This is STILL one of my favourite movies. I watched it in cinema all alone and when I walked out of the mall it was raining. There's something surreal about that feeling that I remembered to this day.

Something I find interesting that I've seen nobody discuss was what a Sapper is. In classic military conflict a sapper is one that tunnels under walls of a castle or a trench and places explosives [or something else like piers of wood and a fire to destroy them] to 'tear down the wall'. Bautistas character is meant to knock down the wall that other characters in the film talk about. He is the first significant step for K to in other words become human. As if the idea of something metaphysical like a miracle is necessary to take steps to humanity. I.E. something that is so out of line of what you KNOW to be or be possible made manifest directly in your vision, keeping with the themes of eyes in the first film mainly, and lesser so in 2047. But 2047 also deals with touch, what you feel. And feeling anything might be enough to make you human.

Bladerunner: Do robots dream about electric sheep? Bladerunner 2049: No. They dream about electric Ana De Armas.

It's good to see a creator skip the all too common trend of bombarding the viewer with background music. Listening to a voice alone is more impactful when the spoken word takes center stage with no distractions. Audiobooks speak to this as we keep up with multi-layered narratives unfolding over hours and hours. Those of us who enjoy excellent long form studies like this will stick around (probably more than once if we're passionate about the topic) and we don't need a synthwave beat to keep us engaged.

Worked as a prison guard for the better part of 8 years. I can say with 100% certainty that some people have a LOT less empathy than the replicants presented in these movies.

Good to see this movie still getting attention!

2049 is so badass. Ryan Gosling killed it.

One of the better analysis videos of 2049, thank you for the effort and perfect delivery!

That scene of the giant hologram Joi calling him Joe broke the internet. Because it's not just about whether Joi or K is real. This isn't just about can synthetic humans be special. This scene makes the viewer question if they, or anyone is really special. Remember, this scene takes place right after Joi is destroyed and tries to say "I love you". Just like K, the viewer thinks she and K are different .But the scene with the hologram destroys that illusion the second she calls him Joe. Because the cold truth is, waaaay deep down, every married couple wonders where's the line where they can be replaced. An illiness? Old age? A job layoff (every guy I knew in a relationship before the Great Recession wasn't after it)? So what's the point of anything? I guess you have to ultimately find your own reason to feel special. K does this at the end. When Deckard asks why K did all this, he doesn't answer. He lived his life his way proving that, while not unique, he could still act like someone who was. And that's what this is all about. It's your actions define you. Was K just another replicant that could be replaced and maybe that replacement does the same thing he did. Hard to say. But the point is he made the choice to sacrifice himself to do the right thing.

I can barely put into words how highly I regard this film and its philosophy on life. Not many movies present such deep questions and even fewer have the balls to attempt to answer them. I'm thinking films like Barry Lyndon and Grand Budapest Hotel. Stories that reflect on what a life is, what's important, and why it's important. I'm sure if you asked 20 people they'd all have a unique list of what films do that for them, but BR2049 is probably the top of it for me.

Joi is a test of K's humanity, of the viewer's humanity. If you are heartbroken by her demise, you bear grace, you are humane. If her plight makes you a better person, then she is worthy, she is important, and regardless of whether she functions upon programming, she makes people better by evoking love and empathy. To me, this is incredibly human.

Found myself tearing up at several points along the way... and, ultimately understanding it better than I had after watching the three shorts and feature three times each. Thank you!

With Joi ( literally designed to be a 'jerk off instruction' AI), K continually gave her free will, and had no intention of controlling her. He treated her as if she was real, and her programming adapted. I thought that their relationship was sweet, and that in a way, he was able to help her break her programming, just as he was able to break his own programming. When she sacrificed herself, she demonstrated selflessness, as a key aspect of sentient consciousness. When he sees the ad for Joi after his Joi has 'died', he does not see his Joi in her, because his version of her was unique to him. He is clearly grieving for his loss and cared about her. To them, their love and affection for each other was real, even if they were both technically artificial life forms. This point is also driven home by Deckard, when he asserts "I know what is real!"

