coming across details like sentient trees. And then amphibian slaves, literal futars, cat people. All of this is Cats on Broadway. New stuff. Yeah.

[B]

Storming the stage. And they're like, literally, we're gonna use the tried and true method of manipulating them from the shadows. It's like, that's not going to work.

[A]

It's just not going to work anymore. And what this is forcing the sisterhood to do, and o' draid recognizes this certainly, is that it's forcing them to a breaking point, to an omtal like breaking point, where it's will you break and die, or will you evolve, change, adapt and get past this barrier? They are at that barrier at this point. And in this chapter, before this revelation about the Honored Matre, Odrade even thinks about Leto, too, and how Leto too recognized that the megalomania, this seizing of power, was dangerous. Quote, Leto too, at least had known what the Bene Gesserit knew how to balance on the point of the sword, aware that you would be mortally cut when you slid from that position. The price you pay for seizing such power, Honored Madres ignored this inevitable fate. End quote.

[B]

Dude.

[A]

And the key word there, as far as I see it, is power. This seizing of power. We have talked a couple of times now over the book clubs about how wielding this overt power, this blunt weapon of power in the way that the Honored Matres do, will inevitably lead to their downfall. They will be washed in a sea of their own blood. And even in the last episode, we talked about how Lucilla told Dama, yo, this just leads the way you're ruling, leads to rebellion and stagnation. Like, that is just the slippery slope you're on.

[B]

And also now we know even the Honored Matre are probably a byproduct of that oppression of the thing. Lucilla's going very slope. Hey, you know, this is like a byproduct of that. And they're like, yeah, we are. Joke's on you. We should have learned this lesson from the get go.

[A]

But they did it.

[B]

But they didn't. It didn't happen.

[A]

And of course, we've talked over the course of the podcast about how The Bene Gesserit have intentionally stayed within the shadows, have never sat on the literal throne itself for this very reason. They don't want overt power because they don't want to face rebellion and stagnation. They have learned that lesson. And yet I think the added nuance here that books 5 and 6 present to us is that they still seek power. It is just a subtle, nuanced, delicate form of power from the shadows, but it is power nonetheless. And so you are still balancing on the point of the sword.

[B]

And I ask you, by what right and the Bene Gesserit. It did not appear to me that the Bene Gesserit insisted on such a right. Just say, oh, Jade. Just saying. It's the same fucking thing. I also wanted to point out, you brought up Emtarol. I love that comparison. And I want to point out that amtal roll or rule, either way, I've heard it said both ways, was one of the epigraphs of today's chapters. It was right, the Amtor rule, to know a thing well, know its limits. Only when pushed beyond its tolerances will true nature be seen. And we're seeing that happen with the Bene Gesserit now. But then the Bene Gesserit commentary is do not depend only on theory if your life is at stake. And it's like. But also the theory is important in this case because it seems like you're getting pushed to the breaking point and you're just going to die. Is that the solution?

[A]

Yeah. The Bene Gesserit comment, that epigraph stood out to me as well because I was like, yo, the Bene Gesserit commentary is off here. This reeks of arrogance. Yeah, they're kind of shitting on the Omtar rule, not realizing that they are at the. They're facing their own Amtal rule right now.

[B]

And also it's like in the face of, you know, we talk about Amtal role being this, like, it's on primitive planets. It's how it's characterized as a concept, definitely, but it fucking works. And the Benedict and like the Fremen lived a stable, good life with that concept in mind. And it was brutal, for sure. There were brutality. You know, the idea that Jamis has to give up his life to die to an off world or just to prove the off world got hops or whatever, like, that sucks. But like also works, you know. And ultimately, like, the Fremen had like really a kind of good thing going until fucking Paul wanted some increased Jordan. So it's right. Which is, of course, a Betty Jesuit fucking thing that they did from the shadows.

