Ramon-Blade Runner Lovey Dovey

I immediately view this final scene through a religious symbolic lens. The dove’s symbolic meaning is threefold. One, it is a symbol of peace in the story of Noah’s Ark. Throughout the movie, Deckard and Roy are battling with each other replicant vs. human. Roy saves Deckard; thus, he makes his peace with Deckard. I see that Roy’s termination is incomplete without a sense of making peace. When he does make peace, he is able to release that peace (dove) to the world/humanity (Deckard). This also answers the question of why Roy saves Deckard.

            At the same time, it should be asked why the “animalistic” nature of Roy is turned to more a more humanistic nature. The best solution to this also can be answered through another symbolic meaning of the dove, which is purity. Though replicants are “animalistic”, they also have a sense of purity that humans do not in this film. The humans here are seen as the “bad guys” due to their thought of owning replicants for colonization. Thus, the replicants have a sense of purity that the humans do not have.

            The third symbolic element of the dove is a combination of purity and peace. These two elements of ideal human nature lead to the definition of a soul. Biblically, we see on many occasions the giving up of the soul to the heavens. From Mary’s Assumption of body and soul, and from Jesus’ final words on the cross, we see figures who give their soul up to God for the greater purpose of the world. I will agree with the producers of the film in their addition of Rachael and Deckard’s escape to the new colony. Roy gave up his soul so that the face of humanity (Deckard) is able to begin anew with Rachael.