During a routine Replicant hunt which he retires the rogue Nexus-8 replicant farmer Sapper Morton (Dave Bautista). K (Ryan Gosling) a Replicant blade runner discovers a box buried under a tree, only to discover the box contains the remains of a deceased pregnant female Replicant. K begins an investigation into his discovery. As K investigates further, he discovers the deceased pregnant female Replicant is Rachel (Sean Young) created by the acclaimed scientist and founder of the Tyrell Corporation Dr. Eldon Tyrell (Joe Turkel) who vanished along with the retired Blade Runner Rick Deckard (Harrison Ford) following Dr. Tyrell's death 30 years earlier. As K tries to find out what happened to Rachel's baby, the case gets the attention of Niander Wallace (Jared Leto) the blind corrupt chairman and founder of the Wallace Corporation who fears that a Replicant/human hybrid could threaten him and begins a Replicant revolt sends his Replicant henchwoman Luv (Sylvia Hoeks) to follow K believing K will lead them to Rachel's offspring. As the investigation develops further and K beginning to question the investigation and begins to suspect that he could be Rachel's child, K heads out to the ruined Las Vegas. In Las Vegas, K finds Deckard and works out Deckard is the father and confronts him about what happened and why he and Rachel vanished. However, K and Deckard soon learn Luv has found them and captures Deckard and brings Deckard before Wallace for interrogation and K sets out to the Wallace Corporation building to rescue Deckard and stop Wallace from finding Deckard and Rachel's offspring.

Because Replicants aren't robots - they're essentially manufactured humans - not clones per se, but biologically manufactured rather than mechanical. While they can be made super strong and fast, and with invulnerabilities humans don't have; they are still biological and therefore still fallible to a certain degree. They are often referred to as robots due to their being manufactured and their purpose being to unquestionably follow orders.

The word "robot" is derived from the Old Church Slavonic word "robota" which translates to "servitude" or "forced labour"; I.e. a slave, which is essentially what Replicants are, bio-engineered slaves. So the term robot is accurate.

It is neither. The juxaposition of seeing a floating dead body, with the positive "sales-pitch" style speech being given by Luv in what is in effect, Wallace's show room; and further showing how the world of 2049 views these living beings as just a commodity. She speaks of Wallace's "gift to the world" in the new model Nexus 8's as if they are just any other unfeeling technology, while in fact they are living beings, albeit manufactured rather than born. K is looking at the Sapper Morton (Dave Bautista) prototype (Nexus 08, Prototype Alpha 01) one of which he had to kill at the beginning of the movie.

Gábor Egyed was a stage worker in Budapest, where many of the scenes were recorded. He died in an accident during the dismantling of Blade Runner 2049's decoration. Ryan Gosling and Denis Villeneuve paid their respects on his death.

Blade Runner (1982) is somewhat notorious for being a film with multiple versions, which largely came about as a result of studio interference, time constraints and rights issues (see for elaborate information). This raises the question to which specific version Blade Runner 2049 is a sequel.

Director Denis Villeneuve has stated that for him, the most important versions of Blade Runner (1982) are the original Theatrical Cut, and Ridley Scott's Final Cut, and even though both he, Scott and Harrison Ford have their own ideas about which version is canon, the plan was to make a sequel that could be a follow-up to both these versions. In both versions, Deckard displays the same red glare in his eyes that established Replicants have: a subtle hint that he could be one as well, but it is never stated that this is a unique Replicant trait. The Final Cut makes a stronger case: there is an added scene of Deckard daydreaming about a unicorn; at the end, Gaff leaves a origami unicorn for him as he allows him to escape with Rachael. Many people interpret this as a hint that Gaff knows what Deckard dreams about, so the memory must be an implant, and Deckard must be a Replicant.

In Blade Runner 2049, Gaff is asked if he knew that Deckard would run and go into hiding. He confirms, saying that he saw it in his eyes. This can be interpreted in the figurative way, meaning that Gaff could 'read' Deckard's sentiments and guessed that he wanted to flee with Rachael to save her. It can also be taken literally: Replicants can be identified through the V-K test via their pupillary reflex, and they display a red glare in their eyes. So Gaff may have realized Deckard was a Replicant, and gave him a hint about it (through the origami unicorn) so that he would run away, for his own safety and Rachael's. Gaff also makes an origami sheep, which possibly teases the title of the novel that Blade Runner was based on (Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?). But in either case, there is no definite confirmation that Deckard is human or Replicant.

Other 'hints' are also non-conclusive. In this movie and its predecessor, Deckard seems physically inferior to Replicants, but this is no definite confirmation of his humanity; he could simply be a next-generation Replicant without a termination date, normal strength and implanted memories (like Rachael was described as 'an experiment'). While in Niander Wallace's office, it is suggested that he and Rachael were set up by Tyrell to meet each other and reproduce. This would seem to be easier if both were Replicants and thus Tyrell's products (they could have been designed to be attracted to one another). On the other hand, in such a tightly controlled world, Tyrell may have had plenty of knowledge about human Deckard, his strengths and his preferences. Rachael may have been designed according to Deckard's likes (she does show some resemblance to the pictures of women in Deckard's apartment), and Deckard could have been specifically selected to come to Tyrell and meet Rachael (which would explain why he was forced to do it, even though he was officially retired). The movie also leaves open the question whether Rachael only lives 4 years (as suggested by the Final Cut) or has an open-ended lifespan (as clearly stated in the Theatrical Cut): it is explained that Rachael died during childbirth, almost two years after fleeing with Deckard, but before her potential expiry date. So the film evades several of the issues brought up by the differences in version of its predecessor, allowing the viewers to decide for themselves which backstory they want to consider.