Does the original novel have a similar setting to the films? Is it less fantastical?

Does the original novel have a similar setting to the films? Is it less fantastical?

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The book is way better. I became very emotional a few times while reading it.

I actually think the movie is as great as the book, but the book explores more concepts in a deeper way

I read the entire book in one sitting before watching the movie. I enjoyed it more but that was 6 years ago so I don't remember a lot of specifics. I'm from the bay area so I did like that the book was set in San Francisco instead of Los Angeles. I enjoyed the new movie quite a bit but I haven't gone back and watched the first one for quite a while.

>Dick

More fantastical with a substantially different theme. Pretty moving meditation on loneliness and isolation. I think. I'm barely literate tho, so that might not be Dick intended at all.

The movie has this fancy neon cyberpunk feel. The book feels much glummer and dingier. I don't know if it's more or less fantastical but it's more sci-fi.

It's more or less the same setting but the story has a lot more meat to it. Since the movie basically took out about half of the book.

Book is set in SF. Endings are completely different.

The book, like all of Dick's works, is a lot stranger than the film, and it's substantially different.

Exploration of what "empathy" means is the central theme of the book, as the lack of empathy is supposedly what sets androids apart from humans. As is typical of Dick's works, there are also moments where the characters are forced to question their own perception of reality. Rick Deckard seriously questions whether he himself is an android at one point, which made me wonder if Ridley Scott's much ridiculed comment about that topic wasn't so silly after all.

The setting of the book is an Earth that is slowly becoming uninhabitable because of radioactive dust particles created in WW3. Most of the population has already left the planet, and of those remaining the majority are undesirables who are barred from leaving because their genes have been damaged by the radioactivity. As a result, Earth is a desolate, withering place, and many people live in isolation and despair, turning to "mood organs" and "empathy boxes" to regulate their emotions.

...

Maybe I'm an android too...

It IS silly because it is completely beside the point.
The book does not try to make a statement about empathy or being human and what those mean. It demonstrates that the perception that those concepts objectively represent something inherently coherent, internally consistent or consolidated is a deception of reason.

t. Nexus-6 model

It's amazing to me that so many of you are saying that the book and first film are similar. There are basically no similarities other than the fact that it's about androids, and some of the names.

I found the book and movie to be quite different. The book is even more fantastical imo, but this is the Dick M.O. One reason why I love him. Blade Runner might be my favorite movie, I have a hard-on for cyberpunk like nothing else, but the book is also great, for different reasons.

Think of Dick as a bridge between the old guard of sci-fi (Asimov/Heinlein) and the cyberpunk wave of the 80's. He's in his own space. One of the few authors whose books I can read over and over again.

I remember the book having some odd shit about a televised religion. A lot of adaptations of Dick's work trim out the weirdness, still haven't watch TMITHC series on Amazon though. I know that the screenwriter for BR wanted to adhere more closely to the themes of the book, the idea that Deckard wasn't literally a replicant, but his job/life made him one metaphorically or some shit like that, but Ridley Scott just thought it'd be cooler to have him be a replicant. Been a while so take this with a grain of salt.

>I remember the book having some odd shit about a televised religion

Humans had "empathy boxes" through which they could all inhabit a character known as Wilbur Mercer, and collectively share in his suffering and struggles in climbing a mountain. This strange communal experience through an avatar is a common occurence in Dick's works; he was captivated by that idea for some reason.

I was going to make a post but then there's a Dick post going all the time. I recently caught the Dick bug (huehue) but feel like the books I've read feel similar. So far I've enjoyed Ubik, Palmer Eldritch, Electric Sheep, Scanner Darkly, and Man in the High Castle. I kind of want one more and it's a toss up between Dr Bloodmoney, Time out of joint, or Martian Time Slip. Any suggestions?

What about Flow My Tears? It's one of the rare ones that he actually took time to edit and polish.
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Only read Martian Time Slip out of your toss up, but can't remember it very well. The other guy recommended Flow My Tears which is good iirc.

