A Matter Of Electric Sheep
Sat, October 1, 2011 at 9:37 PM 
Blade Runner is one of those films that gets written about a lot, it's a very special movie. Even though it's almost thirty years old it still beats out the competiton. At University, despite the fact I was doing an illustration degree, they made me write a lot of essays. This used to annoy me as I felt this was a bit unfair and that I was there to draw, not to write. The easiest way to get the required amount of essays completed without using up too much of my brain or time: Film Studies. Somwhow I was able to write about the same film for every essay. So I wrote about Blade Runner for three years. It honestly started out as a short-cut so I could maximise my time drawing rather than writing and as I knew Blade Runner well it seemed like an easy option. It's a great film to interpret and to be honest anybody with half a brain could skew meanings and infer context to suit whatever end result they wanted. As I continued to write essay after essay I delved into the realms of art-school bullshit finding all sorts of references to feminism, castration, whatever seemed like it'd get me a good mark. The bullshittery was working, so I came over all proud and started doing it properly. This is when I came up with my theory.
When the Directors Cut first came out it opened up the question of Deckard being a replicant. It went back and forth for a while before Ridley Scott came clean in an interview and definitively said so. Case closed. Except no it isn't. The thing about sci-fi is that you have to create a world and these worlds have rules. Once you set these rules up and establish how your vision of the future works to the audience you really need to stick to them in order to get a really good film. Blade Runner has some rules and by following them through and looking at the players in the film I'd had a bit of a revelation.
The replicants in Blade Runner know they're replicants. Except Rachael. She's a new type of replicant and she's been given somebody else's memories to cushion her emotional responses so she can be more easily controlled. So if Deckard is also a replicant, he doesn't know about it either. So he's the same as Rachael. So it follows that he must have somebody else's memories too. And there's really only one person who's memories he could have.
Deckard is Gaff. If you think about it, it makes complete sense. Who is Gaff anyway? I propose that he was the best Blade Runner in the business before he got injured and acquired his limp, possibly even going after the replicants in the film. He's right up there in the cop ranks and appears to be close to Police Chief Bryant, the same relationship Deckard re-assumes when he's hauled in at the start of the film.
Deckard isn't even allowed to fly his own police car. Pretty much every time he needs to go somewhere, Gaff has to drive him. He's a real dick about it too, he doesn't talk to him or even acknowledge his presence. He just chauffeurs him around with that resentful scowl on his face. How come Deckard isn't flying himself around?
Another element of depth on this point comes in the design of Deckard's car. This was designed by the legendary Syd Mead who noted during the design phase that Deckard's car was for ground-only transport and had the vertical take-off flight systems removed. This is why the vehicle is a bit of a mess and has some panels missing and parts of the chassais exposed. Somebody has made sure that Deckard's car has had it's wings clipped. He's being kept under at least some sort of control.
Right through the film, Gaff shows complete contempt for Deckard. Right at the start when he approaches him eating those delicious looking noodles, his way of saying "hello" is by hitting him on the arm with his cane. All the way through he's basically a massive prick to him. The relationship makes sense - this whole endeavour of using a robot to hunt robots is experimental. If Deckard has Gaff's memories and skills than who better to keep a close eye on him to assess how things are going? And how much would Gaff hate doing this? The more Deckard succeeds, the more reason Gaff has to hate him. He's everything Gaff once was and serves as a painfull reminder.
On top of all of this we have the oragami. All throughout the film Gaff appears to know what Deckard is thinking. When he's getting the original brief from Bryant about how hard the job is going to be, Gaff makes an origami chicken and puts it on the desk because he knows Deckard is scared. He knows this because he would be intimidated by the job himself. Later, when discussing a visit with Rachael, Gaff makes the little matchstick man with a boner. He does this because he's already visited Tyrell and met Rachael and knows that Deckard's going to fancy her.
Then we have the one that can't really be interpreted any other way. The unicorn. Gaff knows about Deckard's recurring dream. How else could this be the case unless he also has the same dream?
