Canadian director Denis Villeneuve has emerged as one of the greatest cinematic science fiction auteurs of the early 21st century. He’s turned Frank Herbert‘s once-thought-unfilmable Dune series into a pair of box-office blockbusters, with a third film set to round out the trilogy this winter. Before that, however, he had the audacity to make a sequel to one of the most beloved films in the sci-fi canon—and now, that audacity is paying off.
Blade Runner took a long road to becoming a science fiction classic. The adaptation of Philip K. Dick‘s Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? lingered in development Hell before it was finally brought to the screen by Ridley Scott. However, Scott clashed with both the film’s producers and with star Harrison Ford during production; the resulting film was an initial disappointment with both critics and audiences. However, it is now seen as one of Scott’s masterpieces, and as one of the greatest science fiction films of all time.
In 2017, Villeneuve released Blade Runner 2049, a belated sequel to the original film. Set decades after the original, it centers around K (Ryan Gosling), a replicant “blade runner” who hunts down other replicants when they go rogue. However, he becomes a renegade himself when he stumbles upon an impossible mystery: finding a child who was somehow born to a replicant mother (Blade Runner‘s Rachel, played by Sean Young). The search for the child leads him to the ruins of Las Vegas, where retired blade runner Rick Deckard (Ford) is hiding out. While Blade Runner 2049, like its predecessor, didn’t become the blockbuster its producers were hoping for, it’s currently having a spate of streaming success: it’s the #1 movie on HBO Max.
Collider Exclusive · Sci-Fi Personality Quiz Which Sci-Fi Hero Are You Most Like? Paul Atreides · Captain Kirk · Princess Leia · Ellen Ripley · Max Rockatansky
Five iconic heroes. Five completely different ways of facing an impossible universe. One of them shares your instincts, your values, and your particular way of refusing to back down. Eight questions will tell you which one.
🏜️Paul Atreides
🖖Capt. Kirk
✊Princess Leia
🔦Ellen Ripley
🔥Max Rockatansky
01
How do you lead when the stakes couldn’t be higher? The way you lead under pressure is the most honest thing about you.
02
What is your greatest strength in a crisis? The quality that keeps you alive when everything else fails.
03
What is the thing you’d sacrifice everything else for? Your deepest motivation is your truest compass.
04
How do you relate to the people around you? Who you are to others under pressure is who you really are.
05
You’re facing a threat that no one else believes is real. What do you do? How you respond when you’re the only one who sees it defines everything.
06
What has your heroism cost you personally? Every hero pays. The question is what — and whether they’d pay it again.
07
How do you feel about the rules of the world you’re in? Every hero has a relationship with the system. What’s yours?
08
When everything is on the line, what keeps you going? The answer is the most honest thing about you.
Your Hero Has Been Identified Your Sci-Fi Hero Is…
Your answers point to the iconic sci-fi hero who shares your instincts, your values, and your particular way of facing the impossible.
Arrakis · Dune
Paul Atreides
You carry a weight most people would crumble under — the knowledge of what you’re capable of, and the burden of what you might have to become.
You see further ahead than others and you plan accordingly, even when the vision frightens you.
You are driven by loyalty to your people and a sense of destiny you didn’t ask for but can’t escape.
Paul Atreides is not simply a hero — he is someone who understands the cost of power and chooses to bear it anyway.
That gravity, that willingness to carry what others won’t, is exactly you.
USS Enterprise · Star Trek
Captain Kirk
You lead with instinct, warmth, and an absolute refusal to accept a no-win scenario — because you’ve always believed there’s a third option nobody else has thought of yet.
You take the mission seriously without ever taking yourself too seriously.
Your crew would follow you anywhere, not because you demand it, but because you’ve earned it.
Kirk’s genius isn’t tactical — it’s human. He reads people, bends rules with purpose, and wills outcomes into existence through sheer conviction.
That combination of warmth, audacity, and relentless optimism is unmistakably yours.
The Rebellion · Star Wars
Princess Leia
You are the kind of person who holds the line when everyone else is losing faith — not because you’re fearless, but because giving up simply isn’t something you’re capable of.
You lead through conviction. Your voice carries because your belief is unshakeable.
You gave up everything ordinary the moment you chose the cause, and you’ve never looked back.
Leia is not a supporting character in her own story — she is the moral centre of the entire rebellion.
That same fierce, principled, unbreakable core is what defines you.
The Nostromo · Alien
Ellen Ripley
You are not reckless, not grandiose, and not particularly interested in being anyone’s hero — you just refuse to stop when it matters.
You see threats clearly, you document the truth even when no one listens, and when the time comes you handle it yourself.
Ripley’s heroism is earned, not performed. She doesn’t have a speech — she has a flamethrower and a plan.
You share her composure under the worst possible pressure, and her refusal to pretend the monster isn’t there.
When it counts, you don’t flinch. That’s everything.
The Wasteland · Mad Max
Max Rockatansky
You have been through fire that would break most people — and what came out the other side is something the world underestimates at its peril.
You don’t ask for help, don’t need validation, and don’t wait for anyone to tell you the rules no longer apply.
Your loyalty, when it finally arrives, is absolute — but it’s earned in silence and tested in action, not in words.
Max is not a nihilist. He is someone who lost everything and found, against his will, that he still has something worth protecting.
That bruised, stubborn, ultimately human core is exactly yours.
What New ‘Blade Runner’ Sequel Is Coming Out This Year?
Blade Runner 2099, a new miniseries that follows up on Blade Runner 2049, is headed to Prime Video later this year. It’s set in a future where the roles of humans and replicants are reversed; replicants now rule, while humans are an underclass. In the series, Olwen (Michelle Yeoh), a replicant blade runner nearing the end of her lifespan, teams up with Cora (Hunter Schafer), a human masquerading as a replicant, to find a group of rogues with sinister plans. It will premiere on November 25.
Blade Runner 2049 is now streaming on HBO Max. Stay tuned to Collider for future updates.