I'll recommend Valis. The whole trilogy, but at least the first book.

Ubik might be my favorite of his though.

Valis seems cheesy from the summary. Flow my Tears was a possibility also but neglected to list it.

I think Ubik was my favorite also followed by The Three Stigmata of Palmer Eldritch.

VALIS is really raw

I don't remember Valis being any cheesier than other Dick stories. Give it a shot. I think you can find audiobook versions of a lot of his stuff on youtube if that helps.

The second book is more sci-fi I think, the third is the least sci-fi. It's been a while but I remember enjoying all three.

What about the summary sounds cheesy?

Direct reference

>I became very emotional a few times while reading it.
which parts? the spider scene hit me hard and stuck with me

nah this is because fleece generates static electricity.

nah this is because counting sheep makes you go to sleep sleep just like Dick's writing.

This would be typed Elect/Normal nowadays, absolutely disgusting.

fuk u user

Aren't androids also explicitly robotic in the book, while merely synthetic in the films?

I guess it's not far-off from people vicariously inhabiting a character in a film of tv show.

PETA would get so mad if they tried to pull that shit off in a film adaptation.

No pun intended.

I read all those books. Dr Bloodmoney sucks. Time Out Of Joint is a great one, underrated and more obscure than his major works. Martian Timeslip is very good too, but I like TOOJ more.

Just a question about the Bladerunner film for people more understanding and appreciative of it than I am: when you first saw it, did you finish the film feeling almost like it was unfinished and a little empty? I just finished watching it for the first time (The Final Cut, the theatrical cut was painful to watch five minutes of) and although I liked it, it felt like it was quite a hollow movie. How many times did you have to re-watch it to appreciate it more? Thanks guys

Does my anime waifu dream of animated sheep?

The finest aspect of the movie is its raw noir feel. The minimalistic story and characterization add to this. Still, while I don't mind them being minimalistic it still bothers me that they are quite as shallow. The movie can be appreciated better if you focus on the atmosphere and how it is expressed and less on the narrative aspects.

Thanks, user. Next time I watch it I'll focus more on atmosphere.

I agree with user. It's almost like the characters and plot are only there to serve the mood, rather than the other way around.

...

>Dick Wolf
>Speed Weed

>tfw you live in a barely veiled simulation and its creators are fucking with you

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Book has a sad sense of humor, so book wins

I really love it personally. It was the first Dick book I had ever read, and there's no other writer quite like him. The book's plot is almost kaleidoscopic in the way it folds in on itself and makes you you question its inherent logic- sometimes multiple times in the same chapter. The characters were deeply human, in a way that was quite different to the film- I would quite say better, just different. The stand-out parts, for me, were the existentially terrifying chapters in which Deckard's arrested on suspicion of being a replicant himself; the section where Deckard's and a colleague are discussing how near the nexusses are to reaching a point of sentience indistinguishable from humans; and the sequence at the end where Deckard's has his epithany. I also really liked John Isidore- or whatever his name is- whose character was deeply sympathetic. You don't really see many mentally challenged whose personalities are drawn so lovingly.

Sorry, I typed this from my phone.

I just finished the book and have never seen Blade Runner. How long should I wait before watching it?
I don't want to base the movie solely on its faithfulness to its source.

God communicating as a big pink light sounds cheesy.

Yea, I was reading some reviews and Martian Time Slip seems interesting, and TOOJ as well. I just don't want to get caught up reading the same author when there's a lot else on my list.

VALIS is incredible; you cannot skip it if you like sci-fi (that goes twice if you like PKD). It falls apart a bit at the end, but holy shit I've yet to encounter a story quite like that.

Meh I'll have to read a few other books before I come back to PKD

It is written from the perspective of a schizophrenic nut-job. It sounds just like it should.

I read the book after having seen the film, I didn't even realize there was any connection.

Do you think a more faithful adaptation of the book would be better in a non-high sci fi setting? Basically a more realistic and "minimal" setting that does not forgo the noir elements.

fag

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