(Reblog) Blade Runner Review
by James Wallace Harris, Wednesday, October 11, 2017 Normally I don’t write “reviews” of works I dislike. Why waste time on bad art, huh? I prefer to promote creative work I admire. However, in trying to understand why I disliked Blade Runner 2049 I asked myself, “What did I love about the original?” It came to […]
via Blade Runner 2049 – The Evil of Heartless Sequels — Auxiliary Memory
Peteybee here – I actually enjoyed the movie, but I went in with low expectations. It worked well for me as a mystery. (MILD SPOILER ALERT BELOW!)
The negatives: I found the characters mostly dull and charmless. Notable exceptions of Luv (the evil fembot), who’se desire to… I dunno, please her boss, or be the best or whatever – although dysfunctional, and dark, had a magnetic thing about the way she expressed her motivations and you just want to watch what she will do in her robotic way. Even though unsexy, she had the spark. And Decker, of course. Harrison Ford, being the character he knows how to do so well.
If only the protagonist, K, or the villain, Wallace, had even the slightest bit of life in them… “subtly portrayed” is the polite euphemism. Especially wasted was the potential of K’s interactions with his AI simulated mate. You could probably make a whole side-story about life told from the point of view of a simulation like Joi, but one who *is* actually human, in essence of character, but lacks a body and has to resort to tricks such as she does. But seeing her earnest (if pre-programmed) desire to please so frustrated was almost painful, which I’m sure was the intended effect. Still, you’d think K could do something more creative than just “buy her an upgrade”. He does prove to be creative and intelligent… just not there.
The scenery too, a letdown – and that is something I was looking forward to, since major scifi movies are now dominated by CG which is really just what such movies call set design. But all they did was re-create the “Blade Runner” world, which 35 years later is just a cliche. Again, a couple of exceptions- I liked the orange-light world (even though it’s just fog effect, probably the cheapest CG trick in the movie), and also Decker’s area. The latter especially by way of contrast, after having the rest of the movie in such a dead place. Seeing an interesting interior, anything, was badly needed.
But! Despite all that, the plot is fantastically written and the movie moves. I really wanted to know what would happen at the end, and was excited for each reveal. Easily worth $10.
The review I linked above goes into much more interesting stuff, so do check it out!
Pete's Politics and Variety 
I agree with you on how disappointing the characterization was in this film. For a film to be good it needs people (replicants) we care about, feel for, and want to achieve their goals. None of these characters had goals that defined them outside of plot goals. They were all puppets of the plot.