# Blade Runner: question about Roy Batty's soliloquy **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [March 4, 2011, 1:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/blade-runner-question-about-roy-battys-soliloquy/573437 "2011-03-04T01:54:15Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 6
**Author:** ![Unpronounceable](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/9de0a6/32.png) [@Unpronounceable](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Unpronounceable)\ **Post date:** [March 8, 2011, 7:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/blade-runner-question-about-roy-battys-soliloquy/573437/102 "2011-03-08T19:15:48Z")
> [@Sr\_Siete](#): > > The physiology of replicants is indistinguishable enough from humans that they can only be found out through something called a Voight-Kampff test, which actually requires expert knowledge to interpret. Actually, no - the Voight-Kampff test was a field-test. If you recall, when he was arrested by the alternate police division, the autopsy confirmed his kill was a replicant. And the snake-replicant had a serial number on every scale…the human ones could easily have had something similar. ---
**Author:** ![Dread\_Pirate\_Jimbo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dread_pirate_jimbo/32/3897_2.png) [@Dread\_Pirate\_Jimbo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dread_Pirate_Jimbo)\ **Post date:** [March 8, 2011, 7:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/blade-runner-question-about-roy-battys-soliloquy/573437/103 "2011-03-08T19:56:15Z")
> [@Alka\_Seltzer](#): > > If that’s the case, it lends further support to the idea that the off-world colonies are extra-solar. It seems unlikey that a significant proprtion of Earth’s population could migrate to an artificial environment and enjoy a better quality of life there. if the Blade Runner universe had the technology to build artifical environments on that scale, it would still be chaper and easier to build them on Earth, no matter how ruined it is. Agreed, although it isn’t stipulated in the film – maybe we need to see the 4-hour rough cut that Ridley Scott first presented to the studio to get some of these details. I wonder when they’ll release that version?.. > [@Bridget\_Burke](#): > > I know the book’s world isn’t exactly like the movie’s. But, in the book, Earth had been damaged by a low-grade nuclear war. No Armageddon. But the weather had been screwed, many animals were extinct & most humans who remained had some kind of illness. > > And the off-world colonies were beyond our solar system. I need to re-read the book – it has been a number of years now and I forget a lot of that stuff. ---
**Author:** ![kombatminipig](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/b5ac83/32.png) [@kombatminipig](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kombatminipig)\ **Post date:** [March 8, 2011, 8:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/blade-runner-question-about-roy-battys-soliloquy/573437/104 "2011-03-08T20:17:16Z")
> [@Bryan\_Ekers](#): > > Why would you deliberately design a machine to catch replicants that was weaker than replicants? > > For that matter, why would you let your purpose-build replicant-hunting machine quit, as Deckard did? He never did. The reason I prefer Deckard to be a replicant is because it turned my world upside down when I realized that the first scene we see him in, is literally his first scene. He’s only a day old when he gets collected and rehired. Hence all the exposition, he’s literally hearing it for the first time…and being tested. Why he’s weaker? Because him knowing that he is a replicant would probably ally him to the replicants’ cause. It may need to be shoehorned into the story, but it does give the whole thing a bizarre twist. ---
**Author:** ![Alan\_Smithee](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/2acd7d/32.png) [@Alan\_Smithee](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Alan_Smithee)\ **Post date:** [March 8, 2011, 9:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/blade-runner-question-about-roy-battys-soliloquy/573437/105 "2011-03-08T21:52:45Z")
> [@kombatminipig](#): > > He never did. The reason I prefer Deckard to be a replicant is because it turned my world upside down when I realized that the first scene we see him in, is literally his first scene. He’s only a day old when he gets collected and rehired. Hence all the exposition, he’s literally hearing it for the first time…and being tested. > Why he’s weaker? Because him knowing that he is a replicant would probably ally him to the replicants’ cause. > > It may need to be shoehorned into the story, but it does give the whole thing a bizarre twist. Right! I think the key is _not_ to think of it as a surprise ending with the origami unicorn as the “big reveal.” That does weaken the movie. But if you watch from the beginning with the assumption that Deckard is a replicant, you’ll find that the movie makes perfect sense, that nothing challenges your assumption that he’s a replicant, and that characterizations and interactions that otherwise seem bizarre now make sense. If you watch the movie with the assumption that Deckard is human, _you find exactly the same thing!