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Spoiler Alert! This question is about a recent movie, Blade Runner 2049. I can remove the spoiler tags and change the title after the movie has been out a while and the question would no longer be a spoiler.

The real question I want to ask is ...

Was Officer-K born or made?

There are several hints ...

that he is the long lost son of Rick Deckard and Rachael Tyrell. This would make him the first (or second) child born of replicants.

There are indications ...

that he is a normal replicant with memories implanted from the daughter of Rick Deckard and Rachael Tyrell.

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  • Although this question may seem like it's identical to the "Is Deckard a replicant?" question, it is not. There are clear indications that K was a replicant all along, but doubted that because of some plot events. He never should have doubted. – LincolnMan Oct 9 '17 at 18:43
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You can debate this either way - born or made - but I will say he was made, not born.

Those who would know did about the birth only mentioned one child. Freysa, the leader of the Replicant Freedom Movement, only mentioned a daughter. Deckard (who might have been informed if he had a son as well as a daughter) made no mention of a second child.

If Freysa knew there was a second child, a son, and also believed that Officer-K was that son, she would not have sent him to kill his own father. She would have considered Officer-K as too valuable to risk his life in combat. She directly told Officer-K that he was not the child of Rick Deckard and Rachael.

This means Officer-K was just a normal replicant made in a factory, but implanted with memories from Rachael's daughter.

If Officer-K ever had any doubts, he could just go to a mirror and look up and to the left. If he was made in a factory, his eyeball would have a serial number on it. If he was born, his eyeball would have none. Not sure why he didn't do that in the movie.

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  • Do ALL replicants have an eye serial number, or just the (now) forbidden Nexus-8s? – Jason K Oct 10 '17 at 18:07
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    @JasonK I think they all have them now unless the Wallace company is making some without eye numbers. The Nexus-8 models are not "forbidden", just an older model. The only thing forbidden about Sapper Morton was that he was trying to pass as human instead of registering as a replicant. – LincolnMan Oct 12 '17 at 6:15
  • @LincolnMan Good point. Seems odd to make trivially easy to resolve an important plot point (whether he was the child of Rachael and Rick). – RichS Oct 14 '17 at 16:40
  • who said replicants are clever enough to figure that out – Marian Paździoch Oct 16 '17 at 14:51
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    @MarianPaździoch You know many replicants are smarter than the average human? – LincolnMan Oct 17 '17 at 7:16
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Spoilers below in the entire answer:

Made.

Although K spends most of the movie figuring out that he is the lost son of a replicant and then believing this to be true, it's eventually revealed that he cannot be the son of Deckard and Rachael... Because their child was a girl, not a boy. This is revealed by Freysa after she has saved K.

The identity of the child was obfuscated in several ways. K is made to believe that Rachael and Deckard had twins, a girl and a boy, but quickly deduces that something is amiss about the records because their DNA on file is identical. Twins of different sex can't have the same DNA because they're fraternal twins. So there was ever only one child, not twins. This is obviously corroborated by everyone in the know; there's only one child on the photo, Freysa only mentions one child, and Deckard only mentions one child. These are more than "indications".

In the records, the girl is listed as deceased, while the boy lived. In fact, the records were forged; there was no boy, he was made up to send anyone looking on a wild goose chase. This is corroborated by Freysa.

K started the movie believing he was made, with implanted memories. He then thought he was born, and that the memories were real. In fact, as revealed by the end of the movie, he was made and the memories were implants – but they were real, implanted memories from the actual daughter of Deckard and Rachael.

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