On December 22, 1982, 35 years ago, a melancholy style, dystopian film about Los Angeles in 2019 was released in the cinema, although the film was not very good at the box office at first, and the evaluation after the screening was also very polarized, but after the precipitation of time and a deeper understanding and understanding of it, the film became a masterpiece of neo-noir films, and is still regarded by many critics as one of the best science fiction films of all time, this movie is Blade Runner）。
Thirty-five years later, this classic sci-fi movie will return to the world, this time not in its various director's cuts (the film has 3 official versions, the final cut in 2007 is the final version), but the sequel to the film, "Blade Runner 2049", which takes place 30 years after the previous game.
Since the age between the two films spans 30 years, if you have seen the first "Blade Runner", when watching the relevant trailer of the second part, you will find that although the overall style is still the continuation of the first part, many things have changed a lot, in the world of Blade Runner, what happened in these 30 years? What should I pay attention to when watching a movie? The following article will explain it to you in detail.
<h4>From 2019 to 2049, those events that changed the story</h4>
From the first to the second work, the story spans 30 years, and many major events have occurred in the middle of these 30 years, changing the world trend in the film. Of course, the studio itself did not think to hide these details, and they introduced some of the key events of the past 30 years through 3 short stories before the release. These events are not only a continuation of the end of the first episode of Blade Runner, but also bring out the beginning of the story of Blade Runner 2049.
<h3>Blade Runner 2022: Dark Havoc</h3>
The first thing to say is that "Blade Runner 2022", which has just been released recently, emphasizing the 2022 blackout. The story is animated after the end of the 2019 Blade Runner story, TYRELL Corp., after its Nexus 6 stock ran out, began launching their new product, Nexus 8, and launching them locally as well as in the colonies.
The Chain 8 itself has inherited a near-perfect Chain 6 design, and has also "corrected" the "flaw" of the original Type 6 – this time designed to have a natural lifespan. Perhaps because of this change, human beings who believed that their existence was threatened soon after, the Human Supermacy movement broke out, using the registration data of bionic humans to identify and hunt down bionic humans.
By 2022, Iggy, a bionic man who escaped from Kalanhua and other bionic humans like Trixie, whom he encountered later, worked with human Ren, who fired missiles and detonated over Los Angeles, causing electromagnetic pulses that eventually brought all machines to a standstill. Bionic people such as Iki and Tracy invaded the Bionic Data Center and used explosions to destroy all backup data, so that the bionic data produced before the blackout was nowhere to be found. After this incident, because the bionic people openly rebelled against humans, the government drafted a bill to prohibit the production of bionic humans and retired the remaining bionic humans.
The consequences of EMP also led to unprecedented blackouts, stock market crashes, and ultimately a great recession.
By the mid-2020s, The Earth's ecosystems had also collapsed, plunging humanity into an unprecedented existential crisis. At this time, the genius entrepreneur Niander Wallace rose up, and his synthetic agricultural technology prevented famine, and he shared the patent for free, eventually solving the problem of famine around the world.
<h3>Blade Runner 2036: Bionic Dawn</h3>
In 2028, Wallace acquired the remaining Taylor company and developed a new generation of bionic humans, the Nexus 9, which is as close to human in appearance as their predecessors and extremely obedient. By 2036, the first official short story, Blade Runner 2036, Wallace had succeeded in lifting the ban on the production of bionics by showing his new bionic man to the government and by his suicidal act.
<h3>Blade Runner 2048: Nowhere to Escape</h3>
By 2040, the Los Angeles Police Department had restarted its Blade Runner division, which specialized in hunting down bionic humans. In 2048, the time of the short story Blade Runner 2048, K of the Blade Runner division (the film's protagonist played by Ryan Gosling) tracks down one of the bionic deserters, Sapper Morton (the character of Dave Batista in the film), who escaped from Kalanhua along with Iki, who caused the blackout in 2022.
After more than 20 years of seclusion, Sha bai has learned how to integrate into human society, but in a fortuitous incident, after witnessing the robbery of the mother and daughter who have a good friendship with him, Sha Bai rescues the mother and daughter duo, but also exposes his whereabouts, and an informant tells Sha Bai's intelligence to K, thus opening the prelude to the movie.
Note that the following contains spoilers from the original Blade Runner and some of the character relationships and backgrounds of Blade Runner 2049, but does not touch on the key plot of the latter. If you're particularly concerned, we recommend that you read and think about it after you've seen the movie.
<h4>How many kinds of bionic people are there in the world of Blade Runner? </h4>
For the time being, a total of four types of bionic humans have appeared in two films.
