Warning, don't read this if you haven't seen the movie Blade Runner. However, if you don't plan on seeing the movie then go ahead.

Blade Runner is one of my favorite movies, I just got the collectors edition briefcase, so I spent last weekend watching all 5 of the discs it came with. Based loosely on a book by Phillip K. Dick entitled Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? the movie is about an ex-cop (Rick Deckard) whose job it was to track down and kill or retire as it was called, rogue androids called replicants. He was a Blade Runner. He is called back into service when Holden is shot. Don't worry, Holden can breathe ok as long as nobody unplugs him.

One thing that I noticed while I was daydreaming at work waiting for my box set to arrive is that even though Rick Deckard (the hero?) is supposed to be the best Blade Runner of all time he only survives each fight with thereplicants because of an outside influence. Let us look at a brief summary of each of his encounters with his replicant adversaries and I will attempt to show that Rick Deckard is not the best Blade Runner ever but instead an unscrupulous bastard.

His first fight is with Zhora. Zhora gets a surprise Judo chop to Deckard's throat and she proceeds to strangle him with his own tie. She clearly has the upper hand when a couple of girls open the door to her dressing room, startling her and Zhora runs off. A chase ensues and after looking cool running across the top of a taxi, Deckard ends up successfully shooting Zhora in the back.

Outside influence: strippers don't knock before entering,

Then, minutes later, replicant Leon surprises Deckard when Leon grabs him and slams him into the side of a large vehicle. Leon then proceeds to work him over enough to make the LAPD envious, including body slamming him into a car windshield. Nevertheless, just as Leon is about finish the job Zhora couldn't, he says "Wake up, time to die" and Leon gets shot in the back of the head by Rachel. Rachel who was watching from the crowd, had picked up the gun that Leon slapped out of Deckard's hand, with the ease of a high school bully. Strangely, in the opening scenes, Leon had a gun; he used it to shoot Holden. I want to know why he just didn't shoot Deckard.

Outside influence: Rachel, famous last words.

Third is Pris (the basic pleasure model) and (sigh) once more, she gets the jump on him. They fight. Well, she beats him up. And when it appears as though she is going finish the job that Leon couldn't, she inexplicably runs off only to come running back doing a couple of forward flips toward him. While this is nice to look at, it was a poor attack plan as it afforded Deckard time to stand up and shoot her as she came flipping toward him.

Outside influence: Pris's showboating for the camera

The forth is with Roy Batty (the hero?) and yes he surprises Deckard by punching through a wall and taking his gun away. He then breaks two of Deckards fingers as he says, "This is for Zhora, this is for Pris" and gives the gun back. He doesn't mention Leon. Poor Leon. Deckard becomes the hunted as Roy Batty taunts him through out the Bradbury building eventually leading to the roof where Roy actually saves Deckard from dropping off to his death (assuming of course that Rachel wouldn't be on the sidewalk to catch him). Batty then recites some of the best lines in a movie and dies, because of a four-year life span.

Outside influence: time, compassion

In conclusion, Rick Deckard only retires two of the four replicants he was initially hired to retire. He is caught off guard each time he encountered a replicant and he had his gun taken away twice. He killed both the women, neither of them were armed, one was shot in the back and one was practicing gymnastics and both ran away from him.

I believe that this shows that Rick Deckard is not a very good Blade Runner but an unscrupulous bastard that will shoot an unarmed woman, and if the opportunity present its self, he will shoot her in the back. Providing of course that you don't take his gun away first.

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