[A]

Yeah. It's a wielding of power and, you know, like, zooming out. This is Frank Herbert commenting on power of any kind. Right, Right. You are always balancing on that knife's edge. If you are somebody who seeks out and wields power of any kind, whether overt, like the Honored Matre, or subtle, like the Bene Gesserit. And this is a realization that o' Draid is coming to here as well. And that naturally sort of begs the question, huh? What happens when you slip on that sword? How do you get cut?

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

And what's interesting is, so far, we've not been presented with an answer when that happens to the Bene Gesserit. Duncan very directly asks Merbella, what happens if the Bene Gesserit fails?

[B]

Oh, my God.

[A]

And she's got nothing. She doesn't have a response to that question.

[B]

Yeah. So here we have. Oh, trade. We say, what happens if you fail? And it's like, well, that's not even on the table. We don't know.

[A]

We've never considered it.

[B]

We never considered it. Ohrade is now really balancing between her sort of own heretical tendency and her desire to break free of old molds. Old Bene Gesserit molds, to do the new thing, to embrace the mystery of tomorrow, to kind of follow in the footsteps of the tyrant. I get the impression she was really moved and changed fundamentally, being shown the message at Daris Ballad. And that carries her forward. I think that's also part of Leto's plan, ultimately, when it comes down to it. But she has to. Her role here is impossible. She has to either adhere to the kind of good old. You know, they're entering into a fucking strategy that has a name and it's in Latin. What is it? Extremis progressiva. Progressiva. The insurance policy.

[A]

You're in good hands.

[B]

From Geico, you know, save 15% on the insurance. Progressiva. So this is again, to the bureaucracy. It evolved. They've given it a label. They're like, oh, yeah, are we going to initiate this big red button that we've, like, programmed and spent all this time thinking about? And it's like. Or just do something new. And that's her two choices, right? It's. It's stick with the old, do the thing that's been working for thousands and thousands of years but is now very obviously not working, or do something new. Take a chance, act in the chaotic present and launch the order. The Bene Gesserit and in many ways the only hope for humanity. Because if the Bene Gesserit don't do anything, the Honored Matre are very likely going to drag humanity down with them. Now, it is worth kind of considering the possibility that like, there are enough people out there in the scattering that humanity broadly is safe, the Golden Path is intact. But this old Imperium, that doesn't mean the old Imperium has no value. And we're talking about trillions of lives. So it's like she is making a decision for trillions of lives, right? And it is. And again, it's like, do you then throw humanity, all trillions and trillions of humans into an unknown tomorrow by your own single handed decisions? It's insane. And both paths, to be clear, risk annihilation. There is no historical precedent that she can lean on. She can't look back and go, oh yeah, we know that this is going to happen. And the fucking twist of it all is that she has prescience. She has some prescience, but she also knows not to use it. She's learned that lesson from Paul and from Leto too. Quote, I could lock our future into unchanging form. Muad'dib and his tyrant son did that. And the tyrant spent 3,500 years extricating us. End quote. So her Sea Child and her heresy, it does put her at like an advantaged position in this case. I do think that she is like exactly the right person to steer the Bene Gesserit at this moment. But also among all of this, she's cognizant of her Atreides lineage. We got this fascinating quote today about the Atreides. Atreidesian. Atreidesian gesture. Yeah, the idea of like the grand gestures where you become a story for all time. Paul's grandfather dying on the horns of a Seleucin bull to thousands of cheering and then screaming onlookers. It's like, what an insane thing. And people still talk about it thousands and thousands of years later. Is she going to be like those other Atreides people, like Paul who fucking walked into the desert, just disappeared a God into the sand, and then later came back alive and then got beaten to death by priests? Or like Leto, you know, who was literally a God shot from a bridge and then exploded into a pile of fish, you know, like, what is she gonna do? You know, is she going to do something right? Is she going to launch humanity into this unknown tomorrow for it only to turn out that she was writing a Good story. Being a fun character in a cool story. There's a Tradesian gesture only to doom humanity and nothing else. Is that the instinct? Is that the pull? It's a weakness. Duncan says she's cognizant of herself as an Atreides. She wrote the Atreides Manifesto, after all. She's also uniquely human. I wanted to point this out. She talks. I think o', Draid, more than almost any other Bene Gesserit character that we meet in this book and in the previous, is so present. And she loves the Van Gogh painting. She comments on the overcooked quality of her food. She is recognizing the immediate now. And she's whistling. She sings to herself. She likes music. She likes poetry. She. She loves and doesn't let that get beaten out of her by Bene Gesserit teachings, which also makes her more aware of what's at stake. Someone like Balanda could push a button to doom a trillion people or whatever. Because Balanda's thinking in archives and terms and strategy and chess pieces and all of that. I think o' Draid thinks about all the human stories and the life and the mystery. She has pity even for the Honored Matre. But nevertheless, it is important that she do something. She has to do something. And we see her as she walks out among the cows. You know, Blonda is about to figure out whatever her plan is. She, you know, she says, blonda is going to know by morning what I'm planning to do. So here we are with the cows under the starlight, enjoying the frost of the night.

