Is Deckard a Replicant?

[Deckerd]

They ranged from good to alright. None of them had the amazing vision of the Great Ones. I always thought T&L was overrated. Maybe it's just not my kind of movie.

 

[Asbo Zaprudder]

One of my favorites is "1492: Conquest of Paradise" but I understand why it falls short in other people's opinion.

 

[Deckerd]

Let's keep agreeing with each other until the others turn up and spoil it again.

 

[Asbo Zaprudder]

Is this the 5-minute argument or the full half hour? Too late to get your money back now.

 

[Mr. Laser Beam]

^ I've told you once.

 

[General Kang]

Not only has Scott stated unambiguously that Deckard was a replicant, he doesn't seem to understand why there's any confusion about it. The way he talks about it, anyone who thinks he's human must be a complete idiot.

Personally, I think the novelty of having the hero turn out to be a machine ruins what should be a story about a guy rediscovering his own humanity.

QFT. Simple to fix though by ignoring or editing out the unicorn sequence. I think Ridley Scott is somewhat of an idiot savant director. He produces fabulous images onscreen but I'm not entirely convinced that he is in conscious control of his talent when it comes to storytelling.

I think that the idea that the movie needs to be unambiguous, one way or the other, on whether Deckard is human is completely missing the point.

For me, what makes the story powerful (and the primary reason I gravitate to Dick's fiction) is that the audience is not handed irrefutable evidence for either case - human or replicant. Thus, the viewer is left to wonder, just as Deckard wonders, whether he's a replicant... or whether it is possible for ANYONE to know if they're a replicant.

The true power of this, I think, is that Deckard encounters, in Rachel, someone who clearly is a man-made construct, but because of her programming, has no way to discover this for herself... and it makes him wonder about himself. After all, he clearly has memories about things, and people, and places, and interacts with some people who seem to have a history with him (well, at least one, Bryant, and to an extent Holden, though they don't appear on screen together) --- but how can he know that those memories aren't implanted? Especially in light of what he observes in Rachel?

I really, really believe that it is this inner conflict that gives the movie its lasting appeal - beyond its visual excellence, that is. To actually ANSWER that question, definitively, would be to take enough of the mystery out of it, so that upon repeat viewing you'd be watching Deckard go through the confusion, and the wondering, but you (the viewer) would know how it comes out in the end. The way the movie is structured, with no definitive "reveal" moment, we're left to wonder, or to assume, but never to KNOW.

Which is, for me, what makes it so interesting.

 

[Hober Mallow]

One of my favorites is "1492: Conquest of Paradise" but I understand why it falls short in other people's opinion.

Is that the one with lots of boobies in it?

I think that the idea that the movie needs to be unambiguous, one way or the other, on whether Deckard is human is completely missing the point.

For me, what makes the story powerful (and the primary reason I gravitate to Dick's fiction) is that the audience is not handed irrefutable evidence for either case - human or replicant. Thus, the viewer is left to wonder, just as Deckard wonders, whether he's a replicant... or whether it is possible for ANYONE to know if they're a replicant.

I don't have the same take. Ambiguity is fine if it's an essensial part of the story, but if it's only there for the sake of novelty or a "surprise" ending, it makes your movie more of a puzzle than a story.

A writer or director can tell any kind of story he wants, but the story you set up already promises what the ending should be. In other words, you don't open with a character story and end with a mystery. You don't open with a mileu story (a story focused on exploring the world you created, a la "Gulliver's Travels") and end with a character story. And the feeling I get from Blade Runner is that the ending is not the proper ending for the movie that was set up from the beginning. Don't get me wrong, I like the film, but I'll take the Dick story any day.

I really, really believe that it is this inner conflict that gives the movie its lasting appeal - beyond its visual excellence, that is. To actually ANSWER that question, definitively, would be to take enough of the mystery out of it, so that upon repeat viewing you'd be watching Deckard go through the confusion, and the wondering, but you (the viewer) would know how it comes out in the end. The way the movie is structured, with no definitive "reveal" moment, we're left to wonder, or to assume, but never to KNOW.

