Warning: This post may contain spoilers. Second warning.
Entertainment Weekly just dropped a brand-new batch of Blade Runner 2049 photos on us. They're all very cool and interesting and just as intriguing as you'd expect photos from the new Denis Villeneuve joint to be...but one photo in particular has caught our eye, as it seems to confirm a theory we put forth all the way back in May.
We'll get to that potential spoiler in just a minute. For now, let's look at the stuff that isn't so spoilery.
Here's Ryan Gosling's police detective, K...uh, checking into a hotel? Investigating a very strange tanning bed? We're not sure, but the set design's got Blade Runner written all over it.
Then there's this photo, wherein K presses his hand to a science-fiction-y doorway gizmo while a tattooed man looks at him. We don't know K's relationship to the man, nor do we know what's happening on the other side of that door.
Here's Robin Wright and (who we think is) Sylvia Hoeks glowering at one another inside, I dunno, a lab or a police precinct or an office-supply warehouse or something. It's all very mysterious and we can't really even begin to speculate on the meaning.
This is where it gets spoilery, though. If you're opposed to that sort of thing, turn back now.
Final warning.
Still here? OK, good. First, let's revisit this Phil Nobile Jr. post from May. At the time, our eagle-eyed editor-at-large noticed something odd about a shot in that trailer: namely, that Ryan Gosling appeared to be bursting through a concrete wall in order to protect Harrison Ford's Deckard. Y'know who has a hard time bursting through solid concrete walls? Humans. Y'know who doesn't have a hard time bursting through solid concrete walls? The Kool-Aid Man, that's right.
Also, robots.
The image above seems to be showing us the direct aftermath of K's emergence through that wall. I suppose this could be an extremely elaborate bit of misdirection - the earlier trailer didn't come right out and make it explicit, and the photo above could technically have been taken after someone else burst through that wall and ran out of frame - but we don't think so. How about you guys?
Sound off in the comments below, and stay tuned for more on Blade Runner 2049 as it becomes available.