[A]

Yeah. All right. That's the main thrust of our takeaway and the ideas we wanted to explore about Uhdrade's revelation and what it tells us about the Honored Madre, but almost more importantly, what it tells us about the sisterhood and how similar these two groups are in their arrogance and their inability to change out of the rigid forms that they've been stuck in for thousands of years.

[B]

Right, Right.

[A]

As a final note, we did want to talk very briefly about sort of the meta nature of these chapters. I think it is a fair critique on a first read of this book to go, wow, there's a lot of Odrade just standing around thinking, that is true on a level, on a surface level. Much of this book is exactly that. And so Drade walking, sitting and thinking, doing lots and lots and lots of thinking. And we are tapped into many of her frankly circling thoughts. Right. She's thinking about the same things over and over again as well. So we are also reading about the same things over and over again. That can be frustrating. On initial read, and truthfully, on my first read of this book, I found that incredibly boring because I read it at a surface plot level.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

You know, I listened to the audiobook and found myself often falling asleep during these chapters because just like a whole lot of nothing was happening. But of course, as we're talking about today, as we dig deeper, there is nuance and depth to these thoughts. And as we've discussed, we talked about this a lot in Heretics. Frank, especially in these latter two books, seems to be really putting us in the shoes of the character, forcing us, the reader, to almost feel exactly what the characters are feeling in these moments as well. And so what Odrade is feeling, the anxious, spiraling thoughts, that's us reading the same thing over and over again. What Odrade is feeling, the decision paralysis. What do I do? Do I do A, B, C, D? What are my options? We keep reading about that as well, but we haven't yet made a decision. We're still circling it, the drain in this book. What Odrade is feeling in the bureaucracy of the Bene Gesserit. These God damn meetings with Balanda, that's us, the reader as well.

[B]

We're in these God damn chapters with

[A]

Belanda over and over and over, and she's looking at us.

[B]

Truly, every time Balanda's name shows up on the page, I go, oh, God, Exactly.

[A]

And what's kind of the stroke of brilliance there and the subtlety is that is exactly what o' Draid is feeling and what Frank wants us to feel. Frank Herbert wants us to be in Odrade's shoes. Not just from a narrative standpoint, but emotionally. Yeah. And that's going out on a limb, right? It is a risk to say I'm going to annoy and bore the shit out of my reader because my characters are feeling that, Right?

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

But it's pretty clear at this point in these latter two books that that is intentionally what Frank is doing. For example, we talked earlier speaking of Bene Gesserit bureaucracy in Balanda. Remember that vote that we took no part of? Because we were not part of that vote. O' Draid was not part of that book. We are in Odrade's mind, in Odrade's feelings. We were never going to be part of that vote. We were never going to read about that. That is not what Odrade is feeling. Those are just reports that she is getting. So we, the reader, also simply get those reports. From Balanda and Tamily. Yeah, it's all very intentional here.

[B]

I also, another example that came up just occurred to me. We talk about the weird 4K definition of the. The farmer couple.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

It is so weird to get that much detail about people in Frank Herbert's writings.

[A]

Yep.