Gaff says something very telling to Deckard near the end of the film. He lands on the roof right after the climactic fight which means presumably he was overhead observing the whole time, letting them get on with it to see how things played out instead of stepping in and helping. As he lands, he walks up to Deckard smiling and says "You've done a man's job". Coming from Gaff, this is the ultimate compliment. He has accepted him as his equal.
So that's my Blade Runner theory, that Deckard is actually Gaff. Might go and watch it again now.
Reader Comments (11)
Mind. Blown.
I'm going to have to re-watch it now again with this in mind.
Interesting perspective - I'd like to throw a couple of observations in though:
- Gaff is clearly of Asian descent, so any memories he has involving people (family, friends) would be likely to contain people from the same racial background. Rachel's memories contained a believable family member.
- Everything Tyrell did seemed to reflect his egocentric worldview, even to the point of creating Rachel as a junior member of his family by using his niece's memories. Why would Tyrell want to use memories from one of the people responsible for destroying his creations, thereby admitting the flaws in his own work?
- Following from that, Tyrell delights in challenging Deckard to 'beat' Rachel using the Voight-Kampf test. If Tyrell really intended to build a better Replicant killer, why would he leave that degree of intuition to chance?
- How long has Deckard existed for, and how many Replicants had gone rogue previously? It could be that his inception only came about as a result of Roy and his gang going rogue, which may have been the first time such a thing had ever happened. If Deckard was the first replicant Bladerunner, he would be kept on a tight leash.
- On that tangent Gaff is the cerebral equivalent of a drill instructor, so attempts to break Deckard through psychology rather than physical means. Drill instructors exist to test and *train* new recruits; the issue with the rogue Nexus generation was its ability to learn things other than intended act act accordingly, so pressure training might throw some light on the matter. The Origami was an essential part of telling Deckard that he'd always be one step behind, and diffusing the superiority complex that led Roy to rebel.
- Why bother with that though, unless the police force was looking to use replicants for itself and didn't want to public to find out? They were military after all, and technology filters down. Interesting test too - set a thief to catch a thief, as they say. Of course, that questions whether or not Batty brigade were an accident or a live field test... ;)
Very insightful!
A thought regarding the stick figure/match-stick man origami ran through my mind. The story line sequence in the final edit of the film was not as originally story-boarded. Leon was hiding in the bathroom the whole time Gaff and Deckard were there. In the final edit, it appeared that Leon was outside the hotel. Taking that into consideration, the stick figure (in my view) was to represent that Gaff knew that Leon was in the bathroom. It was Gaff's 'calling card'. (Did Deckard actually "see" the origami stick man?)
You posed a very interesting perspective on this 'deck-a-rep' scenario. Certainly one of the better -- if not best -- scenarios.
I want to make comment as well. Blade runner was a film that I studied hard in film school, met some people who worked on the film including Doug Trumbull. I think that Holden's character is often overlooked in the film. His striking resemblance to Deckard. My feelings were that these Nexus six breed of replicants were so brutal that the average man could not hunt them. So Deckard and Holden were created/tasked for the job. I do like the Gaff/Deckard hypotheses that you propose, one of the more original conclusions in relation to the film.
Oh, this was fascinating! Dang it, wish I could go pull the film and watch it night now! Will definitely need to put it on the queue to see if looking at it with this in mind, whether I see this in there. Never before had I even contemplated Deckard being a replicant himself. Cool!
simply one of the best films ever made. ever.
and DAMM dude! i wish my brain had taken the final leap that yours did, gavin. i mean, i knew deckard is a replicant, and that gaff was somehow privy to whatever memories had been coded into him - the unicorn origami affirms any suspicion - much the way tyrell knew rachel's memories even though they originated in his niece. but the leap to supposing deckard's memories originate with gaff makes perfect sense!! i'm so duh sometimes. from this i take another leap - to suppose that deckard's appearance in bryant's office is his first, that his being quit was a memory planted to explain why he hadn't been there for awhile - for awhile, in truth, being ever.