_ It’s a brilliant exercise in ambiguity. (Except for that damn unicorn dream! It’s presence or absence seems to just tip the scales one way or the other.) Interestingly, I made the comment earlier that in the Director’s Cut/Final Cut, we are led to believe that Rachel and Deckard have limited lives as replicants, but that actually, this would likely be a lie since Tyrell would have had every reason to secretly have given them extended lifespans. In the theatrical version, we are told explicitly that Rachel’s lifespan is _not_ limited, but if Decakard is a replicant, then again, it seems likely that Tyrell would have had every reason to have lied about that! The only reason Deckard saw Rachel’s file is that he was shown it by Tyrell. But if he’s the one pulling replicant-Deckard’s strings (and the police’s), he’s hardly trustworthy! If the whole thing is a setup to test Deckard and Rachel, it would make sense that he would tell Deckard that Rachel has a full lifespan in order to make her more attractive to him, regardless of whether it’s true. So in one version, we’re told that Deckard and Rachel live happily ever after, but it’s perfectly plausible that they both collapse like Roy Batty after the credits roll. In the other version, we’re told that Deckard and Rachel are doomed, but if they can escape the building (which–if he _wants_ them to live–Tyrell would have arranged) it’s perfectly plausible that they live happily ever after! How’s that for a mind fuck! ---
**Author:** ![GargoyleWB](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gargoylewb/32/199_2.png) [@GargoyleWB](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GargoyleWB)\ **Post date:** [March 8, 2011, 11:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/blade-runner-question-about-roy-battys-soliloquy/573437/106 "2011-03-08T23:37:27Z")
> [@kombatminipig](#): > > … > It may need to be shoehorned into the story… The shoehorning shows when, in order for the entire secondary cast to “play it straight” in their reactions to Deckard, it requires a ridiculously complex conspiracy. Here is Deckard, supposedly implanted with a vast beat-cop hard-boiled history of being a Blade Runner, with a network of contacts, stoolies, associates on the street and the police department, and somehow _everyone_ successfully plays the straight man without tipping Deckard off to the secret. Simply Deckard walking up to his favorite street noodle vendor, saying “Hey Ralph, I’ll have my usual noodles today” and Ralph replying “Do I know you, buddy?” would send the whole mess crashing down. Him flashing a badge to enter a crime scene and all of the other beat cops treat him as real, and then knowingly winkwink-nudge-nudge to each other at the Nexus-X prototype replicant walking around as a cop? The police chief, Tyrell & Gaff, are merely unlikely co-participants in this conspiracy, factor in the necessary support-conspirators and it just becomes unworkably silly. ---
**Author:** ![Alan\_Smithee](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/2acd7d/32.png) [@Alan\_Smithee](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Alan_Smithee)\ **Post date:** [March 9, 2011, 1:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/blade-runner-question-about-roy-battys-soliloquy/573437/107 "2011-03-09T01:15:23Z")
But who else knew him? His only contacts with the police are Gaff and Bryant. He wasn’t a beat cop; he was a contract killer for them. He doesn’t seem familiar with the noodle vendor or anyone else. Seriously, watch it again with this in mind from the beginning and you’ll find that although nothing forces you to conclude he’s a replicant, there’s absolutely no shoe-horning required whatsoever. The movie was very clearly constructed with this possibility mind. It works equally well telling two almost completely different stories, and which one you see depends on what you’re looking for. ---
**Author:** ![Gukumatz](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/74df32/32.png) [@Gukumatz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gukumatz)\ **Post date:** [March 9, 2011, 1:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/blade-runner-question-about-roy-battys-soliloquy/573437/108 "2011-03-09T01:40:55Z")
Depressingly, these questions may be put to rest in the possibly upcoming “multi-platform” sequels. Or - _shudder_ - prequels. [http://themovieblog.info/news/new-blade-runner-movies-in-the-works/](http://themovieblog.info/news/new-blade-runner-movies-in-the-works/) ---