[B]

What a way to give us the visceral feeling of weirdness that Duncan has looking at these two fucking farmers with their pokeball approaching him in his like mind palace. Like. It is exactly that. It is like when we talked to Alt Shift X about the weirdness of the Tleilaxu chapter or the unknownness of the scattering. It is these little moments where Frank goes, I'm going to give you way too much detail and you're going to feel off put because I've never told you about someone's eye color before. Or they're like the close cut hair and too many details about a person suddenly and it starts to really feel like, ew, who's writing this? This is so weird. Yeah, yeah. That's the point. It's a very surreal moment.

[A]

It is.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

And I really like this last point you made here about this idea that Frank putting us in the shoes of these characters. It's pretty clear that Balanda seems to be the substitute for the reader here.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Frank is using Balanda as a substitute for what perhaps the frustrated reader on their first read of this book might be feeling.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Because literally in this chapter, the Landa is sitting across from Odrade watching her think, waiting for her to do something, anything.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

And perhaps like Belinda, we, the reader are also finally, in piecemeal fashion, bit by bit by bit, starting to put together Odrade's plan.

[B]

Yeah. Yeah.

[A]

And folks, maybe by morning we'll have it all figured out.

[B]

I do. I like that idea of Frank knowing that he's given enough that maybe you can start to figure it out. And then him deciding to write Balanda will have it figured out by morning.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

It's so much fun if you think

[A]

of Balanda as the reader.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

That's exciting foreshadowing because it feels like we're going to figure this out, baby.

[B]

Also, knowing the pacing of Frank's books, I feel like we're about to hit this fucking gas pedal. But yeah. Oh my God. So three incredible chapters where almost nothing happened. We were told about things that happened off page and nothing happened on page. And it was still deeply thrilling with so much to talk about and a takeaway to kind of get your thoughts spinning. That's right around Odrade and have some sympathy for our girl again. I still see people complaining about this book online. Give a fucking girl a break. O' Draid's got so much on her plate she can't make a decision. Truly have some empathy. We are going to take one last break, but don't go anywhere. Dear listener, we've got some kind of French inspired spice morsels for you right after this.

[A]

Welcome back, folks. Let's wrap up today's episode by chomping down on some delicious French inspired cuisine in our spice morsels today. So first morsel today is Les Majeste. I don't know if I'm saying that right, but I'm going to put a little bit fake bad French accent on it.

[B]

That's great.

[A]

So during Duncan's story about the dog, we get this passage when Teg asks if all they are are just dogs to the Bene Gesserit, are we just dogs to them? Quote, in a way. Never forget it. When you get back to your rooms, look up Les Majeste. It helps place our relationship in to our masters. End quote.

[B]

So obviously we're going to do everything

[A]

Duncan tells us to do when we go back to our rooms. We looked up the term. So here's what we learned. I did not know this term before today, and maybe you, dear listener, will learn something today as well.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Les majesty is defined by Merriam Webster as, quote, a crime such as treason committed against a sovereign power, or alternatively, it's defined as an offense violating the dignity of a ruler as the representative of a sovereign power. End quote. And Merriam Webster goes on to explain the history of the term as well. Les Majest came into English by way of Middle French, from Latin laisse majestus, which literally means injured majesty. End quote.

[B]

So dramatic.

[A]

I love it. So put simply, and put another way, les majesty is pretty all encompassing. It includes anything that one might do to diminish a ruler's dignity. It's almost more of an attitude rather than an action. It's not just a treasonous action act that you commit. You could commit lace majesty simply by just implying that a leader is flawed or fallible. It's a pretty broad and encompassing term.

[B]

I saw it distinguish that like treason's an action that you do. Les Majeste is something that you could just say. You could just say something, not even follow it up with an action. No, like measurable harm is done. Yet you have suggested that the king sucks.