But is that really what the story was about? Is the movie they set up a story about a guy who isn't sure he's human or a toaster?

 

[stj]

^^^This is correct. All that stuff about Batty's pursuit of Tyrell and why the replicants are even on Earth and Sebastian actually being young despite his appearance is time wasted if Blade Runner is somehow about Deckard's inner agony over whether he's human. Plus, writing Deckard as a boring burn out (as I recall the main criticism of the film upon release,) is peculiar if we are supposed to identify with Deckard's inner self. Most of all, if Deckard is supposedly wondering about whether he's human, it is remarkable he doesn't wonder about his incept date.

The red eyes are not thrust upon the viewer. Being so stupidly illogical, the natural response for a generous viewer is to ignore or rationalize such a moronic lapse. But subtle is not the same as ambiguous. The ultimate fates of Deckard and Rachel in the theatrical edition are actually ambiguous. Deckard's hopes may or may not be justified, but the dialogue establishes specifically that they are merely hopes.
For all the talk about liking ambiguity, this genuine ambiguity (where we really can't know,) is widely detested. Most people don't like ambiguity.
This is perfectly reasonable since ambiguous and meaningless are usually synonyms.

Even if you manage to convince yourself that Deckard is a replicant somehow doesn't undermine the natural reading of the thematic content of the movie, how ever does anyone overlook the way this harebrained idea makes the plot and characters ridiculous?

 

[Admiral Buzzkill]

...I think it was a lot more interesting when it was less cut-and-dried.

This is quite probably true.

You don't seem to grasp that whatever a director says, it's what the audience think that's important.

You don't grasp that what "the audience thinks" is not really important as long as they plunk down their money - first because there is no "the audience," just a lot of people watching a movie at various times and under various circumstances and who may each have idiosyncratic interpretations of ambiguous material, and second because this hypothetical audience doesn't get to vote on those story elements that are unambiguous and explicit in a movie. You and your friends can watch Casablanca and decide that you'd rather think Rick gets on the plane with Ilsa - allowing for the sake of argument that anyone would be so lamebrained - and it means nothing; it's unimportant, and anyone who decided to "interpret" the film that way would be wrong.

 

[Harvey]

All that stuff about Batty's pursuit of Tyrell and why the replicants are even on Earth and Sebastian actually being young despite his appearance is time wasted if Blade Runner is somehow about Deckard's inner agony over whether he's human.

Why isn't the film isn't allowed to develop supporting characters in that case?

The ultimate fates of Deckard and Rachel in the theatrical edition are actually ambiguous. Deckard's hopes may or may not be justified, but the dialogue establishes specifically that they are merely hopes.

In the original version, Deckard's voiceover is, "Gaff had been there, and let her live. Four years, he figured. He was wrong. Tyrell had told me Rachael was special: no termination date. I didn’t know how long we had together... who does?" Then the two go driving off together across an implausibly beautiful landscape.

Deckard's voiceover is definite, not hopeful. Now, you could argue that he's an unreliable narrator, but Deckard himself seems to believe that Gaff decided to let Rachel expire as per her programming rather than to gun her down. And, since they've managed to reach this natural wilderness, it seems plausible that they have escaped, since it is likely this environment is a long distance from the industrial hell of Los Angelels, 2019.

Now, Deckard and Rachel could go spiraling off the mountain and die in a horrific car accident seconds after the camera leaves them. But that's true of any dramatic work that ends with two people driving off. And that ambiguity is hardly comparable to the film's original ending.

And, speaking of the theatrical ending, let's not forget it's rather blaring deficiencies. Namely, a beautiful (yet uninhabited) natural landscape within driving distance of a Los Angeles where people live in horrible squalor and anyone who can has alrady left to find a "better world" on one of the off-world colonies. And, more insulting, the convenience that all Replicants have built in expiration dates...except for the one we care about in the end!

