Blade Runner 2049 (2017)
Dying for the right cause is the most human thing we can do.
THE SUMMARY: Thirty years after the events of one of my all-time most-hated movies, a young blade runner hunts rogue replicants and discovers a secret that sends him on a search for the truth about himself, humanity, and replicants alike. Shockingly, there are several pieces I appreciate about this one. It’s a massive improvement over the first, but still suffers from many of the same flaws.
FROM MOVIE-PICKER ROSS: Cells. I agree with Matt that Blade Runner is a bore-fest. Cells. I had zero hope that the sequel would be any different. Cells. I love that 2049 was able to prove me wrong. Cells. It was able to do this despite the presence of Jared Leto. Cells.
THE BEST:
The elites’ need for a disposable workforce underclass fed by bugs: The bug eating, the literal manufacture of slaves, the explicit statement that every civilization is built on the back of a disposable workforce - frequently, this movie is so on point about the trajectory of our society, it almost seems like mockery. Is this a warning of a dystopian future, or is this the Hollywood elite laughing at us because they know that we know, and won’t do a damn thing about it?
There are several aspects of this theme that keep me thinking long after watching, and not just the thirst for domination at the expense of all moral considerations. Is it actually true that slavery builds society? Does one person’s prosperity actually depend on another’s oppression? And what is it about human nature that seeks that domination over respect for the rights of others? By dehumanizing, either philosophically as we’ve seen in past atrocities, or literally as we see in Blade Runner’s fabrication of robot people, we can avoid all of that moral messiness, or so we can convince ourselves.
If our enemies or our servants aren’t truly human, a lot of injustices can be justified. Despite all of my disputes with Blade Runner and 2049’s presentation choices, the deep themes are fascinating and important.
Dying for the right cause: Of course I must appreciate the theme of a principled death, for which I am personally destined in the impending Gay War. But it’s not just for the bit - there’s a lot of truth to the line in the movie: ‘dying for the right cause is the most human thing we can do.’ There are fates worse than death, and these include the sacrifice of what it means to be human: your rights, your family, your dignity, or, as the founders conceptualized it, your life, liberty, and pursuit of happiness/property. If capacity to reason is what separates humans from other life forms, then death in pursuit of reason is a uniquely human thing. We all die eventually - the trick is to live a life of virtue before we do. If we sacrifice fundamental values for fear of death, death still gets us anyway and we lose on both counts.
Excellent visual effects and symbolism: I must acknowledge that much of the reason 2049 is a more visually pleasing movie than the original for me is simply the technological advancement in the nearly forty years between, so I do. But in addition to the aesthetics of 2049’s effects, I also appreciate their symbolism, specifically two: Joi’s frequent malfunctions and the ‘birth’ of the replicant at Wallace’s production headquarters.
Joi’s flickering, intermittent functionality symbolizes that no matter how advanced and convincing our tech gets, it’s not a complete replacement for the amazing complexity that is the human being, and it likely never will be, so accept no substitute and keep your priorities straight.
The replicant’s ‘birth’ is slimy, gross, and pathetic, but not just because the effects team made it visually so, and the actress performed it so (and both did a great job). It’s slimy, gross, and pathetic because everything that makes a human birth beautiful has been stripped of it. There is no celebration. There is no joyful and grateful mother and father. There is no infancy to watch develop into adulthood. There is only mechanization.
In other words, the ‘yuck’ factor isn’t just the KY jelly they smeared all over this actress. The yuck factor is the perspective that grants no value to humanity inherently. The yuck factor is a guy with a god complex who decides what lives are worth living or not. Reject human rights, and the results are grotesque - the scene is an excellent illustration of that point.
What seems like an obvious plot isn’t: I wouldn’t call it a jaw-dropper or anything among the greatest movie twists I’ve ever seen, but I do appreciate a set-up for what seems obvious turning in a completely different direction. Through nearly the entire movie, all signs point to K being the secret son of Deckard and Rachael. Joi connects the dots to say so. The birth records say so. K’s memory of the toy horse coming true at the orphanage says so. Dr. Stelline’s confirmation that the memory is real seems to say so, until it’s revealed the memory is in fact her own, implanted into K. All the prior clues were actually misleading and he has no direct connection to Deckard or Rachael or natural birth at all.
On a presentational level, I like a movie that has the courage to pull a move like that - leading the audience to believe something that seems obvious only to show it’s completely false. It’s a bold move because defying audience expectations is a quick path to disappointment - in fact, failing to meet expectations is the very definition.
