Ok movie, *horrible* sequel

Rating: 4/10 (31 January 2018)

First off, the movie itself is not 'bad' per se.
It's a cliche manhunt thriller that will keep you in your seat if you are a fan of sci-fi movies, with enough special effects and great cinematography to keep you salivating.
Denis Villeneuve pulls off what he does best, he glues you to your seat.
Does that make it a good movie however? And what about the whole point in it being a sequel? I'm rarely judge how good a movie is by if it kept me entertained. Cartoons keep me entertained, B-movies keep me entertained. A good movie, a truly good movie, by my standards will have me reflecting on it, thinking about it, want to watch it again, grow fond of it. There are so many great movies. 2049 is not one of them. It's a thriller. It's a 2.5 hour ride that the moment it arrives at the station you hop off and have already forgotten everything about. There is no great mystery in the movie, no great question, the visuals aren't revolutionary, and while some elements had so much potential, were barely there as complimentary to the director's oh-so-important plot (that really is not important at all). The movie makes it all about finding someone - but in the end, whether that person is found or not changes very little to the entire universe of that movie. Whether the person if found or not, doesn't actually do anything. And yet the movie is entirely built around that intrigue.
If you take the original blade runner. What was it about? Was it about finding and hunting replicants? Or the dilemma of by what right are they hunted? What truly makes them any different? And as a byproduct delving deep into the question of what actually does make us human? Roy showing more humanity, conflict, despair than some actual humans will ever experience. The entire movie was built around this theme, the monologues, the simple scenes, and the atmosphere was built to make the work feel all the more isolated to better illustrate how very personal that question is. No one can tell you the answer to the question, its a very I-think-therefore-I-am type of reflection and viewers are more or left on their own trying to figure what the hell is going on beneath the seemingly simple story of a blade runner rounding up replicants.
None of that in 2049. They even basically answer the original's dilemna straight out. Human, Replicant, whatever, its all the same. Hunt 'x' because its super dangerous if 'x' is revealed to the world. (Even though the world seems to know anyway, and no one would care because Humans or Replicants, its all the same). Not to mention mostly squashing any possibility of the many unanswered theories the original had (i.e. is Deckard a replicant). 2049 did not have to even involve Deckard. At all. They could've done the same movie without him which simply pushes me to believe they needed Harrison Ford to cash in on the cult following. The movie ponders no existential question, no moral dilemna. Its just an action manhunt in a sci-fi setting.
*spoilers*
Where the movie really disgruntled me is in the scenes between the new blade runner and his home AI. Everything begs to be delved deeper in. The concept of Love for 'machines'. If androids can dream of electric sheep, does it make it any less of a dream? And if androids can love and desire, does it make that love any less pure? This is where the movie hooked me in and got me hoping. But it barely even vehiculates the plot and is discarded as soon as it starts. Much to my dissapointment. It's as if it was in the movie only for eye-candy-sci-fi-ness.
*end spoiler*
They could have built the entire movie around this, complete with intrigue etc... and it wouldve made an incredible sci-fi noir (which is what the first is). They would'nt have had to use any pretense. But nope.
You don't get any memorable monologue from this one. You don't end up more and more puzzled every time you watch it (quite the opposite). The movie is barely dystopian with all its super high-tech cleanliness and apart from a few scenes that remind you that somewhere in the city some people are poor and life is crap and its a Blade Runner movie, you're mostly left thinking life is pretty good for almost anyone and that you are watching a longer, more action packed lackluster Black Mirror episode. Pretty much everything about the movie is forgettable.