Blade Runner 2049: Rick Deckard is a WHAT

The Something Awful Forums > The Finer Arts > Cinema Discusso > Blade Runner 2049: Rick Deckard is a WHAT

exquisite tea: Apr 21, 2007; Carly shook her glass, willing the ice to melt. "You still haven't told me what the mission is."

She leaned forward. "We are going to assassinate the bad men of Hollywood."

I cannot wait for them to ruin my favorite movie of all time with a definitive resolution to Deckard being a replicant and slovenly callbacks to the original.

# ¿ Jan 5, 2017 15:49

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# ¿ May 6, 2024 09:29

exquisite tea: Apr 21, 2007; Carly shook her glass, willing the ice to melt. "You still haven't told me what the mission is."

She leaned forward. "We are going to assassinate the bad men of Hollywood."

Ruflux posted:

How does a sequel invalidate whatever feelings you have for the original, though

When I say "ruin" I don't mean that it will literally change my feelings on the original Blade Runner, but by existing and providing a definitive answer to Deckard's fate will now inhabit my consciousness in an irritating way that, upon rewatching Blade Runner, I'll have to think "but yeah and then they made that sequel." It's just a supremely unnecessary movie, in the same fashion The Whole 10 Yards or 22 Jump Street or whatever were supremely unnecessary. But not entirely unexpected as we're now in the age of Tortuous 80s Reference: The Feature Film.

# ¿ Jan 5, 2017 18:58

exquisite tea: Apr 21, 2007; Carly shook her glass, willing the ice to melt. "You still haven't told me what the mission is."

She leaned forward. "We are going to assassinate the bad men of Hollywood."

There's a lot of talent surrounding this production on paper, and if they truly manage to do something new and inventive with the subject material, then I'll be pleasantly surprised. Just like how everybody remembers the Total Recall reboot. Or Robocop. Or that last Terminator movie.

# ¿ Jan 5, 2017 19:22

exquisite tea: Apr 21, 2007; Carly shook her glass, willing the ice to melt. "You still haven't told me what the mission is."

She leaned forward. "We are going to assassinate the bad men of Hollywood."

Neo Rasa posted:

I'm still convinced Ford is going to die like ten minutes into the movie and/or otherwise be out of action for all of it. Not knowing whether or not he was human will play a part in setting the plot into motion but it will lead to other stuff happening instead of his origin being resolved.

That would be some pretty good storytelling but it would also prevent a humorous callback line later on when he tries to order 4 more shrimp + noodles from the Chinese stand, like he mugs back to Gosling and says "they never get it right" so I don't think that will happen.

# ¿ Jan 5, 2017 19:41

exquisite tea: Apr 21, 2007; Carly shook her glass, willing the ice to melt. "You still haven't told me what the mission is."

She leaned forward. "We are going to assassinate the bad men of Hollywood."

Jack2142 posted:

I actually look forward to this movie, Blade Runner is one of my favorite (maybe my absolute favorite) movie of all time. I don't think its via nostalgia goggles because I never saw the movie till I was a teen in the 2000's and saw the director's cut on like G4 or something after midnight, completely blew me away and all the people involved with the movie makes me hope it will be a good spiritual successor/sequel like Mad Max Fury Road compared to... other recent remakes/reboots/sequels etc. more recently.

I think what made Fury Road work where others have failed is that it was still fundamentally George Miller's vision, and because of that he was able to build upon his own universe while moving forward in a new direction. This recent glut of remakes and reboots trip over themselves trying to piece back together the visual referents to the original for so long that they barely have time to contribute anything new. And because they're not directed and/or produced by their creators, there's a certain hesitance to attempt doing different for fear of offending the superfans. And so you get boring, superfluous movies that leave you wondering "what was the point of this" and nobody is happy. I know Prometheus is a controversial film, but I respected Ridley Scott's ambition and willingness to break with slavish Alien references to explore entirely new concepts in the same universe.

# ¿ Jan 9, 2017 15:10

exquisite tea: Apr 21, 2007; Carly shook her glass, willing the ice to melt. "You still haven't told me what the mission is."

