[tingol]

2049 did so many things well (great visuals, great acting, waaaay better love story, better detecting!), but the main story sucked so much. The messianic human/replicant hybrid and the foreshadowed uprising seemed so cheap. The original asked hard questions that's why it's still talked about, the sequel took it away and answered it itself and quite poorly IMO.

[mhh__]

I thought the story was fine. Blade Runner's story honestly isn't all that good, the concept of the memories and K's self-discovery is arguably better than the original if you imagine that the original barely has a story as per se (but does have a better defined set of plot-beats).

2049 feels like it asks less questions, but wait until we have better AI in 10 years and watch how prescient including Joi rather than a new replicant character is.

[kirevmaco]

I saw 2049 when it came out. I didn't like the original film much but of course was still curious about the sequel since I liked the original novel.

One problem I have with both these movies is that the whole "memories" thing doesn't have anything to do with the point the original novel was making. The main point of the original novel is that the replicants are fake human beings which are not only deplorable due to their lack of empathy but are also rather dangerous, and that real human beings will likely become dehumanized ourselves in our eventual efforts to eradicate them. I'm paraphrasing Dick in that last sentence but you can hear the more full version in this interview: https://invidious.snopyta.org/watch?v=3d7XMnmPgUk

Anyway, I agree that 2049 has more of a plot than the original, but I lost most of my interest in the movie as soon as I realized that the main character was a replicant (which unfortunately happened pretty early on). Great cinematography though.

[mhh__]

Authentic replicants like the book wouldn't work on screen, I feel.

The movie tells you K is a replicants within the first few minutes, it's not ambiguous like deckard (eh), the point of K is that he has meaning handed to him on a plate - he might be human.