Yes, I've always thought, "Is Decker a replicant?" was the wrong question. The deep question that resonates is pondering whether or not there's any actual difference between human and replicant.

"Remember, her eyes were green." That just changed my life dude.

This film as a stand alone is one of my all time favorites, as a sequel it vaults into the unprecedented. The shear keen insight into culture and social conditioning is piercingly adroit. Couple that with the profound exploration of what it is to be human and the core contemplation of the nature of human awareness is unparalleled in my opinion. When you add to that, the fact that is is an extension of the initial expression of the original film in the form of a sequel... it occupies cinematic rarified air for me. Truly unparalleled. Thank you Mr. Scott for the gift of this study of human psychology and social conditioning. I shared it with my 17 year old son, who after three days returned to me and asked to watch it again after the notions it stirred in him had settled a bit. He was gobsmacked by the implications it brought up socially and psychologically.

That is a great analysis. Made me think about it in a new way. Thank you for putting this together!

A most excellent analysis. Thorough and accurate. Superb presentation.

Great take, I agree with the majority of your observations, I disagree that K was using Joi as a distraction like Instagram, I see it as a yearning and reaching for a human life, a striving for humanity. And the relationship in the beginning may have been like you say, but I see growth in both, as you said when she risks mortality by being disconnected so they can't make her talk, and at the end when she is destroyed she also in a sense sacrifices herself. I think the evolution of the 2 "artificial" life forms show us the melancholy/ sadness of life and death.

Great insights. I appreciate your work on these long form vids.

Thank you for this. I saw another commenter stating they work in a prison and someone else commenting if we can expect humans in captivity to ach human. I also work in a prison, and while I'm free to leave at certain times I'm as much a human in captivity and just as free to change myself as we were yesterday. In order to change we must destroy who we were and the illusion of our present. That's why this analysis moved me too, because it helps me accept my reality.

I always thought an element of Joys character opened the question of A.I. As sentiency and another level of the existential pondering. Her “version” by her own experiences surely leaves this open, much in the same way replicants were.

I loved both movies. My view on the "Reality Matters", is somewhat different, now that I am closer to the end than the beginning. I would be happy with Joi. A simulation of companionship and kindness is better than none at all.

I’ve watched this movie a few dozen times. It’s such a great movie to get blazed to and get lost in. I watch it a hand full of times a year.