Between the voiceover and the happy ending, the theatrical version is all but unwatchable.

 

[FluffyUnbound]

I also think it ruins the story if Deckard is a replicant.

Dick's entire joke was that humans considered themselves superior to the replicants because they possess empathy. The test Deckard administers is designed to detect the "inferior" and "fake" replicant emotions. But the humans live in a world they have destroyed, and their pretense to empathy is a lie. In the novel, there's a technological device that supposedly "proves" that humans possess empathy, but it is revealed as a hoax. The joke is supposed to be that Deckard thinks he's better than the replicants because he's human, but is in fact no better than they are. That joke collapses if you add the superfluous "twist" that he's a replicant.

Just because Harrison Ford acts like a robot doesn't mean his character should be one.

 

[Admiral Buzzkill]

And, speaking of the theatrical ending, let's not forget it's rather blaring deficiencies. Namely, a beautiful (yet uninhabited) natural landscape within driving distance of a Los Angeles where people live in horrible squalor and anyone who can has alrady left to find a "better world" on one of the off-world colonies. And, more insulting, the convenience that all Replicants have built in expiration dates...except for the one we care about in the end!

Between the voiceover and the happy ending, the theatrical version is all but unwatchable.

Exactly. The studio-mandated ending just about ruins the movie.

 

[stj]

Why isn't the film isn't allowed to develop supporting characters in that case?

Because these are not suporting characters for the imaginary scenario about Deckard's ruminations on his humanity. If the supporting characters do not expand, extend, cast new light on, reflect, or do something to support the main character and his action, then they are not supporting characters. Why such willful disregard for the obvious?

In the original version, Deckard's voiceover is, "Gaff had been there, and let her live. Four years, he figured. He was wrong. Tyrell had told me Rachael was special: no termination date. I didn’t know how long we had together... who does?" Then the two go driving off together across an implausibly beautiful landscape.

Oh, the landscape thing is quite correct. Why ever they keep up a fine road in the supposed nowhere in a world with flying cars is a mystery to me. But I can't take your objection to plot incoherence seriously. The replicant Deckard plot is even dumber, but you don't care about that.

The last line is quite specific: Deckard didn't know how long they had together. He meant one thing. But, as the last line that summarizes the movie, it has a different import. I think this sort of thing is called dramatic irony.

Deckard hoped Tyrell was telling the truth to him and lying to Gaff, instead of the other way round. Strictly speaking all narrators are unreliable, until their reliability has been established. Deckard is reliably reporting the retcon of what Tyrell told him, but is Deckard's ability to correctly identify the truthfulness of his witnesses established? I think the movie makes it clear Deckard can be fooled, or simply wrong.

We of course had seen Tyrell explaining in great detail to Batty how lifespans couldn't be extended. Tyrell wants replicants to stay stable longer, otherwise he wouldn't be farting around making a Rachel. Given that Rachel actually lives with him, it is established from the first that Rachel is in fact special. Logically, if she has false memories to create long term stability, a termination date would mean truncating the experiment! There are other reasons for faulting the final voiceover in the theatrical version, but illogic or arbitrariness in Rachel's specialness is a stupid objection.)

(Rachel's possible extended longevity contrasted to the short life spans of other replicants is a failure in the consistency of the movie's starting premises. If the replicants can't last long, why mess around with false memories to make them easier to work with. But if they can last long, and the termination dates are built in, then why is Tyrell trying to undo them. Batty was too shrewd not to study up biology, so Tyrell could snow him with some big words. Tyrell's death scene is ridiculous if he could in fact save Batty.)

Again, no one who watched the movie really considers Deckard infallible in his judgments. But Gaff knowing that Rachel was near her termination date is in fact the only plausible explanation for why he let her go. The so called happy ending starts there, not in the car, nor with the last voiceover.

Complaining about the car and voiceover, instead of Gaff leaving Rachel alive, is like complaining about the second shot in the head, instead of the first. The "correct," true to character ending, has Deckard finding Rachel's terminated corpse and coming out to see the origami, Gaff signing his work, so to speak. But that's not Ridley Scott's version either.

