Roughly 24 hours after the conclusion of the 98th Academy Awards, Legendary and Warner Bros. have given us our first glimpse into what figures to be a significant contender at next year’s ceremony, releasing nine character posters for Dune: Part Three on Monday evening. The posters were shared to garner anticipation for the debut trailer, which is set to be released on March 17 at 12:00 P.M. ET.
All nine posters share a similar composition, each featuring a close-up of a character’s face with the words “The Epic Conclusion” superimposed atop. Seven of the posters show returning characters while the others feature new additions to the cast.
Timothée Chalamet kicked off the proverbial festivities on Monday afternoon by sharing an image of Paul Atreides as he appears in the upcoming film on his Instagram Story, and his poster seems to show a Muad’Dib who has fully realized his ‘terrible purpose.’ Burn marks surround his eyes that have been given a haunting blue glow by the spice of Arrakis, the stoicism of his gaze suggesting that this character has very much continued down the path he set upon in the final act of Dune: Part Two. Stilgar (Javier Bardem), one of Paul’s most zealous supporters and closest confidants, looks muddied in his poster, suggesting that he’s aided his Lisan al-Gaib along his path.
Chani (Zendaya), Lady Jessica (Rebecca Ferguson), Princess Irulan (Florence Pugh), Alia Atreides (Anya Taylor-Joy), and Hayt/Duncan Idaho (Jason Momoa) round out the returning character posters, with some of them appearing to give a bit more insight into the film’s plot than others. Chani and Lady Jessica appear generally unchanged from Part Two, with the former looking rather scarred and battered and the latter, again, having what appears to be the Litany Against Fear painted across her face in the Fremen language. Irulan, Paul’s wife in title only, has white paint caked across her face and slicked hair in her image, its cracks helping to convey her concerned glare.
Alia’s poster is perhaps the most interesting of the bunch, as it gives us our first indication of what the character will look like in practice. Her utilization in Part Two was one of director Denis Villeneuve’s largest deviations from Frank Herbert’s seminal work, and in the Dune: Messiah novel on which Dune: Part Three is based, the character is in her mid-teens; this poster, which showcases a bloodied Alia screaming at something off-screen, indicates that we may be in for a version of the character that is distinctly Villeneuve’s own. Momoa is also set to return after appearing as Duncan Idaho in Dune: Part One, but to delve into any further explanation would be to mention potential spoilers and to open the incredibly convoluted can of worms that is Dune (and, in particular, Duncan Idaho) lore.
Robert Pattinson’s Scytale and Isaach De Bankolé’s Farok are the only two new characters who have received posters thus far; Scytale is a Tleilaxu Face Dancer with the ability to shift his appearance, and the poster communicates this visually by having a blurred version of Pattinson’s face appear just to the left of the clear image. Farok is a Fremen member of Sietch Tabr.
Dune: Part Three, as its name would suggest, is the conclusion of Villeneuve’s critically acclaimed Dune trilogy, with the first two films in the series—2021’s Dune: Part One and 2024’s Dune: Part Two—combining for $1.1 billion at the worldwide box office and eight Academy Award wins. Part Three is set to hit theaters on December 18, 2026.
