You may have seen Dune: Part 2 this weekend, but did you ride a sandworm in a Fremen stillsuit to do it? No? Then Jesse Myer went just a tad bit harder than you did.
The 30-year-old social media coordinator from Tulsa, Okla. (@jesse_myer and @redprintsrising on Instagram) has gone viral over the past couple days for doing just that, with videos of him cruising through an AMC theater atop his homemade sandworm making the rounds on social media. His own TikTok video, which you can see below, has garnered 3.2 million views alone, which doesn’t even account for the thousands more that it’s racked up on other accounts.
@redprintsrising Thanks for letting me harness the desert @AMC Theatres #dune #duneparttwo #ridetheworm ♬ original sound - History of Cinema
Sitting down for a quick phone call with IGN on his lunch break, Myer says he obviously had no idea his sandworm-riding would get so much attention, but it’s luckily largely been positive, especially as movie-goers appreciate the massive cinematic event that has become Dune: Part 2.
“People seem to really like it,” he says. “Things that stood out to me are the comments like ‘cinema is back,’ things like that. That just brings joy to me that I can be the one to make people feel that again. And I'll see comments like, ‘my husband saw this video and won't stop talking about it. He loves it.’ “
Cinema is back pic.twitter.com/Mm2S4dZO7G
— Culture Crave ? (@CultureCrave) March 4, 2024
It’s even caught the attention of the official Dune X/Twitter page, which reposted it, along with countless other accounts. But how did it all start? Unsurprisingly, Myer is just a really big fan of Dune. He was bummed he couldn’t see Dune: Part 2 on opening night last Thursday, due to his unusual hours that have him often working until midnight, but got tickets with his brother to see it on Friday night.
“I'm just looking forward to it, knowing people are going and seeing this movie,” he says. “I was sitting in my office working on a project on my iPad. And I was just like, 'you know what, I have the entire Fremen costume that I made this past summer for HowlerCon.’ ”
HowlerCon, as he explains, is a convention for his favorite book series – “I’ll shamelessly plug this, everyone needs to read it” – Red Rising, by Pierce Brown.
“So I had this costume for the con for that book series, and I was sitting there and I was just like, ‘you know what, I have my Onewheel. It'd be so fucking funny to ride a worm in the theater and it wouldn't be that hard to do,’ “ he continues. “And the idea just festered in my brain and I was like, ‘I'm dedicating my whole weekend to making this happen. This is going to happen.’ “
Myer was even more determined after actually getting to see Dune: Part 2, which of course he loved: “It is a masterclass in what true cinema should be, and just so refreshing, just a breath of fresh air to see such a good movie like that,” he says. So, Myer essentially put himself on a deadline of sorts, getting tickets with friends to see the sequel again on Saturday night.
In the meantime, he rushed to Target to get two massage hooks, as well as “two of those kid playset collapsible tubes that Target sells” to create the shape of the actual worm, tying and gluing them together. He ran to Joanne’s Fabrics after that, grabbing some fabric that looks as similar to worm skin as he could find. He used that, as well as a bedsheet that he spray-painted, to create the skin, all mounted to his Onewheel Pint (he notes that even Onewheel has reached out to him about his sandworm).
“Tons and tons of hot glue later, I had this worm,” he says.
“I got it all put together, and then Saturday night comes along, I get to the [AMC] parking lot,” he says. “It's already 7:15, there's 20 minutes of trailers, so I'm like, ‘crap, I'm really pushing it.’ So I'm trying to ride this thing. People are watching me with their headlights on just watching me fail because the front half came undone and got sucked in the wheel, and I was just like, ‘ah, screw it, I can't do it.’ “
So, Myer’s first attempt at riding the sandworm was a bust – but he was still determined to make it work for opening weekend. He went back, fixed what went wrong, and called in a friend to borrow his drone to give the videos a little extra kick, shooting the videos that were posted to social media on Sunday.
As for the actual filming of those videos, don’t worry: he called AMC in advance to make sure it was okay for him to go all Fremen in their lobby.
“I overheard the employee asking her manager, ‘He wants to ride a worm,’ “ he laughs. “The manager is like, ‘Yeah, as long as you don't disturb any guests and you don't film in any of the auditoriums, you're good.’ “
When I point out that, in one video, the bystanders are surprisingly unfazed despite the prophecy being fulfilled around them, Myer points out that he was at about his fifth take by that point – the reactions were much more excited during his first and second laps around the lobby, as well as when he initially rolled up.
@josh.gammon lead them to paradise #dunemovie #dune #amctheaters ♬ original sound - History of Cinema
“Pulling up to the theater was a blast because I was just weaving in and out of traffic on a freaking worm," he says. “People were not expecting that and rolling down their windows and clapping and whistling and whatnot.”
In a bit of serendipity, Myer passed two local News on 6 reporters, who just happened to be leaving the theater after seeing Dune: Part 2 themselves: “I guess they had both read the books, and so when they saw me ride by, they lost their minds,” he says. “I have a video of one of them. And he's literally jumping up and down for joy. He's just stoked. And so seeing the pure joy from those guys, I was like, ‘okay, I'm not crazy. People will think this funny. This is funny.’ “
The next logical question, obviously, after all of this is: what is Myer actually gunna do with the dang sandworm that he made? He says it’ll probably end up hanging out in a storage building at the back of his house, although it’ll get at least one more use today when he suits up for an interview for his local news.
“Then if we get Dune Messiah greenlit for the final part of the trilogy, 100%, I'm bringing it back out for that,” he promises.
Director Denis Villeneuve has previously said he’s already well into the writing process for the next Dune, so hopefully Myer will get to mount the sandworm for another cinematic event once again.
For more on Dune: Part 2, check out why the biggest meme to come out of it so far is Stilgar’s unwavering faith in Paul Atreides, as well as our 8/10 review.
Alex Stedman is a Senior News Editor with IGN, overseeing entertainment reporting. When she's not writing or editing, you can find her reading fantasy novels or playing Dungeons & Dragons.
