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Blade Runner 2049 |OT| Do Androids Dream of Electric Boogaloo? [Unmarked Spoilers]

Number_6

Member
They showed a beekeeper suit? I never saw that, but if I did that would be a nugget in the other direction.



absolutely.

No they didn't. I'm just offering alternative explanations.

For instance:

We never see Deckard wear a mask because we never see him intentionally step outside in Vegas.

EDIT:

Also this: https://www.nrc.gov/reading-rm/doc-collections/fact-sheets/fs-dirty-bombs.html

The dirty bomb more likely caused people to leave in panic than any real radiation threat. I mean, why stay rich in a desert wasteland when you can go off planet?
 

III-V

Member
No they didn't. I'm just offering alternative explanations.

For instance:

We never see Deckard wear a mask because we never see him intentionally step outside in Vegas.

Right they don't show it, but if they wanted to hint that he was human, they would have showed it. Instead, they showed it is not necessary for a replicant, as K could stick his hand in the beehive with no repercussions.
 
I don't remember arguments against Deckard being a replicant but I have a hard time thinking of any other plausible explanation for the unicorn connection in the Final Cut.

This is literally the only reason that exists, completely irrelevant to the rest of the film
 

kinggroin

Banned
I can't be the only one slightly disappointed to realize at the end just how much and how little any of this had to do with
Ryan Gosling's character
.
 

jett

D-Member
Right they don't show it, but if they wanted to hint that he was human, they would have showed it. Instead, they showed it is not necessary for a replicant, as K could stick his hand in the beehive with no repercussions.

Villeneuve didn't want to show that Deckard was human. Or a Replicant. He's perfectly happy not answering that question.
 

Totakeke

Member
One of the things I loved the most about 2049 is the editing pace. I know it's not for everyone since I really liked the Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy movie from 2011... which according to a lot of people, had a miserable plodding pace. But man, it's so refreshing to watch a movie that is more than happy to sit on a scene.
 
I don't know why people are believing Wallace when he implies Deckard is a replicant. He couldn't even get Rachel's eyes the right color.
 

jett

D-Member
One of the things I loved the most about 2049 is the editing pace. I know it's not for everyone since I really liked the Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy movie from 2011... which according to a lot of people, had a miserable plodding pace. But man, it's so refreshing to watch a movie that is more than happy to sit on a scene.

Personally I could barely endure TTSS, didn't bother finishing it.

This is very close to how that movie was paced, now that you mention it. I have to say, for a 150M+ production, editing it like this is is almost irresponsible. :p
 

Cheebo

Banned
I can't be the only one slightly disappointed to realize at the end just how much and how little any of this had to do with
Ryan Gosling's character
.

That is the entire point of the movie. About what you do to make a difference in a meaningless world, a meaningless existence. How do to do something special without actually being special. K's character arc was central to the movie despite not being special. That is the point.

If you wanted K to be special/ a chosen one/etc....then that would be a radically different movie. The entire movie would lose meaning and none of the themes set up along the way would pay off if at the end they declared K was the special child or somehow connected.
 

jett

D-Member
Yep, but it dominates discourse because of viewer's priorities in the 21st century. Everything's a spoiler. Everything's plot. Everything's a mystery to be solved.

This is JJ Abrams' fuckin' fault.

It's also this movie's own fault, since it deals much more heavily with twists and reverse twists than the original movie ever bothered with. Then there are the trailers which were incredibly cagey (while simultaneously also revealing too much, somehow). Deadline did say that Alcon/Villeneuve purposely hid basic plot elements in marketing materials and also asked critics to not drop any plot details/spoilers in their reviews.

They really did pull an Abrams.
 

Window

Member
I think the "Is Deckard a replicant or not" discussion point predates Abram's career.

I think it's irrelevant as well. However I do think the Final Cut offers a hard to ignore answer, however unnecessary it is.
 
I can't be the only one slightly disappointed to realize at the end just how much and how little any of this had to do with
Ryan Gosling's character
.

It was a little strange but I guess it's somewhat keeping in the tradition. Blade Runner isn't really about Deckard, and 2049 isn't really about K. They do the whole fakeout with the memories but yeah, pretty much everyone actually important to K's story is dead by the 2/3rds mark (Madame, Joi) and then it just completely shifts gears into resolving Deckard's part in the plot. That's probably my biggest criticism of the film, that the back third feels almost like a completely different film that got attached at some point. It's not bad, mind, just a tone shift that makes a lot of the previous scenes feel ancillary.
 
