These indicators ranged from the fact that not everybody has seen the original Blade Runner to the fact that asking modern audiences to sit through a slow-burn, three-hour science fiction epic is a significant request these days.
Of course, for some of us, there were a few key indicators that Blade Runner 2049 wasn’t going to a big box office earner reasonably early on in its theatrical run.
Denis Villeneuve himself has spoken out about the film’s lack of major commercial success and said that he doesn’t entirely know why it didn’t play better with mainstream audiences, and that seems to relate to his disappointment in lack of official awards recognition.