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    • Galaxy spanning empire with unseen emperor.
    • Spice as a valuable commodity
    • Desert planet to include skeleton of wormlike creature and suited inhabitants
    • Secretive sect of religious warriors with magical powers
    • Chosen one narrative with a dead dad

    Now that said, almost every one of these is sort of set dressing and skin deep, and changed drastically in some fundamental way. Lucas was also not exploring remotely the same thematic ground as Herbert. He owes some of the world building to ideas lifted from Dune, without a doubt, but also to Lensman and Flash Gordon and John Carter of Mars. He owes plot and structure to Kurosawa ad Sergio Leone, and themes to Joseph Campbell and three thousand years of adventure tales, fairy tales, and coming of age stories. the only thing "original" about Star Wars is the integration of so many disparate influences into a coherent whole. You could argue that Dune was exploring more sophisticated themes and had a more actionable morality, but Herbert was flattering himself that Star Wars was a "ripoff." The influences were obvious, but they were just one hopper of grist for the Lucas mill.

  • As if Herbert didn't rip off half his ideas from Heinlein.

    • Wow you don't understand Herbert or Heinlein.

      If Heinlein wrote Dune, Paul would've been a real savior and also wouldn't have hesitated to use the family atomics by the morning of the night Leto died.

      • Just because Herbet ripped off Heinlein's ideas doesn't mean he used the same format or character work. You're taking me to mean "Herbert copied Heinlein in every respect" which I didn't say.

        Heinlein was writing about meta humans with psychic based abilities for decades before Herbert wrote about the KH in Dune. Clairvoyance and neutron dampening/excitement, eidetic memory, inherent mathematical ability (mentats, anyone?), control over human physiology, twins having quantum mental bonds which work outside of light speed limitations, the ABILITY TO ASTROGATE AND LITERALLY CAUSE MATTER/ANTIMATTER REACTORS TO FUNCTION WITH YOUR MIND.

        Pretty much all of Herbert's ideas about human evolution and the people that make society possible without thinking machines were based in Heinlein's prior novels and short stories.

      • If Heinlein wrote Dune

        Then that same argument works for Lucas copying Dune. If Herbert wrote Star Wars, Luke would have taken the title of Duke of the Sith and then negotiated with the Emperor to marry the Emperor's daughter to secure his power.

        Lucas's writing was pulp sci-fi with bad dialog fixed by others. But anyone picking out Dune Easter Eggs from StarWars to claim it's a copy of Dune is crazy. Herbert should have reserved his bitterness for the public who picked StarWars over Dune. Herbert was like a classical music composer angry at the Beatles.

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