I respect your opinion, I mean it's really not for everyone but...I couldn't disagree more and I personally think you are wrong here. Everything in Blade Runner 2049 has a backstory and is telling us things about the civilizations of now and the past. To me it reeks of history, it's so dense.
Villeneuve is NOT the kind of director that just throws stuff in there because it looks good. (Just because you don't feel there's anything to it it doesn't mean that no thought went into the sets!)
I think the imagery in the whole film works on multiple levels...Literal storytelling and as symbolic means to convey emotions and vibes.
Thankyou and as I said I think the world or the setting was fantastic. The problem I have is that there are things in this film, that don't appear to serve any purpose beyond their mere existence. I'm not talking about coffee mugs and such, their existence informs the audience of the person, or to symbalise an addictive personality.
I'm talking things like the Bees. Why are the bees there? Why keep the bees? It's never brought up again or explained. If you are hiding from people, why keep things that give off a big enough heat signature to be worth looking into?
I'm also talking about Wallace. Why is he comparing himself to god all the time? Is it because he creates life? Well I could have told you that without even seeing his character in the film. Why even show him? What does he add to the movie? He's not imposing, he's not in some sort of duel with the hero, he never even meets the main character. So what does he add? The film set itself up at the beginning as attempting to answer, what is a man? Just because he's made, does that mean he doesn't have a soul? But it never answers these questions, it never even attempts to answer them, which makes me wonder why it made it such a point.
His relationship with the AI was one of the better parts of the movie to me. I related with the character when she was about. Her death was meaningful to me, but it honestly didn't feel meaningful to him. Would it be too much to ask for a "Noooooooooo!".
K's character should have been a journey. At the start he is just another cog in the machine, but then finds out that just because he might be different, means the machine he's served is going to hunt him. His journey to find the answers should have broken him. Aside from one scene, he's the same for the rest of the film. The ending should have been him realising it doesn't matter whether or not he was born or made, it's his actions that define him. The scene that should have been that is the part where he meets the hologram of his girlfriend. She calls him Joe and I think the implication is he gets pissed that it wasn't real from the start.
How much more impact would it have been if she said Tim or any other name? That this AI that he was always afraid was just saying things he wanted to hear, had actually made a choice to love him? She was a person, she had a soul and they killed her. That should have been he point of change in his character.
Have you seen Arrival or Enemy and how do you feel about those movies?
It really sounds like you just dont understand Villeneuves storytelling.
I loved Arrival. I think it was great and while the time travel part was a bit all over the place in my opinion, the film was very good. Enemy not so much. Prisoners was the better film to me, but then maybe it was the subject as opposed to the story telling. Enemy was about dealing with his own demons, but it was told in such a way that not a lot really happened, in my opinion. Prisoners had more bones to it due to the subject.