The voiceover tries to come up with an explanation for Gaff letting her live, letting the viewer regard Deckard as victoriously getting the girl, but simultaneously, via dramatic irony, allowing other viewers to think Deckard was wrong and this seeming idyll will be shortlived. I may be prejudiced because that's what I thought when I was walking up the theater aisle, but there it is.

(By the way, the moronic idea that Deckard is a replicant raises yet another insuperable problem. Tyrell will not tell another replicant the truth, at least without a knife at his throat.)

I don't like the voiceover in the theatrical version either, but it was a desperate attempt to fix up something broken, namely a ludicrously happy nonending, with Gaff letting Rachel live. What would Bryant do? The theatrical ending is ambiguous. It takes only the slightest critical reception to the narrator's authority to completely reverse the meaning. As so often, ambiguity is not a good thing. Ambiguity is a failure to communicate, not superior communication.

 

[FluffyUnbound]

I think we're overanalyzing the question of why Gaff let Rachel live.

It seemed trivially obvious to me that he let her live as a gesture of kindness to Deckard. He knew Deckard wanted her to live.

It's not necessary for him to have any knowledge about Rachel or lack any knowledge about Rachel.

 

[Myasishchev]

(2) The Replicant’s glowing eyes: Throughout the film, Replicants are shown to have glowing eyes. This can be seen with Rachel when she takes the VK Test, with Batty when he approaches his maker (“I want more life, fucker”), and of course with Tyrell’s artificial owl seen in both of these scenes. During one scene which Deckard and Rachel share in his apartment, the eyes of both Deckard and Rachel glow. According to the book Future Noir: the Making of Blade Runner, this was no happy accident, but intentional, with Deckard place slightly out of focus and in the background in order to make the point as subtle as possible. Here’s an image of the shot in question.

Just a minor point, but owls eyes might glow in those lighting conditions anyway. Their eyes have the same construction in this regard as cats (a reflective tapetum lucidum). Hence I never suspected that the replicant owl's glowing eyes were indicative of its replicant status (or even that SFX were used to acheive the look). I also never noticed the glow on the humans, because it's much subtler--but if that is an indicium of replicant status, it would really, really undermine the whole point of the long, involved question-and-answer test, inasmuch as it would be a lot easier just to do an ocular exam.

Nevertheless, I do totally agree with you, for the other reasons. In the cuts with the unicorn dream, Deckard is a replicant. Without that, of course, it's rendered entirely speculative; with that scene, it's rendered almost certain. I suppose any other explanation would require Edward James Olmos to be telepathic, although this possibility need not be ruled out.

Additionally, what grown human man daydreams about unicorns? The fantastic, if not to say childish, nature of the fancy is appropriate to someone trying out his imagination for the first time. Also, as has been pointed out by a billion other people, unicorns ain't real, and neither is Deckard (at least in the very narrow, legal sense of the term that society operates under).

On the other hand, stj has a point (pardon if I mischaracterize it) about it messing up Batty's mercy, since he's just saving one of his own instead of a human.

So? He only got the script, and interpreted the character for himself. Which is his job, of course.

I'm sure someone mentioned this, but Harrison Ford should have thought Deckard was a human. After all, Deckard did. If I were Ridley Scott, I certainly wouldn't have disabused him of the notion in directing him.

 

[J.T.B.]

As so often, ambiguity is not a good thing. Ambiguity is a failure to communicate, not superior communication.

I don't agree, there. Ambiguity can make a movie more engaging for the audience, encouraging original thought to make sense of what they've seen. Some directors have made a career of making ambiguous movies, although commercially they are often not very successful.