You nailed the Joi character, bravo. With that nailed a major theme and your closing statement was also spot on. Good job but that's only half the story. The movie is about how someone transcends all that through humility, faith and sacrifice. The religious undertones are in your face. You had said, "To shake people from their reverie, it takes a miracle" and that moment for K, that you describe as his most human, happens in front of Dr. Ana Stelline. When Mr. Wallace first hears of Dr. Ana Stelline, he proclaims, "a child is born" and Freysa talks about her as a type of Messianic leader. So let's look at that. In the first half of this movie, which you covered excellently, K is a loser, unfulfilled with the equivalent of a sex doll for a girlfriend but the story is this. He is pursuing a meaningless life no bigger than himself and devoid of showing love to those around him. The world hates him for it. He starts to escape this in the discovery of a false narrative (fantasy) that he is special. You could say it's analogous to having visions of grandeur, having main character syndrome or just acting like all these tiktok kids. That fantasy is a lie that nearly breaks him. When he visits Dr. Ana Stelline the first time, he glimpses something beautiful but is not able to see it properly because he's looking through a perverted lens. He then loses everything until he finds himself standing in front of the Joi billboard with it's black soulless eyes. It is there that he casts off his bandages, literally, in that scene and accepts a framework of providence and humility and understands what he was not valuing the right things. He faces his final battle against Luv. I don't entirely know what to make of it but he kills her I would argue she represents the love of false things. When she says she is the best one, I believe this is intentionally someone who seeks validation in status like those people who think that whoever has the biggest toys wins, the guy with the most expensive car should go first etc. Her name after all is a diminutive but I believe Joi's is too and the dichotomy between joy and love is obvious. "Happiness is fleeting but suffering requires a sustaining meaning". Joi is analogous to a porn addiction, and in porn the acronym JOI stands for jerk off instruction which I find hilarious in her role as a hologram. I believe that where as Joi represents the placating forces that keep us from rising up, Luv represents the love of worldly things that sends us in the wrong direction. At any rate, K goes back to visit Dr. Ana Stelline, taking Deckard. K has found peace in the service to others. So to me the point of this movie isn't just a warning about consumerism but it's about developing enough humility to have kindness, love and sacrifice for the people around you despite any injustices. When faced with his own impotence, K could have become bitter and resentful but instead chose humility and sacrifice. In so doing so, returns to Ana able to see the truth. He has his soul intact. It's a beautiful movie and it is equally applicable to us all. Some people have accused this of being a Christian or even a Christmas movie because of the Christ themes present in Dr. Ana Stelline. While I believe she represents faith more broadly, living behind glass apart from the world. As the memory maker you could argue that she plants the seeds of a soul in each newly "born" replicant. It is worth noting that when Luv is getting her nails done, you can see Rudolph the Red Nose reindeer painted on one of them. There is also a slight wolf theme in this movie that I am not clear on. We just mentioned Rudolph. That name from it's origins means famous wolf. The name Love means female wolf and Joi's ringtone is from Peter and the Wolf. I am also of the opinion, which is pure conjecture, that they wanted Wallace to look somewhat wolf like. They're first choice was David Bowie and while I have no idea if the wolf theme is real, would wonder if it ties into the electric sheep androids dream of. Would love to hear people's thoughts. Edit, I wanted to add that the name Freysa is the name of the Norse goddes of love and being Norse with 1 eye, there are clear parallels to Odin. I believe she helps him understand what to love and why. Oh, and clearly Mackenzie Davis was the real catch the whole time. Honestly, I've never seen any other movie so layered, full of art and so resplendent in it's philosophy as this one. If you read this far, thank you.

Amazing video! Thanks for showing me new things about this movie. It was especially interesting to see that the poem of the baseline test was in the book that Joy read to Kay.

Very interesting material, and very well told. I'll definitely take a look at what else you have.

Wow, this was one of the best essays I've seen. Awesome job! I love this film so much and this helped me appreciate it on a whole other level...

Movies don’t need to supply all the answers. Provoking discussion for years afterwards is a job well done.

I love warching this movie to fall asleep. Always makes me fall asleep without fail, and for that, its one of my favorites

BR2049 gets better with every watch. While the entire film is very visually stunning and pleasing, the scene where K visits Dr. Ana Stelline ("The Child") is one of the best scenes in the film. "I can't help your future, but I can give you good memories to think back on and...smile...If feels authentic, and if you have authentic memories, you'll have real human responses...wouldn't you agree?"

The sci-fi book ‘Friday’ by Heinlein has a good discussion of replicants vs humans.

I love vidéo essays like this. Very well put together.

thank you for making this video, I've seen the film a few times. I loved it but didn't pick up on half of what you mentioned here. Definitely needs another watch now

The message of Blade Runner, both, is that human exceptionalism is an illusion, and results in defacto racism and specieism. The exhaltation of human life above, and separate from, all other life is the path to delusion and death. The soul, in this context, the context believed and celebrated by most of humanity, is nothing but ego. Ego is seductive, as K experiences when he thinks he was born. However, it was the removal of this fantasy of specialness that allowed him to act truly as a human, as he realized that desire for purpose need not end with a desire for self, for it is truly born in compassion for other living beings, whether like us or not.

