Dunes Sandworms Explained

  • 6 months ago
It is the legend! Welcome to WatchMojo, and today we're planting our thumpers and watching for wormsign as we plumb the mysteries of the mighty Shai-Hulud.
Transcript
00:00 "I serve only one master. His name is Shai-Hulud."
00:05 Welcome to WatchMojo, and today we're planting our thumpers and watching for warm sign as we
00:12 plumb the mysteries of the mighty Shai-Hulud. We'll be discussing some things revealed in
00:17 the second half of Dune, so this is your spoiler alert.
00:20 "I'm going!"
00:32 Giants of the Desert Sea.
00:33 Colossal beasts that traverse the desert. Dunes' sandworms are iconic,
00:45 and have influenced creature designs in franchises as diverse as Tremors and Star Wars.
00:50 Dune author Frank Herbert took inspiration from European dragons,
00:59 such as the treasure-hoarding Fire Drake in Beowulf. Like dragons, Herbert's worms are
01:05 armored in scales and fiercely territorial, in effect guarding the planet Arrakis' treasured
01:10 resource, the Spice Melange.
01:12 "The worm always comes."
01:13 "Always. They're drawn by rhythmic noises."
01:16 Prodigious forces of nature. They resemble giant versions of our own earthly worms,
01:21 with toothed mouths that recall lampreys. The largest can exceed 400 meters or 1,300 feet.
01:28 "The largest and most dangerous organism on Arrakis
01:32 is the sandworm, capable of reaching 400 meters in length."
01:37 In fact, the worm that Paul summons when he becomes a sand rider is over a half a league long.
01:42 That's more than 1.5 miles.
01:44 Their bodies are arranged into ring segments, which may contract and relax to facilitate
01:52 movement through the sand, similar to earthworms. While they're drawn to vibrations and will attack
01:57 anything on the desert floor, man or machine, they feed primarily on sand plankton and smaller worms.
02:03 "We're about to enter worm territory. We can't walk like regular humans. If we do, we're dead."
02:09 Incredibly tough, they can live for thousands of years. Their main weakness is water,
02:14 which is poisonous to their systems. Sandworms have a central place in the ecology of Arrakis.
02:20 In fact, much of the sand on the planet is due to sandworm action. So is the oxygen,
02:25 a byproduct of their digestive factories. The worms are also at the center of Fremen culture,
02:31 and beyond Arrakis, of galactic civilization, in a way that very few suspect. Shai-Halud.
02:37 "Bless the maker and his water. Bless the coming and going of him.
02:41 May his passage cleanse the world and keep the world for his people."
02:47 Dune is a desolate planet, but home to a thriving indigenous population,
02:51 and of course, the all-important spice. Sandworms are at the heart of both.
02:56 "Shai-Halud."
03:01 The planet's native people, the Fremen, revere the worms as manifestations of the divine.
03:06 Descended from the Zensunni Wanderers, whose religion was rooted in Islamic and Buddhist
03:11 traditions, the Fremen have adapted to the planet's unforgiving environment and its flora and fauna.
03:16 "Preferring to inhabit the remotest regions of Arrakis, the Fremen share the deep desert
03:22 with the giant sandworms, known to the Fremen as Shai-Halud."
03:26 For them, the worms are "makers" or Shai-Halud, which can be translated as "old man of the
03:32 desert," "grandfather of the desert," or "old father eternity." Fremen culture has become
03:37 inextricably linked to the worms. To avoid the worms' attention, they've developed a way of
03:42 walking without rhythm on the sand. From the teeth of dead worms, they craft chrisknives,
03:47 sacred blades that, according to tradition, must taste blood once drawn before returning
03:52 to their sheath.
03:53 "This chrisknife was given to me by my great-aunt.
03:59 It's made from a tooth of Shai-Halud, the great sandworm.
04:02 This will be a great honor for you to die holding it."
04:07 Worms also provide a means of transportation across the endless desert.