As I've mentioned before when this has come up, I preferred it when Deckard being a replicant was ambiguous. Although the original theatrical version has plenty of shortcomings as mentioned above, that wasn't one of them. It was more fun as one of those movie discussions you could have with your friends later, like does Shane die at the end of Shane, or what's in the box in Pulp Fiction? I remember discussing the Director's Cut with a friend after seeing it in 1992, and both immediately agreeing that some kind of spark of mystery had been extinguished by definitely confirming that Deckard is a replicant.

As others have said, Deckard being a replicant undercuts the nobility of Deckard, inspired by Roy, choosing to recognize the humanity in Rachael and turning his back on the system to try and save her. If Deckard isn't human, it's just two replicants saving their own asses.

--Justin

 

[Harvey]

All that stuff about Batty's pursuit of Tyrell and why the replicants are even on Earth and Sebastian actually being young despite his appearance is time wasted if Blade Runner is somehow about Deckard's inner agony over whether he's human.

Because these are not suporting characters for the imaginary scenario about Deckard's ruminations on his humanity. If the supporting characters do not expand, extend, cast new light on, reflect, or do something to support the main character and his action, then they are not supporting characters. Why such willful disregard for the obvious?

The last question I pose back to you. Whether or not the film is about Deckard questioning his humanity, the central external conflict is Deckard's pursuit of the escaped Replicants. If Batty isn't trying to meet his creator in order to extend his life, what is he doing on Earth in the first place? Replicants are illegal there ("under penalty of death") and, moreover, Earth is an industrial wasteland (ridiculous theatrical ending aside).

J.F. Sebastian's "Methuselah Syndrome" serves two purposes. One, it explains why a genius (a designer of artifical brains in his early 20s) of his caliber hasn't left for the wonder of the off-world colonies. Two, it provides an area of common ground between he and the Replicants, offering some explanation as to why he is so willing to cooperate with them once he knows they're not human.

I suppose you could drop both of those characters, but then you're left with Batty as an antagonist who has no motivation whatsoever and so little screentime that the audience would be unable to care about his actions in the end in any meaningful way.

Just a minor point, but owls eyes might glow in those lighting conditions anyway. Their eyes have the same construction in this regard as cats (a reflective tapetum lucidum). Hence I never suspected that the replicant owl's glowing eyes were indicative of its replicant status (or even that SFX were used to acheive the look). I also never noticed the glow on the humans, because it's much subtler--but if that is an indicium of replicant status, it would really, really undermine the whole point of the long, involved question-and-answer test, inasmuch as it would be a lot easier just to do an ocular exam.

In the original dialogue (it has been dubbed in all the released versions) Deckard notices that the owl is genuine, not artificial. Later, Ridley Scott had the idea of the owl having glowing eyes, so the dialogue was replaced in order to indicate the animal was artificial.

You're correct that the glowing eyes undermine the VK-test (although it isn't such a long test--it only took Rachel a long time because of her implanted memories) if they're accepted as diagetic. Like the glowing spines of Battlestar Galactica, I've always read the glowing eyes as a nondiagetic device for the benefit of the audience only. Scott makes the same analysis in an interview at the end of the book Future Noir (which I continue to bring up because, well, it's great). Whether you buy that explanation is up to you.

Additionally, what grown human man daydreams about unicorns? The fantastic, if not to say childish, nature of the fancy is appropriate to someone trying out his imagination for the first time.

Well, Ridley Scott (the unicorn dream and other unicorns in the film are his contribution, not that of Hampton Fancher or David Peoples), but, yeah.

On the other hand, stj has a point (pardon if I mischaracterize it) about it messing up Batty's mercy, since he's just saving one of his own instead of a human.

I don't see any indication that Batty realizes Deckard is a Replicant, so it doesn't undermine the act for me. Batty does say that, "I've seen thing you people wouldn't believe." Also, it's a scene of the hunted saving the hunter whoever truly is a Replicant.

I'm sure someone mentioned this, but Harrison Ford should have thought Deckard was a human. After all, Deckard did. If I were Ridley Scott, I certainly wouldn't have disabused him of the notion in directing him.