It is wild that Jared Leto is still making movies

I don't know. This might in fact be my favorite movie of all time. I cannot recall a more beautiful cinematic experience than seeing this in the theater for the first time. Of course, it tanked. But we get 10 sequels for Fast and the Furious. I do not understand my brethren.

Blade Runner was my favorite movie growing up, you did a great job m8 \m/

I really really love this movie, from a philosophical perspective. From a narrative perspective. And from a cinematic perspective. My favorite genre… cyberpunk ❤

Thank you for this incredibly intelligent and illuminating exploration of this amazing film. When I first watched it I had hoped that 2049 would not tarnish my love of the original but it is arguably even deeper, smarter and more beautiful than the original.

WOW! Brilliant synopsis! :)

Wonderful video essay. It does Justice to the powerful, memorable, amazing movie that 2049 is!!!

Great video bro really in depth

Awesome analysis of one of my favorite movies. I’ve lost track of how many times I’ve watched it.

Thank you so much. Words can'T describe what you moved inside of me with this Video.

Ryan gosling put on a masterclass in acting

One of the best sequels of all time

Loved the in depth analysis of the movie. I appreciate the movie more now

This film left me sitting in the theater for a while after it was over. The rest of the evening I just kept thinking about life - meaning, purpose, love, the difficult and complex nature of reality etc. I ended up writing a summation after having seen it a second time: There was no real decoy. It was purely on paper. K/Joe is utterly, completely, unequivocally unremarkable, thus his name, Joe... as in Average Joe. Joi does not possess a soul. She is completely fake. She is the other side of the Replicant coin and is made solely to please and coddle her owner/lover. Her entire branding scheme is that she'll be anything you want. Joi is K's fleeting dream of being special -- to be human... or as he put it, "to have a soul" -- so she always reinforced this to him. In her final moment she made sure to tell Joe that she loved him... Just before Luv crushed her emanator. Wallace posed a question about whether Deckard was moved by love or by programming. To me there's no doubt whatsoever Deckard is fully human. The original movie is about a bad man finding his humanity through the grace of a machine. Wallace's question is not a literal "Are you human or machine?" question, but pondering what the difference is; if love is just neurochemistry, and if we are products of biological programming or something higher, like a soul. The ultimate takeaway is that it really doesn't matter. What matters is what we choose to do with our lives. We find and create our own meaning and purpose. In summary, 2049 is about dreams and delusions. K wants desperately to feel special so Joi tells him this constantly and he quickly assumes all the evidence points to him because it's his dream. He becomes deluded and forces himself into the situation even as it destroys him. He thinks this is what it means to be human - to grapple with one's humanity. Then upon meeting Freysa, K comes to learn that in fact he is not special after all. Not born but manufactured. He is torn between two sides telling him what his identity is and should be; the LAPD who informs his identity as that of a slave, and the resistance which informs his identity as that of a free Replicant. When K comes across the giant pink Joi on the bridge, she says to him "You look like a good Joe". He then realizes that not even the name his Joi gave him was special. Her feelings for him were never real... just programming. K, at this point an emotionally broken Replicant, it is in this moment that he chooses to follow his own path and not let anyone tell him who he is or what he should do. He makes the most human decision of all and takes his life into his own hands. He saves Deckard for the same reason Roy did in the first Blade Runner. He wanted someone to remember him, for his final decision that fully validates him as human to not be in vain. No one else gave him his identity, only he did, and his sacrifice ensured forever that he was by every metric a human being, even if the world would ultimately forget him. And this is why I love Blade Runner 2049 so much. It resonated the deepest parts of my being. And the music score. *Chef's kiss*

Phenomenal; and so very reflective of what we are going through now.

Great analysis. The double entendre of the J.O.I. acronym was brilliant and apropos . Look it up. lol.

Glad to see this movie get so much love. I was so enthralled by this when I saw it, I felt it was a beautiful masterpiece. Afterward I found the opposite opinion was prevailing among the viewership, at least the vocal part. I agree with another's comment, that it will only get better with time and upon reflection. I loved the original Blade Runner, I didn't think it needed a sequel but I did enjoy the sequel nearly as much or as much as the original.