[A]

That's right. Like there you've committed the crime, you've committed les Majesty. So this sent me down a bit of a research rabbit hole and I wanted to share a very quick, not so fun fact that I found. Thailand has one of the world's strictest Les Majesty laws, which was enacted by the military backed government to protect the monarchy's reputation. The military basically had a coup and took over the government back in like the early 2000 and tens. And I was reading a BBC article on this and this is how the BBC explains it. Quote, Article 112 of Thailand's criminal code says, anyone who defames, insults or threatens the king, the queen, the heir, apparently, or the regent will be punished with a jail term between three and 15 years.

[B]

Three is the minimum. That's crazy.

[A]

However, there is no definition of what constitutes an insult to the monarchy and critics say this gives the authorities leeway to interpret the law in a very broad way. End quote. And the article goes on to detail, for example, how this law has been used to prosecute people for things as innocuous as liking a post that's deemed offensive to the monarchy or posting pictures of the late king's favorite dog. Doing that may get your ass thrown

[B]

in jail for a minimum of three years.

[A]

That's right. Now, of course, critics accused the government of using this law as a cudgel. Right? Like a political tool to stifle free speech and criticism against its own rule and its own policies. Right. They're not just randomly throwing grandmas into jail for liking things, but if you are someone suspected of having sort of politically radical views and you like the wrong thing at the wrong time, we got your ass sniped, bitch.

[B]

I also did quite a bit of research on this term and like, it is crazy. You can, dear listener, if you just want to know how crazy the world is, I had no idea so many countries have official law dictating do not talk shit about your leader. And in fact, the US did, and I think it was like 1806 or something like that. And then it was. And then it was overwritten and dropped, basically. But, like, it's crazy. It's an interesting idea, for sure.

[A]

Yes. Yeah. And for what it's worth, that is one of the more important rights that we have here in the States is that we are allowed to shit talk with anyone in power. And you don't realize how powerful that is until you live somewhere like Thailand where liking the wrong Twitter post can get your ass thrown in jail because you're suspected of being a political dissident.

[B]

That's rough because I mostly Most of my posts on social media are like the late dogs of my political rulers. That's like 80% of my content. Anytime you're like, right now, anytime a dog dies, I'm like, that's free content for all, Leo.

[A]

So bringing this back to Dune and wrapping up this spice morsel, having this added context, having this definition of Les Majeste and seeing how, for example, it's implemented in a country like Thailand, really gives Duncan's statement a lot of weight. Because remember, he's saying all of this in front of the comm eyes. Belinda can rewind the tape and watch this.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

And you could argue the statement itself. Him even just saying this could be considered by some to be lace majesty against the sisterhood. Right. Like, you've crossed a line and you shouldn't be saying this about the sisterhood.

[B]

Yeah. Even Mirbela's like, belinda's not gonna like you saying that.

[A]

Right.

[B]

Don't say that.

[A]

Don't say that.

[B]

They're not gonna like that.

[A]

This is a moment to me that reads as Duncan diverging from the handbook. Right. Duncan going a bit rogue and maybe planting a seed and tag that he's not meant to. And certainly it'll piss Balanda off. O'Drade might be cool with it, but someone who's so by the books, like Balanda is going to be raging about this. There's going to be like, 12 meetings on her calendar tomorrow. On a more serious note, I did want to also call out that Duncan saying this about the sisterhood paints them in a pretty damning light. A light that I would argue is not so different from the oner Matres who, we are told in these chapters rule over their servants out of fear of punishment. If you fuck up, we'll kill you. We'll punish you. And so their servants go to any lengths to not fuck up.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

And so that sort of operating out of a fear of punishment. What is a lace Majesty relationship if not a relationship that is grounded in exactly that? The fear of punishment by a ruler that you speak out against.

[B]

Yeah. How often is o' Draid thinking about, I hope no one overheard me say that, or I will not say this out loud because that would freak them out. Or like, I did this knowing it's going to freak. Like, there's such an awareness of. She almost got ousted, I think, from her position by a vote just for doing her best. And it's. It's like, because she's broken some rule, some law, she's being impeached because she's she laughed out loud and said, it's good to be alive, right? Fuck you. No, it's not. Get out of your position.