She leaned forward. "We are going to assassinate the bad men of Hollywood."

The presence of Villanueve and Fancher are what's keeping me from declaring this a total mess outright. I'm just skeptical of this movie's ability to not get destroyed by committee, it's kind of a perfect storm of circumstances that even led to the first Blade Runner being the kind of movie it was.

# ¿ Jan 9, 2017 15:39

exquisite tea: Apr 21, 2007; Carly shook her glass, willing the ice to melt. "You still haven't told me what the mission is."

She leaned forward. "We are going to assassinate the bad men of Hollywood."

I've been hating the idea of this movie being made for awhile but I'm willing to give it the slightest benefit of the doubt. You've got Villanueve directing and Deakins on cinematography, so at the very least this film is going to be beautiful just to look at. If there's a story to be gleaned from the trailer then I missed it entirely because it all seemed quite vague, more proof of concept than anything expository. I'm sincerely hoping they find something interesting to do with the concept. The look and feel is definitely there.

# ¿ May 8, 2017 18:56

exquisite tea: Apr 21, 2007; Carly shook her glass, willing the ice to melt. "You still haven't told me what the mission is."

She leaned forward. "We are going to assassinate the bad men of Hollywood."

You really have to see his entire filmography to appreciate the depth and nuances of Dopey Gosling Face.

# ¿ May 8, 2017 19:16

exquisite tea: Apr 21, 2007; Carly shook her glass, willing the ice to melt. "You still haven't told me what the mission is."

She leaned forward. "We are going to assassinate the bad men of Hollywood."

I know Jared Leto hath besmirch'd the holy Joker but he's a really superb actor and one of the least disagreeable choices about this movie.

# ¿ May 9, 2017 14:03

exquisite tea: Apr 21, 2007; Carly shook her glass, willing the ice to melt. "You still haven't told me what the mission is."

She leaned forward. "We are going to assassinate the bad men of Hollywood."

Zeris posted:

I am worried this will stray from the original's weird mundanity of Deckard, a guy whose averageness is intentionally off-putting. It seems like K has Plot Mandate through several scene and will solve many problems by running / punching / grimacing hard enough.

I thought it was funny how Deckard says he was good at his job in the trailer since his character in the original is an alcoholic coward who shoots women in the back and is bested by all the other Replicants in a fair fight.

# ¿ May 9, 2017 17:18

exquisite tea: Apr 21, 2007; Carly shook her glass, willing the ice to melt. "You still haven't told me what the mission is."

She leaned forward. "We are going to assassinate the bad men of Hollywood."

Snowman_McK posted:

They're not really fair fights, when it's between a regular dude, and a custom built creature that can haul radioactive loads all day.

My point is more that Harrison Ford's character in the original Blade Runner isn't very heroic and is actually kind of lovely, so if they give him the same kind of heroic reverence he got in TFA then it would be a huge misfire.

# ¿ May 10, 2017 15:03

exquisite tea: Apr 21, 2007; Carly shook her glass, willing the ice to melt. "You still haven't told me what the mission is."

She leaned forward. "We are going to assassinate the bad men of Hollywood."

Snowman_McK posted:

Interesting that you correlate being good at being a cop with being heroic. I mean, that's the only way to read it as reverance.

"I was a cop, I was good at it" said in loaded way by an old man living in complete isolation.

Which is a whole lot less inherently praiseworthy than, say,

"I need the old blade runner, I need your magic."

and less enthusiastic than, say,

"You could learn from this guy, Gaff. He's a goddamned one-man slaughterhouse, that's what he is. Four more to go!"

Which obviously ignores the context of who says it and how Deckard reacts.

The original is built around the idea that Deckard's job is morally questionable at best, and also that Deckard is really loving good at it.

No.

# ¿ May 11, 2017 13:52

exquisite tea: Apr 21, 2007; Carly shook her glass, willing the ice to melt. "You still haven't told me what the mission is."

She leaned forward. "We are going to assassinate the bad men of Hollywood."

Harrison Ford's period of sleepwalking through movies is pretty close now to matching his period of actual acting.

