Denis Villeneuve Reflects on BLADE RUNNER 2049 and Why He'll Never Make Another Legacy Sequel

Director Denis Villeneuve’s Dune: Part Two hit theaters this past weekend, and that was one hell of an epic movie! Damn, I love what he’s done with this feature film adaptation! He’s such a talented filmmaker, and the visualization of the stories he tells is stunning.

Blade Runner 2049 was also an incredible movie, and the filmmaker recently reflected on his experience making that film. During a recent interview with The Hollywood Reporter, the director was asked about creating a sequel to Ridley Scott‘s Blade Runner and shared his feelings about following up on someone else’s film. He said:

“Blade Runner is one of my favorite films, and it’s absolutely a masterpiece. Ridley Scott is one of my favorite filmmakers, and even though he had given his blessing, it was very important for me to hear it and see it in his eyes that he was OK with me doing the movie at the time. But I was constantly thinking about the original film as I was making Blade Runner 2049. It was impossible not to.

Villeneuve went on to explain why he will never make a legacy sequel again because of how difficult it was:

“So 2049 was really a love letter to the first film, but it was by far one of the most difficult projects I’ve ever done, and I don’t think I will ever approach someone else’s universe again. I still wake up sometimes at night, saying, ‘Why did I do that?’ I’d declined a few other projects of that scale, but at the time, I said to myself, ‘It’s a crazy project, but it’s worth the risk of losing everything.'”

While the movie is a freakin’ masterpiece and a brilliant follow-up to Scott’s original movie, Blade Runner 2049 was a box-office disappointment.

The film unfolds in a dystopian future where society grapples with the complex relationship between humans and replicants, bioengineered beings virtually indistinguishable from humans. Officer K, a replicant "Blade Runner" played by Ryan Gosling, unearths a long-buried secret that has the potential to plunge what remains of society into chaos. His journey to uncover the truth leads him to seek out Rick Deckard, a former Blade Runner portrayed by Harrison Ford, who has been missing for decades. As K delves deeper into the mystery, he finds himself questioning his own identity and purpose in a world where the lines between artificial and real are increasingly blurred.