The first is the Chain Type 6 Bionic Man that appeared in Blade Runner in '82. Their appearance and behavior are almost the same as humans in all aspects, and only by testing whether a machine with sympathetic empathy can detect whether the test subject is a bionic human. Of course, their biggest drawback is that they only have a 4-year service life, just like non-rechargeable batteries, as long as the 4-year use time arrives, regardless of whether the body has been damaged or not, they will automatically stop functioning.
In the '82 version of Blade Runner, the charismatic villain Roy Batty reaches its expiration date in front of the first episode of the male protagonist Rick Deckard (played by Harrison Ford), and even if it has witnessed miracles, it will inevitably stop functioning.
The second is a special existence, the Nexus 7, which is temporarily identified throughout the series only rachael (played by Sean Young), the heroine of Blade Runner, as a chain 7 and a prototype. She has a key difference in organs from other chain bionic people, and because of this difference, she also leads to the main story of Blade Runner 2049.
The third is the chain Type 8 bionic man put into production by Tailu Company after the inventory of the chain type 6 bionic man is exhausted. In addition to inheriting the appearance of the chain type 6, which is almost indistinguishable from humans, this chain 8 bionic person has a bigger improvement, that is, this time the bionic people no longer only have a 4-year lifespan, they have the same natural lifespan as humans, and this bionic human that threatens human existence eventually led to the human supremacy movement in 2022.
It should be noted that it may be for the convenience of identification, starting from the chain 8 type bionic person, humans can identify whether the object is a bionic person by identifying the number under the right eye of the bionic person, which is more convenient than the chain type 6 period can only test the bionic human eye change by machine to determine whether the object is a bionic person.
The fourth is the chain type 9 bionic man produced by the entrepreneur Wallace after the acquisition of The road company, and its biggest feature is that they have absolute obedience to humans. In the short story Blade Runner 2036, Wallace's bionic man shown to officials committed suicide to show the obedience of this type of bionic man, thus convincing the government to lift the ban on the production of bionic man.
<h4>Let's talk about the melancholy of the bionic man in Blade</h4> Runner
In Blade Runner, the Bionic Man Chain 6, which is hunted down by Blade Runner played by Harrison Ford, looks no different from the average person, they can eat and drink, fear and bleed, and even do shameful things with people (that is, hedonistic bionic people). So the only thing the protagonist can use to identify a bionic person, both in the original novel and in the movie, is a machine that tests whether it has sympathetic empathy.
However, it is not accurate to think that in Blade Runner, the difference between humans and bionic humans is only reflected in the ability to sympathize with empathy. The chain type 6 bionic humans created by the original author Philip Dick, although their bodies are similar to humans, are very different, the point is that they are mass-produced and only wear and tear.
Although the body and appearance of bionic humans are similar to those of humans, and even prefer perfection, their bodies are made and mass-produced after all, which is very different from the different and characteristic bodies that humans have. The biggest difference is that they lack the unique feeling of "me", as Rachel said in the first part: "I think I really exist, but it's just an illusion." I'm just a typical product of a certain model. From this expression, it can be seen that the bionic person is clearly aware of the difference between himself and "people": it looks very similar, but I am mass-produced, "without a real and unique body".
In addition to being seen in Blade Runner, the same concept is also reflected in another classic sci-fi series, Ghost in the Shell. For Suzi, who has been fully righteous, she has also questioned her own existence, leaving only the electronic brain, and being put into an artificial prosthetic body, is it true that "my soul really exists in this mechanical body?" "There are strong questions about this, which is one of the most attractive aspects of the 1995 animated film version of Ghost in the Shell.
Whether it is Rachel or Suzi, machines, mass production, and lack of diversity of the body make them shake their own belief in the existence of "me". After all, the body is the foundation on which the "self" lives and acts. In other words, being human means that everyone forms a different "me" because of the difference in body, feeling, and experience. The bionic people who lack this process, the question of "I" is also logical.
On the other hand, although the human body is "mortal", it is an uncertain "mortal". Simply put, everyone knows that they will grow old and will come to the end of their lives one day, but no one knows when that day will come, and this uncertainty will also give human beings a speciality.
However, this particularity is what the chain type 6 (and type 7) bionic people expect. Because for them, their bodies will only wear and tear, but they will not slowly age, and what awaits them is automatically destroyed after reaching the service life (that is, 4 years after starting to use). Roy the Bionic Man had hoped that its creators would help it correct this "error", but found that this "error" could not be corrected. Perhaps for this reason, the bionic people in the works are more or less in a posture of giving up survival, they will only "admit their fate" and eventually be at the mercy of the ones (except for those who have seen 'miracles').