It's not out of the routine for a director to flat out lie to a performer in order to get the performance he wants. On the other hand, in that book I keep bringing up (Future Noir), there are a few instances where a performer and the director have pretty different memories of what direction Ridley gave in certain scenes.

 

[Kegg]

An observation: Tyrell was also planned to be a replicant at one point. This was going to be obvious when he was being killed; as Batty crushed his face the technology supporting him would become visible. The real Tyrrell was in some sort of cryosleep. I think they simply abandoned the idea due to time, or the effect didn't work, or whatever (don't recall.)

Deckard is a replicant in the movie because that's the only conclusion that really makes sense. Gaff knows about the unicorn; he knows that the unicorn is significant; and what other significance could there be?

Which is different from, say, Total Recall, where I'd say Arnold Schwarzenegger is still inside the fantasy because that's simply the more interesting answer (either way, feh, not fond of that film.)

Does it undermine the relevance of the story? Not really. Thematically Blade Runner never struck me as that deep; it's Film Noir plus robots, with an energetic man child at the centre (Roy Batty). Deckard is listless, relatively dull and somewhat inhuman; he could be a real human or a fake robot but the point about humanity made by the other replicants remains fairly clear. More human than human, this is indeed Roy's trait. The childishness of the unicorn daydream is very apt as emotionally - if not intellectually - the replicants are all children; they are immature; not even Deckard is necessarily even a decade old.

Does it undermine the plot logic? Possibly. Hiring a non-superman to kill them on paper doesn't seem as useful as hiring a superman, but then, a superman might be suspected of being a replicant? It may be that Deckard as a replicant is as good at his job as any human hypothetically could be, but not good enough for people to suspect he's really not a human being. Even still, he could have used more backup or something.

Still, the ambiguity does come from Ridley Scott's intention being at cross-purpose to the screenwriters, which I believe wanted Deckard to be human, IIRC, and of course he's a human (and married, no less) in the novel.

 

[Harvey]

I think the Tyrell thing was abandoned for the same reason Zhora's dance isn't in the movie--they couldn't afford to build the extra set required. The movie already reuses a ton of sets and other materials (count the number of times the neon dragon is in the movie, for example). Tyrell's office and bedroom are the same set, and the pillars seen there are used on the street set as well.

 

[stj]

I don't agree, there. Ambiguity can make a movie more engaging for the audience, encouraging original thought to make sense of what they've seen. Some directors have made a career of making ambiguous movies, although commercially they are often not very successful.

One little detail again, that although subtle enough to easily miss and being every bit as dumb as the national park at the end and hard to accept, the red eyes remove all ambiguity. At this point, people are just arguing that ambiguity is great and/or what Sir Ridley Scott says is not just automatically correct but great art.

Genuine ambiguity means you can't decide what it means. The kind of ambiguity that really comes up most often is the ambiguity of people's motives. The curious thing about that is, barring an intense desire to sit in judgment on people for not being sufficiently pure, it doesn't make much difference. The thing that matters is what people do. As far as encouraging thought goes, taking a definite point of view can do the trick even better, I think. The viewer can be inspired to think why he or she disagrees.

Things like whether Shane lives or dies, or what's in the box in Pulp Fiction are not decidable, but also irrelevant to the drama. Shane is not choosing to live or die at all. But he did choose to fight, then leave (if I can trust my childhood memory of the movie, that is.) What's in the box in Pulp Fiction being a mystery doesn't undermine what themes you can find in Pulp Fiction. One of them seems to be, shit just happens. A mysterious box fits right in with that one. Whether Deckard is a replicant just doesn't.

Unless, the thought occurs to me, the moral of the story is that being a bad robot like Batty is sexy and cool and so badass not even a billionaire can escape your righteous wrath. But being a good robot like Deckard means being boring and dim and depressed and so wimpy you get beat up by women.

Why didn't I see it before?

Of course Deckard is a replicant! The ironic contrast between the superior coolness of evil and the dorkiness of good is totally lost if Deckard is a human being!

My humblest apologies to everyone for wasting their time.