Outstanding all around, except for the story.

Rating: 7/10 (15 October 2017)

The film does a great job in taking what made the original so iconic, expanding on it, reinventing it for the modern area and delivering a fresh new take on the universe. This is true for the production design and cinematography, which, although faithful to the original, it brings astonishing imagery. The directing and pacing was also refreshing, yet still very much in the same spirit as the original.
It is therefore a bit disappointing that the script did not live up to the original and did not bring anything new to the table.
A good place to start is actually the ending. The original delivers a powerful message in the last few minutes, with Hauer's character saving Ford's. It sums up very well what the movie is about. However, in 2049, the ending is somewhat meaningless, and Goslin's sacrifice seems unnecessary.
The film in general seems to bring up a lot of ideas, but doesn't delve deeper into any of them. Leto's character presents a few interesting ideas about slavery, but they are never referenced again. In that same very first scene, Luv promises to be a deeper character, with a torn identity, but ends up falling into all the flat villainous tropes. It would have been extremely interesting to explore K's character as the real Child. Does he feel different to the others? Does he realize there is nothing special about him? What does he expect his duty to be? Instead all these questions are thrown away in exchange for a cheap plot twist, where the child is a secondary character with no heavy consequences.
Furthermore, the film suffers from a thin blockbuster structure. How many times have we seen the "Inglorious Bastards" start? How many times have we seen the villain step on some object to kill the protagonist's love interest? How many times have we seen the villain leave the protagonist alive, assuming he'll die? Another clear example is when Rachel is shown. Instead of hiding her face in shadows and camera angles, which would have built tension and anxiety in the audience, instead Hollywood decides to show off their CGI technology, killing all drama with it. It lacks the complex story and innovative narration the first one had.
Back in the day, I gave Mad Max: Fury Road a better rating than Blade Runner 2049, although the film probably suffers from an even faultier script. However, when watching the old Mad Max films, the story was never the outstanding bit - it was the action scenes, and Fury Road delivered. However, in the old Blade Runner, the story had a lot more significance, and although the new did a masterful job in the visual side (which is also one of the original film's strengths), it failed in the narrative.
I hope Hollywood becomes a little braver with their storytelling so that it can match the daring of their groundbreaking visuals.