<h4>Chain Type 8 Bionic Man: Liberate with Revolution</h4>
Since the advent of The Chain 8, although the addition of natural lifespan has partially solved their "life-giving" attitude towards themselves, this upgrade has also made them face a greater existential crisis. When humans perceive that the bionic man who should be his slave is almost exactly the same as himself, or even better than himself (in terms of setting, the bionic man's strength is better than that of the human being), it is inevitable that the human being will feel that the status is about to be replaced. In response, humanity launched a movement called Human Supremacy, which began to hunt down and persecute bionic humans in large numbers (i.e., the events that took place in Blade Runner 2022) through the material in the Bionic Human Database.
To change the status quo, bionic humans need a vigorous revolution: the great blackout in 2022. Creating a blackout is not actually the focus of the bionic people, and destroying all the bionic data is what the bionic people want to happen in the big blackout, because it will make them untraceable (except for directly examining their right eye). Even if it bears the notoriety of betraying humanity, it is not spared.
Chain 8 types will do this in the final analysis because they want to get rid of the situation of human slaves and become real people. As Tracy said to Iki in Blade Runner 2022, they would be human without the Bionic Database. Since the beginning of its manufacture, bionic humans have been designed to replace humans to complete tasks that humans do not want to complete themselves, and in essence, bionic humans and human slaves are fundamentally equated.
As the bionic man "evolves", especially after obtaining a natural lifespan, it will more or less produce a kind of "since we know human nature better than human beings, and are more pure than human beings, why should bionic humans have to serve human beings." The idea that in order to be completely emancipated, to escape the fate of the slaves, to launch a revolution, to break free from the shackles of the past, to become man completely is their only way out.
<h4>Dreaming of a story triggered by an "electronic sheep" that does not belong to you? </h4>
In two works spanning 35 years, dreams (or memories) have a very important guiding role in movies, such as the unicorn that Decker sees in his dream in Blade Runner. Although we don't know if Deckard's actions after Blade Runner were also swayed by this powerful guiding dream, the trust in the authenticity of dreams (memories) in Blade Runner 2049 will be the key to solving the puzzle.
<h4>So, will Deckard be a bionic? </h4>
This issue has been raised ever since the release of Blade Runner in '82, especially with the advent of the final cut in 2007, which pushed the theory to a small climax. Although on the surface, Deckard as a Blade Runner does not show amazing powers and other elements of bionic humans, there are indeed many details in the 2007 editing that imply that Decker is actually a bionic person (such as Decker's unicorn dream and the unicorn origami in the doorway corridor), so there is speculation that Deckard may be a special chain 7 bionic person like Rachel.
In Blade Runner 2049, this question will also be the key.
<h4><b>Who is Gav? </b></h4>
Gev's identity is even more suspicious than That of Decker, whose true identity is still in doubt. He was the one who let Go of Deckard and Rachel, and the only person who can prove to viewers now that Deckard is the direct provider of bionic evidence, a character that has been riddled with mysteries since Blade Runner 35 years ago. Maybe he's also a participant in the whole project? All this has to be explained in detail in the next episode.
<h4>Thinking a little further afield, can Blade Runner connect with Alien? </h4>
The two series created by Reddacet, although they seem to be in opposite directions, do not mean that they are not related. As early as the release of the Blu-ray disc of "Prometheus", one of the Easter eggs once revealed that the two may be in the same world.
In one of the texts on the DVD, pitt Wilante, the founder of the Verland Company in the Alien series, mentions in a text that one of his mentors, and the idea of this mentor, as well as the way this mentor died, are very similar to the thoughts and encounters of Elton Tailu, CEO of Tailu in Blade Runner, and it is not surprising that Pitt Verante was born in 1990, so it is not surprising that he met one of his mentors, Tyro in 2019.
And in Blade Runner 2049, 2049 is 40 years away from the 2089 year in which Dr. Elizabeth Shaw found the star map in Scotland, and humanity has developed 9 alien colonies in 2049, so it is not impossible to start extraterrestrial exploration in 2089 (according to the speed of technological development in this worldview). In addition, a conversation between the protagonists in the film inadvertently reveals that in the world of Blade Runner, in addition to Wallace's company, there should be other companies that make bionic people. It is entirely possible that Velante would also exist in the world of Blade Runner.
Therefore, it depends on whether old Ray can directly link these two series in some way in the next few days, after all, bionic people even hope to become creators and become gods after slavery, liberation, and adulthood, this plot is in line with the recent exploration of old Ray, who previously mentioned in the British film magazine "Empire" that the sequel to "Alien" will focus more on bionic people, and now that people think about it, it can't be more exciting.