# ¿ May 12, 2017 10:46

exquisite tea: Apr 21, 2007; Carly shook her glass, willing the ice to melt. "You still haven't told me what the mission is."

She leaned forward. "We are going to assassinate the bad men of Hollywood."

The_Rob posted:

The great thing though is that Ford sleepwalking in Blade Runner is exactly what his character is supposed to be doing anyway.

Yeah, I'm just worried they're going to give him the Han Solo treatment instead of the rightful Actually Deckard Kind of Sucks one.

# ¿ May 12, 2017 18:22

exquisite tea: Apr 21, 2007; Carly shook her glass, willing the ice to melt. "You still haven't told me what the mission is."

She leaned forward. "We are going to assassinate the bad men of Hollywood."

I think that while TFA shows that Han definitely plays dirty, he is cast in a pretty heroic light overall and is given one of the most dramatic sendoffs in the entire series. Deckard by comparison is not even a very likeable dude, and by the end of the movie, it's Roy Batty whom we end up sympathizing with the most.

# ¿ May 12, 2017 19:01

exquisite tea: Apr 21, 2007; Carly shook her glass, willing the ice to melt. "You still haven't told me what the mission is."

She leaned forward. "We are going to assassinate the bad men of Hollywood."

Deckard is certainly changed by the end of the film, but thinking about how that would alter his character for a sequel just reminds me of all the reasons why I don't think this movie should have been made.

# ¿ May 12, 2017 19:14

exquisite tea: Apr 21, 2007; Carly shook her glass, willing the ice to melt. "You still haven't told me what the mission is."

She leaned forward. "We are going to assassinate the bad men of Hollywood."

Neo Rasa posted:

With Blade Runner's aesthetic's roots coming from 70s and early early 80s French comics I'm not surprised to see the sequel potentially still using "Oriental stuff" as a signifier for being in an exotic world beleaguered white people must put up with.

The asian influence in Blade Runner came out of a period where Japan's consumer goods economy was dominant and China was just emerging as a manufacturing powerhouse, why is why Atari and Toshiba seemingly rule the world in 2019 Los Angeles. It was their attempt to predict how cultures would blend in the future.

# ¿ May 14, 2017 13:12

exquisite tea: Apr 21, 2007; Carly shook her glass, willing the ice to melt. "You still haven't told me what the mission is."

She leaned forward. "We are going to assassinate the bad men of Hollywood."

SUNKOS posted:

Villeneuve wanted to leave it ambiguous, but then Ridley happened:

Ridley Scott ownes so much.

# ¿ Jun 27, 2017 16:44

exquisite tea: Apr 21, 2007; Carly shook her glass, willing the ice to melt. "You still haven't told me what the mission is."

She leaned forward. "We are going to assassinate the bad men of Hollywood."

I haven't seen Alien Covenant but I think Ridley Scott is a beautiful bastard whose movies are always enjoyable to watch even if only like 50% of it connects.

# ¿ Jul 5, 2017 16:47

exquisite tea: Apr 21, 2007; Carly shook her glass, willing the ice to melt. "You still haven't told me what the mission is."

She leaned forward. "We are going to assassinate the bad men of Hollywood."

Emetic Hustler posted:

Fresh trailer. Have no idea what it's about.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dZOaI_Fn5o4

I've been very down on this movie from the beginning but this trailer looks pretty good to me, honestly.

As for anybody trying to suss out what the story is going to be, trailers like these are so misleading that it could literally be about anything, and are often deliberately cut to appear more action-y.

# ¿ Jul 17, 2017 18:39

exquisite tea: Apr 21, 2007; Carly shook her glass, willing the ice to melt. "You still haven't told me what the mission is."

She leaned forward. "We are going to assassinate the bad men of Hollywood."

Frankenstyle posted:

I mean I really want this to be good, but it's got a real Ghost in the Shell vibe of a production company handing off an IP to people who have no clue what to do with it.

You've got Villanueve and Deakins working on Blade Runner, so if this movie fails it's certainly not going to be through lack of competence. These guys ain't lightweights.

# ¿ Jul 17, 2017 19:05

exquisite tea: Apr 21, 2007; Carly shook her glass, willing the ice to melt. "You still haven't told me what the mission is."

