Make room, Oscars: Zendaya’s in the Best Actress race for Dune: Part Three

Zendaya is making a proper go at the Best Actress Oscar this year — and it’s for her role in Dune: Part Three. This time, she’s not being slotted in as supporting like in the last two instalments, but is being put front and centre for the lead category. Not at all what many folk were expecting, especially given how the earlier Dunes handled her character, Chani.

Dune: Part Three lands in cinemas 18 December 2026.

Zendaya’s Monster 2026

In fairness, Zendaya’s been everywhere this year. The big push for Dune comes right after a string of heavy hitters, starting with The Drama, a black comedy where she shares the screen with Robert Pattinson. They play an engaged couple whose picture-perfect life erupts just days before the wedding — she’s also being campaigned as a lead for that one.

If the Oscar gods are taking notes, she also showed up as Athena in Christopher Nolan’s take on The Odyssey — yes, the mythological epic that actually broke a billion at the box office. And if that’s not enough, she’s back as MJ in Spider-Man: Brand New Day, which has now climbed into the all-timers league — apparently third only to Endgame and Avatar for global gross. No small year, really.

Zendaya’s picked up two Emmys and a Golden Globe for Euphoria, all in the last few years, but an Oscar has so far eluded her. If she lands a nomination this season, it’ll be her first time in the running.

Dune 3: Down the Rabbit Hole

This next part of Dune takes the story a good twenty years after Paul Atreides grabs the throne. Now firmly Emperor, he's not exactly your sympathetic underdog any more — these days, he’s haunted by visions of everything falling apart, with old enemies crawling back into the picture, new dangers popping up from every direction, and just a bit of betrayal sprinkled throughout for good measure.

The real kicker this time: Chani isn’t just on the sidelines. The plot brings her right into the centre, wrapped up in all the political conspiracy and the emotional fallout of a regime that’s teetering. While Paul wrestles with the nightmare world he’s created, Chani’s wrapped up in the thick of it, driving the mystery and, by the looks of things, getting a lot more to do than last time around.

Director Denis Villeneuve has been blunt this is not just a rehash. To quote him from a press event where he laid it all out:

"The idea was to try to make a movie that will have the same DNA — it’s a Dune movie — but it’s a very different movie. It has a different pacing… We are back with the same characters, but this time the world has totally changed. Their psyches, their perspective on reality has totally changed, and Paul is living with the burden of what he created, trying to find a way out of this spiral of violence."

All of which sounds… not exactly cheerful, but definitely ambitious. December 18 is the date to circle if you want to see Zendaya aiming for Oscar history.