**Author:** ![Princhester](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/3e96dc/32.png) [@Princhester](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Princhester)\ **Post date:** [March 9, 2011, 4:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/blade-runner-question-about-roy-battys-soliloquy/573437/109 "2011-03-09T04:33:49Z")
Getting back to the Batty question, the other reason I assume they are real is because they are memories of the type of dangerous and horrible thing a replicant would be used for. They aren’t childhood memories like Rachel was given. Also, we need a new variant on Godwin: “as the length of a thread about _Blade Runner_ increases, the probability of it turning into an ‘was Deckard a replicant’ debate approaches one”. 'Course with most debates it takes about five to ten pages before Godwinisation becomes a high probability. With Deckardisation, the probability approaches 90% if it goes longer half a page. ---
**Author:** ![Askance](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/askance/32/8281_2.png) [@Askance](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Askance)\ **Post date:** [March 9, 2011, 4:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/blade-runner-question-about-roy-battys-soliloquy/573437/110 "2011-03-09T04:48:34Z")
Of course Deckard’s not a replicant, none of the Bladerunners can be. Their entire job is to hunt down replicants that make it back to Earth, having them be replicants too would contradict that rationale. If having replicants on Earth was such an awful thing that they all needed to be hunted down and destroyed, setting up a unit of them right there on Earth already would be utterly deranged. ---
**Author:** ![Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/7cd45c/32.png) [@Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Elendil_s_Heir)\ **Post date:** [March 9, 2011, 5:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/blade-runner-question-about-roy-battys-soliloquy/573437/111 "2011-03-09T05:40:17Z")
> [@Novelty\_Bobble](#): > > Interesting that Ridley Scott also made “Legend” soon after Bladerunner. The unicorn playing a major part in that film as well… He used some of the same footage in both, didn’t he? I’m in the “Deckard wasn’t a replicant, really, but it makes for an interesting theory” camp. I, too, have read that Scott assured Ford during filming that he wasn’t a replicant. The red glow in Deckard’s eyes when he and Rachael are in his kitchen wasn’t in the original theatrical release. It makes for a better story, as someone noted upthread, if Deckard is a human who has virtually become an automaton because of his work, while Batty and the others are automatons who desperately want to become, or be more, human _despite_ their work. But just to be ornery, here’s another data point for the debate: Gaff’s praise to Deckard on the roof, after Batty’s death: “You’ve done a man’s work, sir!” Odd wording, it seems, unless…nah. Couldn’t be. Rutger Hauer claimed to have written Roy Batty’s soliloquy himself, didn’t he? I learned from the DVD extras that the views of the beautiful wooded landscape in the original theatrical ending was surplus footage from Kubrick’s _The Shining_. And I confess: I actually liked Deckard’s world-weary, hardboiled V.O. in the original. ---
**Author:** ![Alan\_Smithee](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/2acd7d/32.png) [@Alan\_Smithee](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Alan_Smithee)\ **Post date:** [March 9, 2011, 6:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/blade-runner-question-about-roy-battys-soliloquy/573437/112 "2011-03-09T06:31:44Z")
> [@Askance](#): > > Of course Deckard’s not a replicant, none of the Bladerunners can be. Their entire job is to hunt down replicants that make it back to Earth, having them be replicants too would contradict that rationale. > > If having replicants on Earth was such an awful thing that they all needed to be hunted down and destroyed, setting up a unit of them right there on Earth already would be utterly deranged. Did you read the thread? If he’s a replicant, _he’s not really a blade runner!_ There is no unit of replicants, Deckard never worked for the police, never hunted down a replicant before Zhora, never gave the Voight-Kampf test before Rachel, and probably never ate noodles or anything else before the third scene of the movie. The unbelievably wealthy and powerful Tyrell (did you see the size of his building?) coerced the cops into using Deckard instead of a real blade runner to hunt down the Nexus 6s because the best real blade runner had already been shot and Tyrell wanted to see what one of his new human-identical replicants would do if it was sent out into the world with programmed memories and instructed to locate and identify replicants. He didn’t really care if those replicants were actually killed or not; he was quite pleased when Batty came to see him. He wanted to know if he could build a replicant that was so perfect even it would think it was human _even when it had all the information about human-identical replicants and how to identify them_. ---