K was ordered by Joshi to keep a secret, therefore ordering hin to be able to lie.

Damn.. I've seen so many videos on why this is a good or bad movie, but this might be the first one I've seen on what it's about. Well done! 👏👏👏

Great analysis. Who is to say, we as humans, are not some form of AI technology? We have a CPU (brain) and Sensors to interact with the physical environment (smell, touch, taste, sight, hearing)

2049 nailed it, and just like the original, it will take years, decades, for it to grow and be truly appreciated.

One of the greatest video essays. ❤

Good video. Nice perspectives.

Great video. It was heartbreaking to see Joe realize the lie of Joi. Gosling was exceptional in this movie. I've loved the original BR more than you know and I think Denis Villeneuve crafted a sequel better than it had any right to be. He's not a lightweight director as evidenced by his movie Enemy.

Seeing Joi fall in love with K was the first time that really made me think about if our current AI can form human emotions. Like was she really in love with him, or was she programmed to be? This is where the technology is headed, and i think it will keep people from forming real human bonds. Whether they are programmed to love you, become sentient, its real enough for the user. Thankfully, this would be less destructive to the world than a rogue AI supercomputer like Skynet. But it will create a world of introverts instead lol. So pick your poison. Overall this was a great video, i enjoyed it!

"Remember her eyes were green." Beautiful close out ;)

Outstanding analysis!

God, thank you for recognising that Joi's love isn't real. That's like the whole crux of the theme, and it just isn't the same if Joi's love was somehow genuine.

Oh sweet! 👍🏻 Thank you Gil. 🙏🏻

So good! Thank you!

This movie was a goddamn masterpiece

Blade runner 2049 is the masterpiece we need but we don't deserve 😭

Nice video, it’s funny I have seen this movie at least twice, but videos like this it’s like I didn’t see it lol.

I really enjoyed watching this. It helped answer a lot of questions I always thought about. Only part I don’t like is …… I have to join “Crunchyroll“ in order to see those animated versions. Now I got to try to find some kid who has a User & password that he’ll loan me so I can watch the 13 episodes. 😅

Brilliant commentary. A top ten all time movie for me. Blade Runner being number 1

EXCELLENT analysis.

You are one of very few commentators who really get PKD - in particular that character arc of regaining empathy to become human

Fascinating, tganks for the explanation

I love the original, but I like 2049 even more!

The warmth and empathy of humans is nurtured as a child. People who lose the good memories of their childhood (trauma, damage) all question their own existence and humanity.

Watch those scenes again, because this is important. K and Luv *never* lie in them. The writing here is extremely clever. The replicants say things and Joshi assumes things, but the replicants never lie. Luv predicts that she is going to tell Wallace that Joshi attacked her first and she killed her in self defense. And that's *exactly* what happens. Luv provokes Joshi into attacking her first by making Joshi believe she's capable of lying. But she pulls this off without ever telling a literal lie because Luv is a genius and Joshi is a master at self deception. K takes advantage of the fact Joshi trusts him, and then Joshi takes advantage of Joshi's paranoia. In both cases Joshi is undone by her own flaws, which the replicants are smart enough to exploit successfully. All without telling a single lie.

Wow nice dive into the material.

The ethical question re: androids always makes me think of the plight of animals, who are reduced to objects for our instrumental use - even though we too are animals and only not necessarily superior - only more powerful due to technology. Mammals and birds have souls. They are individuals with personalities, the ability to love and be loved, to feel pain, to dream, etc. But they are treated as inanimate objects to be used.

Excellent video, enjoyed your analysis & insights, Personally watched this movie multiple times at the cinema, a total cinema experience, thanks to Denis Villenueuve & Hans Zimmer et al. Have liked & subbed

I find the juxtaposition between illusions and reality interesting considering humans capacity for creating illusions. It would be interesting to see a story explore how humans can often act in ways we ascribe to ai while ai can sometimes act in ways we ascribe to humans (beyond what has been in this and similar media like ex machina of course)

Very profound. Thank you for that

2049 is a modern classic. It becomes more relevant every day.