She leaned forward. "We are going to assassinate the bad men of Hollywood."

At this point I feel like trailers and one-off promo clips like these are going to tell us absolutely nothing. I hope this new Blade Runner will be good, it has the right people behind the project, but it's kind of a total fluke that a movie like the original Blade Runner ever got made in the first place, and subsequently became as popular as it did.

# ¿ Sep 11, 2017 15:29

exquisite tea: Apr 21, 2007; Carly shook her glass, willing the ice to melt. "You still haven't told me what the mission is."

She leaned forward. "We are going to assassinate the bad men of Hollywood."

Lobok posted:

Is Final Cut a good version of Blade Runner to watch? Kind of a 'beggars can't be choosers' situation here since the best option for watching it without buying it is streaming from the Playstation store and that's the only version they have.

It's more or less universally agreed upon to be the definitive version, although the peculiarities among the five main cuts of the film are almost another field of study unto itself.

# ¿ Sep 14, 2017 14:03

exquisite tea: Apr 21, 2007; Carly shook her glass, willing the ice to melt. "You still haven't told me what the mission is."

She leaned forward. "We are going to assassinate the bad men of Hollywood."

Phi230 posted:

So were the rumors that Ridley Scott and Harrison Ford got in screaming matches on set true for this film

if so very worried

It took multiple production disasters to result in Blade Runner being one of the best movies ever made, so maybe they're just trying to make lighting strike twice.

# ¿ Sep 17, 2017 11:20

exquisite tea: Apr 21, 2007; Carly shook her glass, willing the ice to melt. "You still haven't told me what the mission is."

She leaned forward. "We are going to assassinate the bad men of Hollywood."

DC Murderverse posted:

I'm not entirely convinced that performance is all that great and not just riding the massive wave of nostalgia that came with VII.

To me it was more just Harrison Ford not giving a gently caress. I'm more optimistic than most about his performance in Blade Runner because all he's required to do is not give a gently caress.

# ¿ Sep 17, 2017 19:09

exquisite tea: Apr 21, 2007; Carly shook her glass, willing the ice to melt. "You still haven't told me what the mission is."

She leaned forward. "We are going to assassinate the bad men of Hollywood."

Zimmer + Blade Runner sounds like the mismatch of the century.

# ¿ Sep 25, 2017 09:18

exquisite tea: Apr 21, 2007; Carly shook her glass, willing the ice to melt. "You still haven't told me what the mission is."

She leaned forward. "We are going to assassinate the bad men of Hollywood."

I kind of wish they just didn't waste time creating all this other ancillary media to Blade Runner 2049 because none of it is very good. And I generally liked the Prometheus shorts.

# ¿ Sep 28, 2017 14:12

exquisite tea: Apr 21, 2007; Carly shook her glass, willing the ice to melt. "You still haven't told me what the mission is."

She leaned forward. "We are going to assassinate the bad men of Hollywood."

hyphz posted:

Hmm. In DADoES the replicants/androids died after 4 years because they were organic and their cells could not be regenerated from natural decay. But I thought the film made clear that the limit was artificial in that version.

In the movie Bryant tells Deckard that Tyrell "installed a failproof device" in the form of a four-year lifespan, which does make it seem artificial. However in the now apocryphal voice-over narration, Deckard says that Rachel didn't have a termination date so they could live happily ever, which would indicate it was maybe a bluff? Doesn't matter now though since the original cut has been relegated to the trash bin of history.

# ¿ Sep 28, 2017 21:14

exquisite tea: Apr 21, 2007; Carly shook her glass, willing the ice to melt. "You still haven't told me what the mission is."

She leaned forward. "We are going to assassinate the bad men of Hollywood."

Ironic since Deckard would have been the role most apropos of Ford not giving a gently caress.

# ¿ Oct 2, 2017 16:35

exquisite tea: Apr 21, 2007; Carly shook her glass, willing the ice to melt. "You still haven't told me what the mission is."

She leaned forward. "We are going to assassinate the bad men of Hollywood."

