MovieChat Forums > Dune (2021) Discussion > Shields are useless!

Shields are useless!

posted 2 months ago by sati_84 (441)
1 reply | jump to latest

The movie spends an entire scene setting up personal shields as a piece of technology that exists. The brawl between Brolin's character and Paul lets the viewer know that slow attacks penetrate the shields, and such slow attacks are marked with red glow, whereas ineffective, fast attacks are lighting up with blue. So far so good, nicely done visually and the idea is interesting.

But this whole ordeal could have been spared, as in later scenes, personally shielded combatants completely disregard this "use slow attacks to get through" strategy. Case in point: the Harkonnen attack - when Atreides soldiers are faced with the Emperor's elite troops, everyone is flailing at normal speed, i.e. like a "normal" fight scene, we never see evidence of slowing down their attacks, and yet, red spots are flaring up from time to time on participant's shields, and they are evidently effective attacks, as people are dying. I was so confused.

Then we get the face off of Momoa VS the Emperor troops, and the same thing happens again. Neither Momoa, nor the troops slow down any of their attacks, yet some of them are repelled by the shields, some of them are not. The red glow is dramatic and all, but absolutely makes no sense, in light of the setup (no pun intended). I was really looking forward to a different kind of fight scene, in both cases, seeing the combatants strategically using slower arm movements or whatever, but the fight choreorgraphers couldn't be bothered, so they just used traditional choero and told the guys where to put the red glows in post.

Personal shields are supposed to be a huge part of this universe, and it would have been nice to see something new, that differentiates this movie - not just visually - from the rest of the sci-fi outings. So... why did they messed this up so badly?

I saw a brief scene from Dune '84, where the shields looked ridiculous, and they were certainly better visually here, but that's not the point. The fight choreography should have aligned with what we know about shields, but in an unbelievable display of carelessness and laziness - it did not!

Did I miss something, or they were really this lazy?

[–] Fluffyudders (119) 2 months ago

I could be wrong, but my interpretation was that you have to strike in a particular way to get past the shields. If you imagine for example a slash across the throat, while the movement itself could be quick, if the speed at which the blade approaches the throat is slow the shield may be rendered ineffective.

However, the real point to note here is that the shields only seem useless because they are actually very effective - this is a sci-fi fantasy world set in the far future, but everyone is fighting in melee combat. Ranged attacks are effectively nullified, which is the true purpose (and strength) of the shields. While you have a shield up, you can only really be attacked or killed from extremely close range. The exception to this of course is the hunter-killers, and I am slightly confused how exactly they work, but it's fair to assume that if it was as simple as a projectile that can pierce the shields, battles would be fought by armies firing the damn things at each other!