Blade Runner 2
- Thread starter WarpFactorZ
- Start date
Ahhhh...that makes sense. And I wondered about the spine, especially considering the size. Still, it's only $12, so I'll probably get it now, that way I can review it after I watch the film in preparation for 2049.
The second short film, 2048: Nowhere to Run, focuses on Dave Bautista's Sapper.
Nice background delving. I'm really impressed out the production team has largely recreated the similar aesthetic of the original film on the ground level.
However, I've been avoiding spoilers as much as possible, so I was a little disappointed that
However, I've been avoiding spoilers as much as possible, so I was a little disappointed that
the short ended by revealing that Sapper is a Replicant. I was looking forward to being surprised by who might be a Replicant and might not. Perhaps it's been mentioned elsewhere, even in a press release that Sapper is a Replicant and I just haven't seen that.
If the information was revealed in an official short ahead of the film's release, then the filmmakers want us to have that information ahead of time, and that means it isn't a spoiler.
Yes, I get that. My point was I didn't know if that was the case or not.
The coming third prequel short, to be released September 26, will be an anime by Cowboy Bebop director Shinichiro Watanabe(!!!!!) that details the cataclysmic Blackout of 2022.
Oh, I wasn't sure whether the anime was the third short or a separate, longer project. I mean, neither of the other shorts had its own trailer as far as I knew.
Anyone else notice the rather familiar looking face @3:09?
Nice. I didn't notice either until now.
Is that Adam Savage?
To be honest, it was extremely likely to the point of obvious that Dave was gonna be a replicant. It's nice he is closer to the Leon figure Brion James thought he was playing rather than what we got onscreen.
I am not too happy about the grim being added into the dark with the people trafficking aspects (children particularly) being highlighted in recent releases. It's not like I think BR is some great utopia, but it is something I cannot imagine being in any way good for or useful for the plot, and could do without the bad taste. (Remember when the BSG reboot realised the same thing and stepped away from that episode? Yeah.)
One problem this new short does serve up is that This replicant is now 100 percent sympathetic, and therefore how he is treated in the new film is going to be heavy handed in a way the original wasn't...even the most sympathetic of the replicants in the original was shown to be manipulative and violently murderous in the original. (Priss is the only replicant not to murder anyone, and she struck the first blows in her fight with Deckard...not even decisive defensive blows, but sadistic fighting to hurt before going for the kill. She is also shown manipulating Sebastian, and goodness knows how his friends got trussed up.)
So subtlety about the position of replicants and relative morality will be lost. Especially with how messed up we now see multiple human characters behaving. Maybe that's part of the plot...but subtle it ain't.
I am not too happy about the grim being added into the dark with the people trafficking aspects (children particularly) being highlighted in recent releases. It's not like I think BR is some great utopia, but it is something I cannot imagine being in any way good for or useful for the plot, and could do without the bad taste. (Remember when the BSG reboot realised the same thing and stepped away from that episode? Yeah.)
One problem this new short does serve up is that This replicant is now 100 percent sympathetic, and therefore how he is treated in the new film is going to be heavy handed in a way the original wasn't...even the most sympathetic of the replicants in the original was shown to be manipulative and violently murderous in the original. (Priss is the only replicant not to murder anyone, and she struck the first blows in her fight with Deckard...not even decisive defensive blows, but sadistic fighting to hurt before going for the kill. She is also shown manipulating Sebastian, and goodness knows how his friends got trussed up.)
So subtlety about the position of replicants and relative morality will be lost. Especially with how messed up we now see multiple human characters behaving. Maybe that's part of the plot...but subtle it ain't.
I couldn't disagree more. The obvious angle to play is that Replicants offer a way to replace human slaves. Just behind that would be that slavery has filled the void left by the banning of Replicants and that Replicants are perceived by some to be needed to set that aright. Will they play either card? I have no idea, but these possibilities are certainly things that are easy to imagine that could be "useful" for the plot, as things look now at pre-release.
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The film has gone to great lengths to recreate the look and feel of the original, which is wonderful. However, this is supposed to be 30 years onward from 2019, but the world looks basically the same. I suppose this is due to the "great blackout" putting temporary brakes on technological advances.
Can't wait for October 6th!
Can't wait for October 6th!
If anything, the norm throughout most of human history has been stability; periods of swift innovation and change have been the exceptions. We don't tend to realize that because we happen to live during one of those periods and we solipsistically assume that our experience is normal. But in the grand scheme of things, bursts of rapid innovation only come with the right combination of societal needs, attitudes, and opportunities. Globally, they've been the exception rather than the rule.
Indeed, even today, there are plenty of places in the world whose appearance hasn't changed much in centuries, even if many of the people in them are now carrying smartphones. Progress has never been uniformly shared.
Would be interesting to see (or at least hear) exactly how the world recovered from the blackout and "turned the lights back on" as it were.
It's not the slavery issue (though that was something always implicit in the original..wel...explicit eventually.) it's the grimdark child trafficking. The implied sexual trafficking also....the society already shown in BR has what appear to be licensed and legal red light districts, and a level of desperation or technology to keep the, fully staffed. So why would it exist in the narrative? Beyond a heavy 'look, humans are shit to humans, no wonder they are Shit to replicants too' and a heavy 'replicants as humanities children, which are treated badly but may ultimately be its salvation' what purpose does it serve to story as currently presented? Could the same story be told without the need to lean on Shock (not that it's uncommon in this century's media) story crutches?
Because as NuBSG (something which borrowed actors, story hooks, and slang from BR) shows, there are people who aren't going to respond favourably to that use of a very serious real world problem as set dressing in a fiction. (Myself included.)
It's also infantile storytelling. The original never needed to make a villain appear villainous by showing them harming the weak or vulnerable. Modern storytelling though...relies on that trope. And it has its roots in children's stories...you introduce you child as an orphan or suffering to engender sympathy (Roald Dahl does it over and over, and Harry Potter continues that cue. As examples.) except now, in adult fare, we show that suffering, usually to a horrible conclusion, as a moustache twirl to show a villain (group or individual) as a villain. It saves bothering with character or motivation...here is a villain, watch him lose and be glad he did.
None of that suits the narrative style of the original Blade Runner. There was more grey and less gratuitous stuff. What violence was lingered on, was framed artfully or fast and hidden in shadow. The really dark stuff (Priss was a pleasure model.....Sebastian was dying from a genetic disorder probably grafted into the Replicants...etc etc.) was implicit, not explicit.
There is no grey in what has been shown, and it's a clumsy way of showing a society in decay so we can shine a light on the 'good' that much more easily.
It's has the potential to be lazy storytelling.
But, am hopeful it won't be, and will be handled well...though that almost never happens.
I don't recall Rachel being that way.
(Sure, she killed Leon, but that was in defense of Deckard.)