In Denis Villeneuve's Dune, Lady Jessica, the beloved concubine of Duke Leto Atreides and Bene Gesserit, seems to be afraid of her son, Paul; here's why. As a Bene Gesserit, Lady Jessica (Rebecca Ferguson) is trained to have complete control over her emotions so that she can read and manipulate the emotions of others. Yet, she spends much of the movie in a panic about her son, Paul (Timothée Chalamet), and the powers he's starting to exhibit – even uneasy around him.
The Bene Gesserit technique may seem to be a way to suppress emotional responses, but that's not necessarily the correct interpretation. Rather, the Bene Gesserit are supposed to both have a complete hyperawareness of the inner and outer workings of their surroundings, including a deep understanding of their own emotions. Lady Jessica still manages to look stoic when she's in front of others, including her love, Duke Leto (Oscar Isaac), only expressing her feelings when she's alone or with Paul. The Dune novel explains all of her fears concerning Paul through inner monologue, but the film instead shows her emotionally distressed when she's in solitude, a change that's more effective for a cinematic portrayal.
In both the novel and the Dune movie, Lady Jessica's emotional response to Paul's evolution to the Kwistaz Haderach is key to understanding why she's afraid of that revelation. In reality, she's worried about Paul's immense power as the Atreides heir looks as though he's destined to become the Kwisatz Haderach, Dune's Chosen One/messiah figure that the Bene Gesserit sisterhood has been planning for generations. Lady Jessica's obvious fear regarding Paul is because, as a Bene Gesserit, she realizes with an awful intensity what his fate will be. What's more, she's frightened by what he might become, knowing full well what that sort of inhuman power can do to a person. Paul's position as a supreme being may well strip him of his humanity and wreak violence across the known universe, a fate that scares Paul but arguably scares Lady Jessica more because she understands what's happening better than her son.
It may seem a bit confusing at first that Lady Jessica is so distraught over the idea of her bearing her order's messiah, seeing as how the Bene Gesserit have tried for years to selectively breed the Kwisatz Haderach. But there are a few reasons for her to be afraid. One, she's afraid of Paul's potential power to wage war throughout the Imperium, a future that Paul himself is frightened of when he foresees this future in his visions in Dune. But two, the Bene Gesserit consider Lady Jessica's love for the duke and for Paul to be a flaw. She was supposed to have a daughter, who, in turn, would then go on to potentially mother the Kwisatz Haderach. But Lady Jessica's love for Duke Leto was such that she defied the Bene Gesserit's orders and bore him a son so Leto could have an heir to House Atreides. In other words, Lady Jessica heralded the Kwistaz Haderach a generation earlier than the Bene Gesserit had planned.
Lady Jessica's fear underscores the fact that the Bene Gesserit do not have a grasp on their own scheme. As Paul's powers start to show, his mother starts to doubt that she, the Bene Gesserit, or anyone else can control Paul. Even when she instructs him to keep his powers at bay, Paul seems unwilling to obey and ends up proving that he's a potentially dangerous weapon. Lady Jessica is aware that her son has a headstrong grasp on his own freedom and autonomy, a trait that makes Dune's Paul Atreides an antihero. With Paul's anger over being manipulated, Lady Jessica is more aware than any in Dune that the soon-to-be Kwisatz Haderach resents those that helped breed him and will not listen to their commands.