[A]

She liked the wrong fucking tweet.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

And almost got ousted. So I think it is pretty damning for Duncan to acknowledge this about the sisterhood, that we are all just dogs to them. It very much reads to me like how the honored matre also treat their subordinates.

[B]

Yeah, I think Frank's given Duncan the kind of token of he's. He's calling it as it is basically in this moment.

[A]

That's why you gotta love him. That's sexy.

[B]

Motherfucker. So good at rock climbing too. Well, our second morsel today is also with Duncan, also with Duncan's chapter. A lot of fun. This one is the Donnie and Marinette or something. Donnie and Marinette. Marinette, something. In today's reading, Duncan tells Tag, quote, you liked to drink Donnie and Marinette a very fine brandy. I recall, end quote. And we all, we leapt to action, opening tabs, opening Wikipedia, Googling things. What is Brandy? Who's Brandy, Randy? I don't know her. Does she go to this school? Now, as it turns out, Danny and Marinette has also already come up in this. In this series.

[A]

I forgot about this.

[B]

I had forgotten about this as well. This is in Heretics in the pub scene when Tag has entered the Soldiers pub near the end of the book, Quote, Teg scanned the room while someone was getting him a glass. When it was thrust into his hand, it was as he expected, the deep blue of Donnie and Marinette. These old soldiers knew his preferences.

[A]

Yeah, they did.

[B]

End quote. They're like, yeah, this tall fucking guy loves brandy. So let's discuss what we know about this fun beverage because I think this is kind of fun. And obviously just to get out of the way, half of the beverage. Danny and Marinette, Danny and. Is anything from Dan, aka Caladan, aka the planet where House Atreides ruled since like 8000 AG, something like that. 8711 AG. I don't know who's to say the word Marinette is a little bit more mysterious and took a little bit more digging and ultimately I wasn't able to find anything like rock solid. But I have a theory that I think works with the tie to the maritime ocean water planet Caladan, basically. So I think Frank started with the word marine or mahra en France, en francais, which is like basically marine or like ocean, like. Or it's like. I mean, it's the word marine in English, but it's Also, if you say like mahran in French, it's like a sailor or like, it's like the ocean.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

And then the French suffix et e, t, T e is like, connoting endearment. Like, you might. You might add that to the end of something as a way of saying, like, oh, little. Little something. Right. And as it turns out, marinette with an extra T is a literally a French given name, which, if we were to, like, try to break it into its composite pieces, could be interpreted as like, little sailor or a little person of the sea, or like, little, you know, something like that. Right.

[A]

Is that a mahanet in your pocket or are you just happy to see me?

[B]

I could be both. Could be both, honestly. Always enjoy recording with you, buddy. Now, regarding the color. Brandies are always not blue. They're never blue. That's a weird way to say it. Brandies are never blue. So apparently this is just another instance where Frank was like, what if I made a brandy? But it's all ocean themed, just machinette. And then it's like, blue like the ocean. And it's just all. Yeah, it's all very, like, fun and sci fi. And then finally we looked. I tried to find, like, oh, what if, like, you today wanted to try Teg's favorite brandy?

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Like, maybe there is a brand that like, like Frank had in mind.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Kind of. Kind of a dead end as well. But there are. There's a type of brandy called a Brandy de Jerez. I think it's Spanish, which is a type of brandy made in a coastal part of Spain. And of course, most other brandies are made more inland. It's a type of wine. It's like a condensed wine. So we've learned a lot about Brandy's, all of us, I'm sure. Yeah. And the biggest takeaway is there is basically no real world brandy that you could have. But I will say, if you wanted to try Teg's favorite drink, you could do Brandy de Jerez. Get a glass food coloring, make it as blue as you can. Get up on a stool or a step ladder so that you're six, seven, and they'll. You'll have the real authentic tag experience.

[A]

That's right. Your Teg cosplay will be incomplete without some blue food coloring and a brandy.

[B]

Meanwhile, people are like, spice essence. And you're like, no, no, no, no. It's a different kind of poison.

[A]

Right. They're like, oh, I saw this in the dude movie. It's the.