i'm thinking, though, that gaff's omnipresence is more than a monitoring of the newbie, if that's what indeed deckard is, brand new. i'm thinking he's keeping a watchful eye in case deckard becomes self-aware of what he is, as roy, zhora, leon and pris were. tyrell seems to keep very close tabs on rachel - she is much like the owl, no? a pet. but when she goes off on her own, she is hunted by the police. is she property, or person? (but gene roddenberry took that one on... ;) ) and is she a new experiment? or possibly the prototype...
and from a film-lover's perspective can i add that, although i hated the tone of the voiceover in the original theatrical release - and harrison had a good reason for doing it that way - i miss it in the director's cut, it was truthful to the whole futuristic film noir thing that makes it so delishuss and cohesive. in light of all the die-hards who know deckard's little secret, they could do much more with it than simply explain the complexities of the world they've created to audiences that don't get it. they could explore the interior life of a replicant who doesn't know he's a replicant. and if we factor in the supposition that gaff, athough an originator of deckard's interior life, cannot be privy to all the current variations of thoughts in deckard's head, it could have as intriguing a resonance as the light on deckard's eyes when he stands beside rachel at the piano. or roy's fighting dialogue 'YA that's the spirit!', for was roy not also aware of deckard the 'good man's' secret? and was he not teaching deckard what it's like to really be alive? what life is worth? subtlety for the initiated. i wish they'd rewrite it, get harrison to re-do it and put it back in.
hm, anyone have ridley scott's and harrison ford's emails??
signing off with this - great insight, gavin. i feel like a moron. :D
In the end, an Insightful, metaphysical theory.
I'd like to point out to the first commenter that Gaff is played by Edward James Olmos, who is definitely not Asian.
I *really* like your theory. I've just asked for the Final Cut of this for Christmas, so now I'm going to be watching it even more intently to see how your theory pans out.
Batty: the machine becomes human.
Deckard: the human becomes machine.
Gaff: human baby-sitting Deckard (his role at the end is simply to acknowledge a job well done but also the fact that Gaff knows that the only way for Deckard to love Rachael is to leave and never come back, to simply dissapear...Gaff humanity spared Rachael also).
It's possible that Nexus-6 could become aware of their status: i.e 4 year life-span, built for a sole purpose: slavery. Tyrell Corp doesn't want those N-6 back on Earth because this is, ultimately, a defective product that could become dangerous to others (Corp line/propaganda). Tyrell's moto says it all, therefore, to get those Off-World contracts, supplying N-6 to do the dangerous jobs no humans wants to do, it has to make sure that the product is safe for everybody involved.
Deckard is out and is re-called to duty because he's an embarassement not only to the force but mostly to the Blade Runner Section...why don't we eliminate this alcoholic pittiful human being and give him the ultimate mission: retire UberMensh Batty and company.
What are his chances of succeeding? His death into the hands of those machines would achieve two things: restoring Deckard's status as a Repdetect and the BRS and for Tyrell to prove whitout a shadow of a doubt that these N-6 are dangerous and have to be killed on sight.
Deckard as a Rep doesn't make sense, there has to be redemption from him by way of seeing Batty and Rachael becoming fully humans with all the complexities involved in that process. Him leaving with Rachael is simply the logical conclusion of someone who will become a teacher. Teaching her the minute details of what it is to be human while re-discovering his humanity at the same time and also a new purpose in life: truly a match made in heaven.
I like your theory a lot. However, I'm doggedly adhering to Harrison Ford's take on the character: that he's a non-replicant whose humanity has been burnt out by the inhumanity of his job. That, to me, is a far more interesting proposition than his being a replicant.
There's a deleted scene that implies Gaff's antagonism is good old professional jealousy. And if Deckard had Gaff's memories, wouldn't he believe he WAS Gaff? What about all the memories he'd have of looking in the mirror and seeing a hispanic guy? Unless the memories could be edited somehow.... but without some kind of indication in the film that such an editing procedure exists, ultimately I can't buy it.
But I enjoyed it.It's definitely worth considering.