**Author:** ![BMalion](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/e274bd/32.png) [@BMalion](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BMalion)\ **Post date:** [March 9, 2011, 12:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/blade-runner-question-about-roy-battys-soliloquy/573437/113 "2011-03-09T12:38:14Z")
> [@Alan\_Smithee](#): > > …The unbelievably wealthy and powerful Tyrell (did you see the size of his building?) coerced the cops into using Deckard instead of a real blade runner to hunt down the Nexus 6s because the best real blade runner had already been shot and Tyrell wanted to see what one of his new human-identical replicants would do if it was sent out into the world with programmed memories and instructed to locate and identify replicants. He didn’t really care if those replicants were actually killed or not; he was quite pleased when Batty came to see him. He wanted to know if he could build a replicant that was so perfect even it would think it was human _even when it had all the information about human-identical replicants and how to identify them_. Naaa. ---
**Author:** ![Quercus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/q/7ab992/32.png) [@Quercus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Quercus)\ **Post date:** [March 9, 2011, 3:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/blade-runner-question-about-roy-battys-soliloquy/573437/114 "2011-03-09T15:29:45Z")
> [@Askance](#): > > Of course Deckard’s not a replicant, none of the Bladerunners can be. Their entire job is to hunt down replicants that make it back to Earth, having them be replicants too would contradict that rationale. > > If having replicants on Earth was such an awful thing that they all needed to be hunted down and destroyed, setting up a unit of them right there on Earth already would be utterly deranged. May I humbly suggest you examine the concept of ‘mercenaries’ and find out what kinds of people have traditionally been hired as cops/bouncers? ---
**Author:** ![Snowboarder\_Bo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/snowboarder_bo/32/229_2.png) [@Snowboarder\_Bo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Snowboarder_Bo)\ **Post date:** [March 9, 2011, 3:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/blade-runner-question-about-roy-battys-soliloquy/573437/115 "2011-03-09T15:37:35Z")
> [@Derleth](#): > > _Blade Runner_ was firmly in the camp of a movie that used a novel, as opposed to a novel that got filmed. “Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep” has never been filmed any more than “We Can Remember It for You Wholesale” has been filmed. > > On the other hand, you could reasonably say that “A Scanner, Darkly” got filmed. [NITPICK] It’s **A Scanner Darkly** (no comma) [/NITPICK] ---
**Author:** ![Snowboarder\_Bo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/snowboarder_bo/32/229_2.png) [@Snowboarder\_Bo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Snowboarder_Bo)\ **Post date:** [March 9, 2011, 3:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/blade-runner-question-about-roy-battys-soliloquy/573437/116 "2011-03-09T15:42:44Z")
> [@Sr\_Siete](#): > > That’s hardly fair, is it? We don’t know what would have happened had the confrontations gone all the way. We do know he’s a veteran replicant-hunter (well, with false memories he could have been created five minutes before the movie starts, but let’s not go there) and that he survives several beatings by very strong baddies without needing a couple months rest afterwards. Ah, but are y’all suggesting that everyone who knows Deckard and has a history with him is also a replicant with false (implanted) memories? Because that’s the only way the Deckard-as-replicant idea can hold up. Deckard was human. Without him being human, there’s no way to reliably call anyone else in the movie human, and that would kind of ruin both the premise and the deeper meaning of the movie. ---
**Author:** ![Askance](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/askance/32/8281_2.png) [@Askance](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Askance)\ **Post date:** [March 10, 2011, 4:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/blade-runner-question-about-roy-battys-soliloquy/573437/117 "2011-03-10T04:17:32Z")
> [@Askance](#): > > Of course Deckard’s not a replicant, none of the Bladerunners can be. Their entire job is to hunt down replicants that make it back to Earth, having them be replicants too would contradict that rationale. > > If having replicants on Earth was such an awful thing that they all needed to be hunted down and destroyed, setting up a unit of them right there on Earth already would be utterly deranged. > [@Alan\_Smithee](#): > > Did you read the thread? Every word, from start to finish. You, on the other hand, clearly have not - or at least not understood it. > [@](#): > > If he’s a replicant, _he’s not really a blade runner!