[B]

It's the Blue juice. That makes everything worse.

[A]

No, no, this is a Danny and Marinette.

[B]

You go. Silence.

[A]

You dumb fucking idiot.

[B]

I'm Miles.

[A]

Tag.

[B]

And then you run around the room as fast as you can and they go, my God, he's so. Oh, my God, he must have read

[A]

the sixth book I gave up in Messiah.

[B]

I need to nuke this whole apartment. There's no way we're gonna beat that guy in one on one fighting.

[A]

All right, folks, those are our morsels today. We hope you learned something.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

And that, in fact, is our episode today. Another great one. I cannot wait to continue in this book. I am genuinely having such a blast.

[B]

Same.

[A]

Speaking of continuing in this book, here's your homework for the next episode.

[B]

Look at this picture of your home. No, no, no. Read more of the book.

[A]

Lovingly. Look at this picture of your home for a long, long time. But then also make sure you've read chapters 22, 23 and 24, the next three chapters in the book. Or if your edition is different from ours, read through the chapter that ends on this line. Get in tune. Don't think, do it. End quote.

[B]

So what do we think? Palpatine or Nike? Which is the bit. Which is the funnier bit?

[A]

I like it as a Palpatine bit.

[B]

The Palpatine bit is pretty. Maybe Palpatine in Nike.

[A]

Just do it. Just do it. Just do it. Unlimited power. But it's just him running a marathon.

[B]

He's like.

[A]

Unlimited power.

[B]

That final stretch of the marathon. Yeah, yeah. Okay. All right. Dear listener, before we let you go, we want to remind you of some ways that you can stay in touch with us. And of course, ways that you can support what we do here at Gom Jabbar. And of course, the two best ways. One is to become a patron [e-mail] Gom Jabbar. $5 a month gets you a bunch of cool benefits. And we got some fun stuff on the way, so check it out. And of course, we also have Dune themed swag at our merch store, which is going to be. We have a new URL soon, so stay tuned for news about our new merch store. Just in time for the holidays, as it turns out. Unless you're listening to this on the public feed, at which point you fucking missed it, consider checking out the first link, the Patreon link, if you want to not miss it in the future.

[A]

That's right. And of course, this is an evergreen reminder that applies to Patreon listener that. An evergreen reminder that applies to Patreon listeners and public feed listeners. Email us.com jabbar podcastmail.com that email has never changed in many, many years of making this podcast. Send us your thoughts. Send us your questions. Send us pictures of your cute pets. Send us photos of your Danny and Marinette concoction.

[B]

Homemade. Yeah, yeah, that'd be fun.

[A]

Drink responsibly, but that would be fun. Send us pictures. Send all of that to gomjabarpodcastmail.com we love to get your thoughts and questions and observations as you read along with us.

[B]

I'm going to try that. I'm going to try it.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Get a brandy. I don't know if I'm going to try. I mean, it's a lot to track down, like a specific type of brandy. Right?

[A]

But, like, it could be any brandy.

[B]

Yeah. Who's. No one's going to check.

[A]

It's just going to be blue at the end of the day.

[B]

I found a type of brandy that they literally age in casks that they sail around the oceans. Like they put. Does that help the brandy, maybe?

[A]

Or is it a marketing stunt?

[B]

It certainly costs more,

[A]

You know,

[B]

does

[A]

the brandy know it's sailing the seven seas?

[B]

Or that's what makes.

[A]

It just thinks it's in a cask.

[B]

It knows sea shanties.

[A]

The brandy's like I'm on a Disney cruise around the world.

[B]

Oh, boy, I'm drunk on brandy. Well, friends, there is no real ending. It's just the place where you stop the recording. But this podcast is always one step beyond logic. So help spread the word of Muadib and leave us a review on Apple podcasts and Spotify and be sure to check out the other shows on the Lore Party podcast network on loreparty.com we're also on Twitter and Instagram at Lore Underscore party and on YouTube. Thank you so much much for listening. And remember, whoever controls the podcast controls the universe. We'll see you on the golden path.