BladeZone's Off World Forums

How come Roy Batty saw all these beautiful, amazing things in the far corners of the universe when all he had was a 4-year lifespan?

Because he burnt twice as bright ... Something along those lines.
I'd guess this is more of a technical question - since they figured out how to get to Mars, why shouldn't they be able to travel from one corner of the universe to the next in a couple of days?
If 4 years wasn't enough to see all those things, Enterprise and Star Wars would be nothing but huge plot holes.

Star Trek and Star Wars were never very hyper-realistic. I guess you're saying that in Blade Runner they also travel at light speed, right? Mmmm.

Getting around does not seem to be a problem in any of the P.K. Dick stories - not the ones I read. Why should it be in the movie? I don't know if the travel at light speed, but I guess they figured out how to do it.

I've just seen the main news on tv and they featured the "Scram Jet" that traveled (unmanned!) at 10 times the speed of sound.......( you will never get me in one of those things!) .........if we have this now , who knows how fast or far we can go.

Not fast enough to go to the Shoulder of Orion .

Not fast enough to go to the Shoulder of Orion .[/quote]



Make an impressive stamp on my passport

I think he was just trying to make a point that he's seen all these amazing things in his life but now they will become nothing after he dies.

To get to the Shoulder of Orion and back again, 4 years is not enough at lightspeed:

If -as I'm inclined to think- Roy refers to the "right shoulder", that would be Betelgeuse (Alpha Orionis), which is 520 light years from Terra.

If he's talking about the "left shoulder" that would be Bellatrix (Gamma Orionis), which is 243 ly. away.

Do the math for lightspeed... No way. There must be a faster travel system available in 2019. Therefore, I think space-time bending/tunneling (or "warp" as it is called in the StarTrek universe) is implicit in the Blade Runner universe.

Anyway, this thread made me think that we are not really sure about where was Roy when his inception took place. Perhaps he was "born" in Orion's Shoulder...

What is the exact quote? I thought he was just observing the "Phenominon" as it passed by the constelation itself. Which would mean he was in this solar system very possibly near mars.

"I've seen things you people wouldn't believe. Attack ships on fire on the shoulder of Orion. I watched C-beams glitter in the dark near the Tannhauser gate. All those moments will be lost in time, like tears in rain. Time to die."

You wouldn't say those things if you only saw it by the use of a telescope. It must've been something he witnessed, with his own eyes, whilst being there. Otherwise, anyone can go to the observer center on Mars and watch it through a telescope. Batty is clearly saying that he has been to places most humans have no idea of (Batty doesn't know that Deckard is a replicant) and that he relishes these moments. As a replicant, Batty sees beauty. Batty loves life.

Obviously he didn't see the battle from a telescope. What I was trying to say is he was making a setting or back drop for the battles imagery using the constellation as reference since he was probably in space. Like one of us might say we saw a meteorite fly over the moon, even though it was in our atmosphere and no closer to the moon than anywere else in the sky. Since the stars in the constellation of orion are no where near each other the constelation actually only exhists from our point of view (or in reverse in a point of view directly opposite us). Therefore the shoulder of orion is only something that would be seen from our solar system unless he is talking about something else all together. He was talking about a visual memory that was probably pretty vivid and seeing burning ships with a memorable constellation as the backdrop would make sense to me.

Yeah, that could be it. That's pretty smart, ridleynoir.

Of course I think in reality Rutger Hauer made up his lines to sound "vivid" and may have meant the actual star bellatrix or betelgeuse, but i like my explanation better.

I hope I didn't just end this thread...or maybe it is a good thing

Tannhauser gate sounds like a wormhole portal which could imply that by 2016 we've managed to travel through them safely, making 'travel time' to distant stars irelevant yeh?