My most recent read of Dune was after Foundation in order (side bit: bailed at Foundation's Edge because it got too "preachy").

One of the things that I had stumbled across was that Dune was an argument against the utopian view of Asimov and Foundation where individuals don't matter in the Seldon Plan and its played out in a galactic scale. Dune in that read is a dystopian view of the future where everything (at the galactic level) hinges upon individuals and the plot is played out on a planetary scale.

Asimov was asking "can reason organize civilization?" and Herbert came back and asked "what are the dangers if you think it can?"

...

So, when I revisit the large scale science fiction from the era... to me, now, it's more of a philosophy paper with a plot founded in future speculative fiction - more akin to reading Plato than Tolkien. Philosophical arguments rather than myth making and story telling that the authors were dueling in serialized pulp magazines rather than letters and treatises.

Ha, I love Dune personally, but it definitely doesn't get better after that.

It's a good thing that people have different preferences