*This was a great analysis.*

I do love videos like this, but I always find the "is Joi's love real or not?" speculation to be both hilarious and sad. How do you know if a real life human's love is real? How often has someone said "I love you" and it was a huge lie? A human can pretend to love someone or fall out of love with someone for any reason, or no reason. I think an argument could be made that Joi's love is more pure than a human's love, because she would never do or say anything to hurt or betray K, because she can't. Honestly? I'm more convinced a dog's love is more pure than a human's love most of the time.

ya know why i like this movie because when K finds out he's not special he's so angry. Which is all of us then he finds purpose and does his duty.

Staying with brown … Good content bro. Greetings from good old Germany. ✨🦉💫

Ai girlfriends may be the future. A Woman like Joi would sell like crazy. April 2024. USA

I haven’t watched past 30 min of this movie ever, not sure why not. My father and brother watched it in theaters when released and loved it

I actually saw the original Blade Runner in the theater when it was released. It did all right but was pretty much a box-office disappointment. It was nominated for the Hugo award at the World Science Fiction Convention. Since it was competing with Star Treck II, The Dark Crystal, a film about an E.T. and and another one about a Road Warrior staring an unknown Australian actor named Mel Gibson, it was not expected to win. None of the major people associated with the film bothered to attend. They sent a lowly third assistant director who was an SF fan who was going to attend anyway. After Blade Runner won the Hugo we were treated to the site of a dazed young man wandering the halls, going from party to party, clinging to a rocket model on a pedestal. I had a nice, if surreal conversation with him while keeping his beer glass filled. The thing is, the appreciation and reputation of the first movie grew slowly over time. Even a year after it's release, it won the Hugo award despite the supposedly unbeatable competition. I think the same thing is happening to Blade Rummer 2049. It is also going to be considered a classic in a couple of decades.

Perhaps Wallace knows full well that it is inevitable that the units will develop emotions, and the baseline test is their way of ensuring the units will feel shame and accept their retirement.

It’s still one of my top favorites movies of all time

I can’t wait to watch this movie on my vision pro

Im just wondering, which movie do you think is better, 2049 or its predecessor?

I like this essay a lot. Just like the film. :)

What it is to be Human isn’t just a matter to be known, it’s also about to be felt. A felt knowing. “The felt source … wellspring of life’s ceaseless vitality.” ~ Mark Vernon

B​oth the original Blade Runner and 2049 deal with the question of what it means to be human. Most people focus on the conclusion that a replicant must also be human if there are no differences between the two, but I find it interesting that the reverse of that conclusion seems to be evaded by most too, that if humans can be mass produced, just like any other product, then there's nothing intrinsically special about us, that we are nothing more than the sum of our parts. I think most of us seem to instinctively block this though out of necessity, to believe that we are something more.

It is a movie about a Dream of Ken from the Barbie universe that has about living in a future where he is not oppressed by the Matriarchy in Barbieland.

I was surprised how good this was, reboots normally suck but this was probably better than the original.

I like what the sequel did and it actually provided roy with real motivation to save deckard... We all see that the replicants had a close nit underground they knew who is whom... It was a secret society... So they all knew Rachel was pregnant and it was a miracle the replicants all rejoiced and saw that they can now extend their due date by having offspring. Therefore Roy in a way got his life extended through Deckard and Rachel's daughter. That is why he saved Deckard. He too wanted the miracle child to have her parents. And Roy felt like he extended his life and memories vicariously.

Love both films though I was never really clear on whether Rachel's eyes were actually green or if Deckard just wanted to punish Wallace for creating a Xerox of someone whom he loved. I'll have to go back to the first film and see since I remember them as brown. Either way, great films!