Which scenes?

I saw it at BFI IMAX on Thursday and the only laughing was for alco-doggo

There was an idiot with an obnoxious laugh at my showing too, I don’t remember the scene but it was earlier in the movie.

Not to mention the asshole next to me who started munching popcorn near the end of the movie where everything was being revealed.
 
Oh boy... the raging debate of Deckard's true origin continues. It was left ambiguous in 2049 on purpose also in the book Deckard is confirmed human but Blade Runner was loosely based on it so again, it's ambiguous.
 

III-V

Member
Villeneuve didn't want to show that Deckard was human. Or a Replicant. He's perfectly happy not answering that question.

I get that he does not want to state it explicitly, it would remove some of the mystery from the film.

I think the "Is Deckard a replicant or not" discussion point predates Abram's career.

I think it's irrelevant as well. However I do think the Final Cut offers a hard to ignore answer, however unnecessary it is.

I can't agree that it is irrelevant. But I do think it is best that it is not explicitly revealed.

One of the things I loved the most about 2049 is the editing pace. I know it's not for everyone since I really liked the Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy movie from 2011... which according to a lot of people, had a miserable plodding pace. But man, it's so refreshing to watch a movie that is more than happy to sit on a scene.
agreed. a bit of a return to 'film'
 
I went at 8 friday night and there were maybe 20 people there. And there was weird laughter during some of the deeper character scenes.
I was incredibly proud of my theater for the most part. I expected a nightmare, but the crowd was great. 8:45 showing, about half full, and everyone was quiet, calm, and fixated on the screen. I was half expecting people to clap or cheer when EJO showed up, but none of that. A few giggles here and there, but only at times that could actually be considered humorous. There was one asshole who pulled out his *full brightness* phone a couple times, but it was pretty brief.
 
I just thought of something that annoyed me in the opening scene. That damn pot of boiling water. The sound of it and even the pot itself seemed to be an intentional element of that scene, was it? Or was I just focusing on it because that sound annoys me?
 

Arex

Member
Contrast this with an actual human like Gaff. Gaff is now in what appears to be some sort of nursing home, and although claiming to prefer to 'work alone' is now surrounded by other people. He does not even meet in private. Many of the humans in the film are always shown close, huddled together, while the replicants are often solitary.

Meanwhile Deckard is alone in a Las Vegas post nuclear fallout, where it was not even safe to go for humans years ago. You see when they arrive they have special masks to protect themselves. Luv, Deckard and K do not need them, as they are (seemingly) not in danger, being replicants.

The dog is a replicant

Joking aside, did anyone know what happened to the dog :(

Also the cinema I watched in had the speakers vibrating so loudly that it kinda takes me out of the movie a bit lol. Anyway, I really enjoyed the visual and overall story.
 
Anybody else try to figure out the symbolism with animals in the movie? As soon as K put the horse down I realized that it was way darker than the other wood carving, which made me think the child was a "dark horse" so I was way more confident K wasn't the child. Also Gaff folds a sheep for K to imply that he hasn't awakened to the truth yet?
 

daviyoung

Banned
I just thought of something that annoyed me in the opening scene. That damn pot of boiling water. The sound of it and even the pot itself seemed to be an intentional element of that scene, was it? Or was I just focusing on it because that sound annoys me?

It's about replicant doing human things, like eating. Referenced again when K makes himself a boiling pot of silicon noodles and black things.
 

Window

Member
I was incredibly proud of my theater for the most part. I expected a nightmare, but the crowd was great. 8:45 showing, about half full, and everyone was quiet, calm, and fixated on the screen. I was half expecting people to clap or cheer when EJO showed up, but none of that. A few giggles here and there, but only at times that could actually be considered humorous. There was one asshole who pulled out his *full brightness* phone a couple times, but it was pretty brief.

Yeah I caught a 8:40 showing too with the theatre 2/3 full and everyone was quite good. One comment from a couple sitting next to me when Joi lights K's cigarette ("That's a hot woman") which I thought was kinda funny.

I went to a screening of the original a week earlier and there people laughed at very odd moments by comparison (such as Pris' death). Some even walked out right before Roy's monologue.
 

Adry9

Member
I just thought of something that annoyed me in the opening scene. That damn pot of boiling water. The sound of it and even the pot itself seemed to be an intentional element of that scene, was it? Or was I just focusing on it because that sound annoys me?