If I remember correctly, it was stated in Future Noir that Ford didn't really have a great time on the set of Blade Runner in between ego disputes with Ridley Scott and all the production delays. He downplayed talking about Blade Runner for many years and it wasn't until the Final Cut rerelease that he started to come back around on it.

# ¿ Oct 2, 2017 17:14

exquisite tea: Apr 21, 2007; Carly shook her glass, willing the ice to melt. "You still haven't told me what the mission is."

She leaned forward. "We are going to assassinate the bad men of Hollywood."

I thought Ford in Blade Runner delivered a genuinely good performance playing against type as a coward and a creep. Deckard being such a lovely human being was an important contrast to Roy Batty's anti-hero, whether it was intentional or not.

# ¿ Oct 2, 2017 17:37

exquisite tea: Apr 21, 2007; Carly shook her glass, willing the ice to melt. "You still haven't told me what the mission is."

She leaned forward. "We are going to assassinate the bad men of Hollywood."

ElectricSheep posted:

Maybe he was just programmed as such in order to be effective at his job? If you fall on the whole "he's a replicant" side of the debate, of course.

I'm firmly in the "doesn't matter" camp on whether or not Deckard is a replicant, but even supposing he was programmed, what does it say about our humanity that having the burden of memory made him a petty shitbag while the childlike Nexus 6 had the fierce will to live.

# ¿ Oct 2, 2017 23:56

exquisite tea: Apr 21, 2007; Carly shook her glass, willing the ice to melt. "You still haven't told me what the mission is."

She leaned forward. "We are going to assassinate the bad men of Hollywood."

The Final Cut is the latest and most definitive version of Blade Runner. Director's Cut if you can't get your hands on that. The rest are interesting curiosities but are weaker presentations of the film overall.

# ¿ Oct 3, 2017 11:54

exquisite tea: Apr 21, 2007; Carly shook her glass, willing the ice to melt. "You still haven't told me what the mission is."

She leaned forward. "We are going to assassinate the bad men of Hollywood."

Samuel Clemens posted:

I never really felt that Blade Runner was particularly slow. Sure, the film takes time to establish mood and setting, but it's also constantly moving forward and introducing new elements. If that's slow, what would you call a Weerasethakul or Tarkovsky film?

Blade Runner is only two hours long. Every big dumb comic book movie of the past 10 years has a longer runtime and worse pacing.

# ¿ Oct 4, 2017 14:39

exquisite tea: Apr 21, 2007; Carly shook her glass, willing the ice to melt. "You still haven't told me what the mission is."

She leaned forward. "We are going to assassinate the bad men of Hollywood."

Well I saw the new Blade Runner and... unfortunately I didn't think it was very good. It was about 45 minutes longer than it needed to be, pacing was really off, every female character felt really underwritten, Robin Wright was criminally underused. Zimmer was a horrible cacophonous mismatch on the score and I don't feel like it even shared the same DNA as the original. The replicant revolution subplot went absolutely nowhere and just springs up in the third act. It felt unnecessarily wide in scope for the story it was trying to tell. Good visuals, that's about the only nice thing I can say about it, which is unfortunate because Blade Runner is probably my favorite movie of all time. You really appreciate how economical Ridley Scott was with his storytelling compared to this languishing, overwrought mess. Do not recommend!

# ¿ Oct 7, 2017 03:28

exquisite tea: Apr 21, 2007; Carly shook her glass, willing the ice to melt. "You still haven't told me what the mission is."

She leaned forward. "We are going to assassinate the bad men of Hollywood."

LingcodKilla posted:

Uh... so was it me or did Chief try to have a go at K?

That was the single strongest scene in the film, it's too bad that Robin Wright's character was totally undeveloped otherwise.

# ¿ Oct 7, 2017 09:45

exquisite tea: Apr 21, 2007; Carly shook her glass, willing the ice to melt. "You still haven't told me what the mission is."

She leaned forward. "We are going to assassinate the bad men of Hollywood."

Neurosis posted:

it's the unicorn scene of this film, and i will similarly treat it as having not happened.

Don't forget that super important scene with Edward James Olmos that looked like it was recorded in 30 minutes at a senior living center.