04:11 "Shai-Halud decides today if you become Fremen, or if you die."
04:15 Using a thumper, Fremen lure in a worm and employ maker hooks to pry open a ring segment.
04:21 Sand enters the soft tissue between segments, irritating the worm, which rolls over to bring
04:26 the exposed tissue higher above the sand, lifting the sand rider with it.
04:30 Additional hooks allow for steering.
04:32 Perhaps most importantly, primitive, stunted worms are drowned, releasing a liquid exhalation
04:52 that the Fremen call the "water of life." Fremen priestesses, or "Saiyadina," who ingest it,
04:57 experience what's called the "spice agony," unlocking the genetic memory of female ancestors.
05:03 "Here is the water of life, the water that will free your soul."
05:07 As with the Bene Gesserit, women who undergo this ritual become reverend mothers.
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05:25 It's the complex life cycle of the sandworms, however, that opens the door to their deepest
05:36 mysteries and holds the key to the spice.
05:39 The sandworms are strongly associated with the spice melange, which only exists on Arrakis.
05:47 Their "protection" of the spice is really just territorial,
05:50 but Paul also notices that worms and the spice both smell like cinnamon.
05:54 "The spice. Do you smell it?"
05:59 "Yes!"
06:00 A miracle drug, the spice prolongs life and unlocks greater awareness. For some,
06:05 such as the Bene Gesserit and the mutated guild navigators, it also bestows prescience.
06:10 This prescience allows guild navigators to navigate interstellar space.
06:15 "The spice extends life. The spice expands consciousness. The spice is vital to space travel."
06:26 It's no wonder spice is the most coveted resource in the galaxy.
06:30 So what are sandworms? And the worm, the spice, is their relationship?
06:36 When you think Dune, you think sandworms. So it might surprise you to learn that sandworms
06:41 are an introduced species, from back when Dune was a wet planet. "Guts, what a monster!"
06:46 But it's their life cycle that's truly astounding. It begins with microscopic sandplankton,
06:52 which feed upon the spice, and upon which sandworms themselves feed.
06:56 Sandplankton burrow down and become sandtrout, known to the Fremen as "little makers,"
07:01 flat, diamond-shaped leathery creatures that are half plant, half animal. Attracted to water,
07:07 sandtrout band together, blocking off the planet's water into pockets,
07:11 which is what caused the desertification of Arrakis. Sandtrout excretions combine with
07:16 water to produce a pre-spice mass, a stage of, quote, "fungusoid wild growth."
07:22 This results in a spice blow, with the mass exploding onto the surface.
07:26 Exposed to sun and air, the mass becomes, drumroll, the spice.
07:32 "Spice blow."
07:33 "Trading places with the sands above. The sun and heat will dry it out and soon..."
07:40 "Spice."
07:43 "Treasure of the universe."
07:45 The sandtrout who survived the blow enter hibernation,
07:48 emerging six years later as small, 10-foot-long sandworms.
07:52 As planetary ecologist Liet Kynes observes,
07:56 "The relationship is circular. Little maker to pre-spice mass. Little maker to shai-halud.
08:01 Shai-halud to scatter the spice upon which fed microscopic creatures called sand plankton.
08:06 The sand plankton, food for shai-halud, growing, burrowing, becoming little makers."
08:12 As for how the sand plankton propagate, it isn't specified, but plankton on Earth
08:18 reproduce through various means, depending on the type of plankton. For example,
08:23 cell division or sexual reproduction. The spice is thus a product of the sandworm life cycle.
08:28 This is the secret that few understand, and the link between the sandworm and the spice.
08:34 We'll let Paul sum it all up.
08:35 "Worm is the spice. The spice is the worm."
08:39 Have you ever tried to walk without rhythm so you don't attract the worm?
08:43 "Remember, walk without rhythm and we won't attract the worm."
08:48 Be honest. It's harder than you think, right? Tell us in the comments.
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09:00 [Music]