_ He’s not a Bladerunner? What then the hell is the frickin’ movie about? Of course he is. He is explicitly tasked to go a shoot replicants. What’s your definition of a Bladerunner in your perverse universe? > [@](#): > > There is no unit of replicants, I know, that’s precisely my point. They are humans and can’t be anything else, according to the morality of the mythos. > [@](#): > > Deckard never worked for the police, never hunted down a replicant before Zhora, never gave the Voight-Kampf test before Rachel, and probably never ate noodles or anything else before the third scene of the movie. Wow, man, that’s deep. Hey, did you ever think that an atom in your fingernail could be a solar system that some other dude is living in? Heavy shit! And shit. > [@](#): > > The unbelievably wealthy and powerful Tyrell (did you see the size of his building?) coerced the cops into using Deckard instead of \*\*a real blade runner \*\*to hunt down the Nexus 6s because the best **real blade runner** had already been shot and Tyrell wanted to see what one of his new human-identical replicants would do if it was sent out into the world with programmed memories and instructed to locate and identify replicants. He didn’t really care if those replicants were actually killed or not; he was quite pleased when Batty came to see him. He wanted to know if he could build a replicant that was so perfect even it would think it was human _even when it had all the information about human-identical replicants and how to identify them_. There is not the slightest evidence for a single shred of this ridiculous, what, conspiracy theory about a fictional universe? And I’m amused to read that you recognise there were real actual Bladerunners in the story, So where and who the fuck were they? ---
**Author:** ![Askance](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/askance/32/8281_2.png) [@Askance](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Askance)\ **Post date:** [March 10, 2011, 4:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/blade-runner-question-about-roy-battys-soliloquy/573437/118 "2011-03-10T04:21:19Z")
> [@Quercus](#): > > May I humbly suggest you examine the concept of ‘mercenaries’ and find out what kinds of people have traditionally been hired as cops/bouncers? You can suggest all you like, with whatever underlying attitude you like. As you have. What the hell it has to do with anything relating to Deckard’s patent humanity, you’ll need to explicate. A hint: there isn’t the slightest connection between "the concept of ‘mercenaries’ "and “what kinds of people have traditionally been hired as cops/bouncers”, let along those two thoughts and the question under examination here. Deckard is human. He has to be human or the whole story and movie is an utter frickin’ pointless wank; and the fact were are discussing it with such vehemence is proof that’s not the case. ---
**Author:** ![Alan\_Smithee](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/2acd7d/32.png) [@Alan\_Smithee](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Alan_Smithee)\ **Post date:** [March 10, 2011, 4:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/blade-runner-question-about-roy-battys-soliloquy/573437/119 "2011-03-10T04:34:03Z")
> [@Askance](#): > > Every word, from start to finish. You, on the other hand, clearly have not - or at least not understood it. > > He’s not a Bladerunner? What then the hell is the frickin’ movie about? Of course he is. He is explicitly tasked to go a shoot replicants. What’s your definition of a Bladerunner in your perverse universe? > > I know, that’s precisely my point. They are humans and can’t be anything else, according to the morality of the mythos. > > Wow, man, that’s deep. Hey, did you ever think that an atom in your fingernail could be a solar system that some other dude is living in? Heavy shit! > > And shit. > There is not the slightest evidence for a single shred of this ridiculous, what, conspiracy theory about a fictional universe? And I’m amused to read that you recognise there were real actual Bladerunners in the story, So where and who the fuck were they? Dude, either try the decaf or take it to the pit. ---
**Author:** ![Askance](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/askance/32/8281_2.png) [@Askance](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Askance)\ **Post date:** [March 10, 2011, 5:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/blade-runner-question-about-roy-battys-soliloquy/573437/120 "2011-03-10T05:38:51Z")
No. But thanks for confirming you have nothing of substance to come back with. ---
**Author:** ![Alan\_Smithee](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/2acd7d/32.png) [@Alan\_Smithee](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Alan_Smithee)\ **Post date:** [March 10, 2011, 8:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/blade-runner-question-about-roy-battys-soliloquy/573437/121 "2011-03-10T08:20:12Z")
> [@Askance](#): > > No. But thanks for confirming you have nothing of substance to come back with. Fine. [Guess I have to do everything around here.](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?p=13554000#post13554000) [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/blade-runner-question-about-roy-battys-soliloquy/573437.md?page=5) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/blade-runner-question-about-roy-battys-soliloquy/573437.md?page=7)