Dune: House Harkonnen #5 - BOOM! Studios

DUNE: HOUSE HARKONNEN No. 5, May 2023

Having started this comic with a fast-paced opening involving young Gurney Halleck staging "a tense rescue mission” inside a depraved Pleasure House on Giedi Prime, it is hard not to imagine some within this book’s audience becoming a little despondent at the somewhat sedentary storytelling which then follows. Sure, the subsequent seemingly inescapable fate of little Victor Atreides to fall before the charge of a gigantic Elecran should definitely grab all but the most cold-hearted of bibliophiles by the throat, especially when the tiny boy's bodyguards declare their inability to protect the first son of Caladan’s duke from so deadly a sea mammal. Yet even this devastatingly dramatic near miss is quickly engulfed by the co-authors’ determination to cram in as many other locations, personalities, and dialogue-driven predicaments as the twenty-two-page periodical will allow.

Furthermore, there arguably seems to be some distinctly dodgy characterisation taking place where “Leto the Just” and Earl Dominic Vernius are concerned. Many readers will doubtless acknowledge that “the Red Duke” is very wise to be suspicious of the Reverend Mother Mohiam’s motives when she suddenly visits him bearing “a trained Bene Gesserit to serve in your household.” However, the ordinarily cordial and considerate ruler debatably acts more like a paranoid Baron Harkonnen during this meeting, by savagely grabbing his unarmed “gift” around the neck and threatening to cold-bloodedly stab her in the throat with a hand-dagger. Likewise, it is difficult to imagine the “hero of the Ecazi Revolt” making small talk with a couple of Fremen traders who have inadvertently stumbled upon the fugitive’s hidden headquarters deep within the South Polar Zone on Arrakis, when the former war hero’s beloved wife was cold-bloodedly gunned down following a similar indiscretion.

Quite possibly adding to this disconcerting avalanche of figures and affairs from Frank Herbert’s “feudal interstellar society” is artist Fran Galan, who frustratingly appears as just another in an increasingly protracted line of contributing illustrators for this mini-series. Slightly stiff when it comes to drawing the physical movement of this comic’s considerable cast, the Spaniard’s proficient pencilling itself is not really the problem though. But rather his ‘take’ on the appearance of certain individuals, which will doubtless cause some fans to initially rely upon this publication’s text to inform them as to just who it is being depicted in the panels – most notably Gurney, who repeatedly seems to either age or rejuvenate his looks depending upon what activity the “talented minstrel” is sketched performing.

The regular cover art of "DUNE: HOUSE HARKONNEN" #5 by Raymond Swanland