Tension rising?
 

zelas

Member
So if you say he isn't a replicant and use evidence, I guess we could say that this is confirmation bias, as well.

And if you are paying attention to the context of the film that real line is anything but ambiguous.
Not unless he's using superlative phrases like abundantly clear. Most people would say its ambiguous, and intended to be so, instead of claiming either theory as de facto. Accepting that as the status quo, regardless of their own belief, is not confirmation bias.
 
The dog is a replicant

Joking aside, did anyone know what happened to the dog :(

Also the cinema I watched in had the speakers vibrating so loudly that it kinda takes me out of the movie a bit lol. Anyway, I really enjoyed the visual and overall story.
I like to think the Nexus-8s brought it to join them in their revolution.
 

III-V

Member
Anybody else try to figure out the symbolism with animals in the movie? As soon as K put the horse down I realized that it was way darker than the other wood carving, which made me think the child was a "dark horse" so I was way more confident K wasn't the child.
I did not think of the 'dark horse' I just assumed the others were light as they looked like fresh carved wood, and the horse had been sitting in soot for 30 years.


Also Gaff folds a sheep for K to imply that he hasn't awakened to the truth yet?
Thats a possibility. I saw it as a sheep for common, or follower, in contrast to Deckard's unicorn, but that works as well.

Tension rising?
Yes, exactly.
 
I think the "Is Deckard a replicant or not" discussion point predates Abram's career.

It was mentioned publicly as early as the 1992 Director's Cut. If Ridley Scott mentioned his vision of Rick as a replicant in interviews before that rerelease, I never saw it. The film was more or less a niche item between 1982 and 1992, so its plot wouldn't be mentioned that often.

The film's reputation as a kind of Lazarus was cemented by the Final Cut project, in its own way as ambitious as the various restoration projects on Gone with the Wind. I suppose it's understandable that curiosity about the status of the film's central character has grown accordingly.
 

daviyoung

Banned
The pot was already boiling when K entered the house. If it was a depiction of replicants engaging in mundane daily activities It didn’t scan for me. But I’ll need to rewatch on Blu-ray to pick up on everything.

We know K is a replicant hunter but we don't know if Dave Babushka is. Why would a replicant be cooking garlic? Must be human, or is it?
 
The pot was already boiling when K entered the house. If it was a depiction of replicants engaging in mundane daily activities It didn’t scan for me. But I’ll need to rewatch on Blu-ray to pick up on everything.

I think it was just meant to add tension. It's just, you know, background noise to make you anxious.

Plus by the end of the scene I really wanted to know what was in the pot, which gives that nice little gross moment when Batista reveals that he cooks and eats grubs. And then a bit of humor when K checks the soup after he kills Batista (I guess he likes garlic.)

Also, I get the feeling that K smelling things was originally supposed to be a bigger deal than it ended up being. There are two big scenes right at the start where K prominently smells something and then....never really again (as far as I could tell). Maybe I'm reading too far into it.
 
Does anyone know what was the new replicants supposed baseline is? The Nexus replicants had very little real world experience underdeveloped emotional responses. But since the new ones all had implants, is the baseline like Luv’s coldness? The suppression of emotions?
The dog was a new breed, a superior form of Replicant known as a Nexus 9. It's name was also K.

K-9 I worked too hard for that joke.
Lol
 
The sculptures in the hazy Vegas desert remind me of a number of 50+ foot tall sculptures built for Burning Man. One of them ended up in Vegas, even.

beauty-1-a.jpg
 
Also Gaff folds a sheep for K to imply that he hasn't awakened to the truth yet?

Something like that. Sheep are powerfully gregarious and follow the flock to stay close together while maintaining a small comfort difference from their neighbours, which is how a single shepherd can easily control a large flock with the aid of a dog. It also occurred to me that it's a reference to the title of the novel, though that could be coincidence.
 

Window

Member
I haven't seen Macross Plus but was it the first one to come up with the idea of giant city faring holograms? They used it to an interesting effect here and seemed like a logical extension of the original's giant blimp billboards.

Edit:Yeah the Sony branding was a bit much.
 
We know they eat when K eats, but you don't know that at the start of the film

Those who have seen the first film do know they're biological. Although they're not explicitly shown to eat to the best of my knowledge, it's implied. In the novel the JF Sebastian character, a lonely mentally challenged man named John Isidore, shares a meal with Pris.

But I think you're right, the food cooking might be confusing to those who come to this film without preparation.
 
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