# ¿ Oct 7, 2017 10:06

exquisite tea: Apr 21, 2007; Carly shook her glass, willing the ice to melt. "You still haven't told me what the mission is."

She leaned forward. "We are going to assassinate the bad men of Hollywood."

There's a lot of stuff that could have been edited a lot better. Pointless scene with Edward James Olmos cameo that contributed nothing to the plot and was obviously shot second unit in a day, sexbot scene with surrogate girl that goes on forever, really bad pacing when Gosling and Ford first meet. It's not what I would consider to be a very tightly edited movie. A lot of people accuse the original BR of being a slow film but Scott is remarkably restrained with the establishing shots and never languishes.

# ¿ Oct 7, 2017 14:04

exquisite tea: Apr 21, 2007; Carly shook her glass, willing the ice to melt. "You still haven't told me what the mission is."

She leaned forward. "We are going to assassinate the bad men of Hollywood."

DC Murderverse posted:

her dialogue in every scene that wasn't the one where she and K talked about his childhood was laughable. Like, the really paranoiac stuff she says about him needing to stop a bomb from going off sounds really goofy and out of place. I get what it's going for but that still doesn't make it any less bad.

The entire time I was thinking "the tone of this dialogue is really off, the planet earth of Blade Runner is a dystopian shitshow where nobody recognizes anyone's humanity period, why is replicant/human conflict seen as such a huge deal." Robin Wright is a personal favorite of me and my wife so to see her have to work with such bad lines was a disappointment.

# ¿ Oct 7, 2017 14:11

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# ¿ May 6, 2024 09:29

exquisite tea: Apr 21, 2007; Carly shook her glass, willing the ice to melt. "You still haven't told me what the mission is."

She leaned forward. "We are going to assassinate the bad men of Hollywood."

Mandrel posted:

I don't know when 2 hours and 40 minutes become "too long" for a movie. Like somebody said, it feels like yesterday that every other "big" blockbuster was 2:30, pushing 3 hours. The Pirates sequels were like 2 hours and 50. Dark Knight was like 2 and a half hours. Independence Day, Titanic, all the loving Lord of the Rings, Braveheart, Heat, Godfather, Interstellar, Django, Gladiator, Inception, etc.

Now it seems like critics think a movie is pushing it at 2 hours and 10, tops. I don't get it. Like, if you're not a movie person that's cool, stay home and watch a TV show if following a single storyline for that long wears on you. The movie is the length it is, there's not a wasted scene or shot in there that doesn't service the plot, characters, world, or visuals in some way. Scenes shouldn't just be cut because you can, there's not any inherent value in a shorter movie besides servicing your attention span or individual lack of interest in the movie.

The length hurting the box office thing doesn't hold much water, like I said there's a mountain of examples that runtime doesn't mean a lot to box office draw. It's definitely not a dealbreaker, anyway. Blade Runner isn't doing good numbers because there's anything wrong with it as a movie (a given, since word of mouth is overwhelmingly positive and people don't decide they're not going to see a movie because they thought the replicant rebellion subplot they don't know about was unnecessary), it's because it's loving Blade Runner. It's a follow-up to a niche movie that doesn't hold much weight branding wise for the vast majority of people. And like it's predecessor it's tricky to market because weird cyberpunk retro-futurism noir is not and has never been a huge draw for the general public. They obviously tried to sell it as an action film, but weird cyberpunk retro-futurism action flick isn't a huge draw either. Ironically, there's probably a much bigger audience for that with the prestige TV crowd these days, if Westworld is any indication. And while people love Ryan Gosling and Harrison Ford, people don't really turn out in blockbuster numbers for movie stars anymore.

The studio had to know all this going in, it's not like it's a big secret that Blade Runner is a cult classic that your average person hasn't heard of, it's like the whole Thing about that movie. If somebody thought they had a big franchise on their hands here they were nuts

The original Blade Runner is not even 2 hours long, and accomplishes a lot more in its runtime than this film.

# ¿ Oct 7, 2017 21:16

The Something Awful Forums > The Finer Arts > Cinema Discusso > Blade Runner 2049: Rick Deckard is a WHAT

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