But I appreciate it even more on a philosophical level. Never take what seems obvious for granted. Always ask questions, even when it seems stupid to do so, or even when they call you stupid for doing it. The only stupid person is the one who claims to know without actually knowing. The guy with the humility to know what he doesn’t is much smarter. The only reason Socrates was wise is because he knew that he was unwise, after all. So never assume you know it all, even if it seems obvious that you do.
Joi malfunctions on crash landing
The replicant ‘birth’
THE WORST:
Fake humans - cool concept, boring characters: One of my primary complaints with the original remains in the sequel. When you make fake humans stripped of their souls, the characters lack, well… soul. By design, yes - I get it. The whole point is these replicants lack an intangible set of ingredients that make humans human, and that deficiency is reflected in characters who are robotic. I understand why the characters are the way they are, but it doesn’t mean I’m entertained by it. I thought the original did a remarkable job of making one of Hollywood’s most charismatic actors totally flat, and Harrison Ford’s same boring performance returns in the sequel as well.
The same terrible pacing: Another major complaint I have with the first movie is it takes forever to get to the point. There are interesting concepts to consider, if you like the intrigue placed sporadically between scenes of the movie constantly admiring its own environments. In the original, there was little to admire. In this one, the visuals are better and more worthy of an extra second of sight-seeing, but still, I get it - the setting is a dystopian decaying urban hellscape. I don’t need fifty different establishing shots of it.
Several scenes are painfully slow, even if plot-relevant. The orphanage scene takes forever just to make its point: the toy horse remains where K remembers placing it. Great - just take ten fewer minutes of walking around in silence to establish that fact. Same goes for K’s death - it’s a choice he made for a principled reason, a fact I can appreciate, but I don’t need several extended minutes of dying on a sword. Make like Jericho in End of Days and get on with it. Just because snowflakes are falling doesn’t mean it’s so much more meaningful.
One additional note: it’s debated whether K actually dies at the end of the movie or not, since the death itself isn’t shown. Screenwriter Michael Green confirmed in an interview that K does indeed die.
The sex scene: My gripe with the sex scene between K and Joi is also pacing-related, but not exclusively. I’m actually very conflicted about it because it’s a scene that’s both great and terrible simultaneously, for different reasons.
On the movie pacing, K and Joi’s entire romance is only tangentially related to the main plot mystery of whether K is Deckard and Rachael’s son or not, so for a side point to consume so much time is somewhat frustrating. And of course bizarre AI sex is as awkward in presentation as it sounds in writing, but there are additional points for both appreciation and criticism.
As I’ve already credited, the visual effects of the AI mapping herself onto a real woman are quite impressive, and believable. But the philosophical implications are quite worrisome - how far are we away from putting digitally enhanced bags over women’s faces like this? Think ‘OnlyFans plus.’ Subscribe, map that girl’s appearance onto any old meatbag, and enjoy your time. No real human connection necessary.
That sounds dystopian because it is, but this movie strangely romanticizes it. We’re supposed to believe in the love between K and Joi, even though she’s just an algorithm available to anyone. She’s literally programmed to say ‘I love you,’ yet there’s supposed to be meaning when she does. How the movie intends for her to be understood I find confusing, but maybe that’s the point. Maybe she’s supposed to be convincing because that’s what would entice us all to buy her as a product. Or maybe the message is that technological advancement always carries costs with its benefits, and those costs have to be weighed against moral considerations.
I really could go either way in including this scene under ‘the best’ or ‘the worst’ about 2049. The reason I’m including it with my criticisms is because it’s a side point that consumes a lot of time, without clear philopshical intent in doing so.
The porn statues: And on the point of side-quest sexual indulgence, I have to take a moment to laugh at the statues of the Vegas ruins. Like the Joi sex scene, there is actually some nuance to analyze here. The movie is not saying that giant statues of women in porn poses should be viewed as a good thing. It’s saying the opposite - that this perversion and destruction of the relationship between men and women creates ruin, not paradise. That’s a point I can certainly appreciate, but the presentation is so over-the-top it comes off as a joke, not a serious, ominous philosophical point. The women on their knees are ridiculous enough, but in homage to the first movie, STOP, ENHANCE. It’s even crazier in the background - see below.
Here I sit calling the movie ridiculous for this presentation, but I’m probably the ridiculous one. Give our society until 2049, and I’m sure we’ll be building statues to even more degenerate idols and ruining society in far worse ways, actually. At least this sculptor got the female form right. The real statues will probably be obese trannies.
The step up from OnlyFans
False idols
THE RATING: 3/5 Wickies. A much more interesting presentation than the original in its concept, execution, and effects, but the same slow pace, boring robot characters, and weird aesthetic choices hold it back from greatness.
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NEXT WEEK: Amadeus (1984)
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