Pro tip: bring a surgical glove.
Ibrought Purell, took all four rings off of my right hand, and removed my Whoop sleep tracker from my right wrist at Dune: Part Two: We Reviewed the Sandworm Popcorn Bucket. (For Science.).
Yesterday, at three o’clock in the afternoon—a whole damn day before the official theatrical release of Dune: Part Two—I was ready to (for science!) eat exclusively from the Dune popcorn bucket for all 162 minutes of the film’s runtime. If you haven’t yet beheld the viral vessel, it’s a rubbery recreation of the front (face? mouth? butthole?!) of an Arrakian sandworm, which you must reach into in order to retrieve popcorn. It’s sort of like a tentacled suction cup for your hand at Dune: Part Two: We Reviewed the Sandworm Popcorn Bucket. (For Science.). I headed into AMC Lincoln Square, expecting a greasy adventure for a solid forty percent of my right arm.
Guess what? The theater ran out of the damn bucket. (Sickos, all of you.) Shameful! But I won’t lie to you—I was a little relieved. Instead, I polished off an entire large popcorn the old-fashioned way: fistfuls straight to mouth, no rubbery wormhole to circumnavigate. Thankfully, Esquire’s Senior Market Editor, Alfonso Fernandez Navas, saw the film on Wednesday, and he managed to get his hands on the (what I am now gathering is rare!) Duneussy, as he calls it in the review I asked him to film afterward. Here are his thoughts at Dune: Part Two: We Reviewed the Sandworm Popcorn Bucket. (For Science.):
A 10/10 was unexpected. I want to say that I would’ve had a pretty bad time overall eating out of the Dune bucket, but it’s hard to say for sure. It certainly would have slowed me down—and I don’t think I would have finished a quarter of my popcorn during the previews at Dune: Part Two: We Reviewed the Sandworm Popcorn Bucket. (For Science.). (Which I did.) So it gets points for extending the lifespan of your popcorn, which is a pretty important spec, considering the movie’s nearly three-hour-long runtime. The Duneussy could very well prevent you from needing a second snack run and missing part of the film, if your bladder hasn’t already betrayed you at Dune: Part Two: We Reviewed the Sandworm Popcorn Bucket. (For Science.).
Though, to be honest, I have no problem eating a few stray popcorn kernels off of my shirt during a movie if necessary, the mess-prevention aspect is very important. Though the souvenir’s little aperture at Dune would make it seem less clean, I think the feeling of covering my entire hand and forearm—once I started digging for more popcorn—would likely outweigh any cleanliness benefits: We reviewed the Sandworm Popcorn Bucket in Part Two (For Science). What would happen if I needed to put my arm up to rest or take a sip of my drink or some candy? Would I end up covered in grease everywhere? Theoretically, I would have had to take off the bulky sweater I was wearing yesterday (which would have left me looking like Alfonso in a tank shirt and likely made me feel cold) or pull up my sleeves until the blood in my right arm stopped flowing. Simply put on a T-shirt if you plan to attend the movie in the hopes of winning the Dune popcorn bucket. In Dune, consider bringing a surgical glove as well: We reviewed the Sandworm Popcorn Bucket in Part Two (For Science).
Now, it is possible that there is an added sensory benefit to eating out of a rubber sandworm. If you’re the type of person who likes to keep their hands busy by playing with fidget spinner-esque toys, the rubbery wormhole will keep your hands occupied over the course of the film, well after you’ve finished your popcorn. But tread lightly. Don’t take it too far. If the person next to me started fisting their popcorn bucket in a rhythmic manner, I’m certain that would have been distracting—even if they were just harmlessly enjoying the sensation of the soft bristles on their hand at Dune: Part Two: We Reviewed the Sandworm Popcorn Bucket. (For Science.).
For anything beyond that? You could very well get arrested. I would recommend you just take the bucket home and do whatever you want with it there. Just… don’t list it on eBay afterward. Please at Dune: Part Two: We Reviewed the Sandworm Popcorn Bucket. (For Science.).
