10 Movie Villains Obsessed With Immortality

The basic premise of Philip K. Dick's Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? from which Blade Runner was adapted, is that what it means to be human is derived from what it means to be an artificial human. And the lines are certainly blurred.

Indirectly, it's a reiteration of the Frankenstein theme, whereby the sins of the father are unjustly experienced by the son. Batty is one of several renegade androids scheduled for death.

His pursuant, Rick Deckard, develops a level of sympathy for replicants after falling in love with one, and finds it more difficult to dispatch them so coldly. Indeed, the replicants are believed to have developed more accurate human traits than they were programmed for, making their limited lifespan seem rather cruel.

In the latter half of the film, Batty confronts Tyrell, the head of the corporation that created him. His "father" patronizes Batty and tries to console him and reassure him that his existence has had meaning, whereby Batty gouges out Tyrell's eyes.