Preamble: I know more about Blade Runner than I do about Red Dawn. Know also that there's a 500 page book on the making of Blade Runner that isn't tedious, overly long or filled with esoteric details that are irrelevant to the story.

So know that I'm trying to make this short.

To the best of my knowledge, extant, available versions of Blade Runner include:

- The Dallas workprint

- The theatrical cut (USA)

- The theatrical cut (foreign)

- The VHS cut (Canada and other English-speaking regions)

- The "director's cut"

- The "Final Cut"

This is in large part because Blade Runner was a pigfuck of a production. Ridley Scott actually moved the whole thing from Los Angeles to the UK just to get away from his crew, who towards the end were wearing shirts that said "Ridley Sucks."

As far as "source material" none of the movies have anything whatsoever in common with Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? which, really, is fine... 'cuz it's a shit book. As are most Philip K. Dick novels. They make good source material for movies because he had some whacky ideas but in his own words, "I'm a science fiction writer with five mouths to feed. I do a lot of speed." PKD died in the middle of production of Blade Runner but not before disavowing the production and leveling a gun at not just Paul Sammon, but David Peeples in the course of interviews. It's also worth noting that the first Hollywood interest in Androids Dream came from Martin Scorsese, who wanted Robert DeNiro to star in it.

Contrary to popular opinion, Blade Runner was always intended to have voiceover. The reason it sucks so hard in the original Theatrical Cut is that by the time Harrison Ford recorded it, the studio hated Ridley, Ridley hated the studio, everyone wanted it to die but they couldn't kill it because it was the most expensive movie made in 1981 ($12m, if I recall correctly, more than f'ing Empire Strikes Back or E.T.).

And then they fired that writer and another producer took over and they re-cut it and Harrison Ford had to do the voiceover again.

And then they fired THAT writer and ANOTHER producer took over and they re-cut it and Harrison Ford had to do the voiceover AGAIN.

At this point Ridley Scott and Harrison Ford were hopeful that the movie would go out without voiceover. What Harrison recorded he recorded in one take while working on something else (can't remember what). The Dallas Workprint was Ridley's best edit delivered without voiceover. It did not, however, meet with universal acclaim.

As such, the movie hit theaters with voiceover because frankly, you need the voiceover to understand what the fuck is going on. Ridley Scott has now had 30 years to polish his baby and I gotta tell ya - the "Final Cut" is pretty damn confusing still.

I've read four different versions of the script. Long story short, Blade Runner was a $30m movie (in 1981) that was made for $10m by a studio in trouble. Imagine if someone took two thirds of Peter Jackson's money away after filming was underway on Lord of the Rings and also tried to replace him several times. The result would be similar to Blade Runner.

It's still a masterpiece.

You wanted a short answer. I didn't give you one. That's because all that preamble will hopefully cause you to watch the theatrical cut, forgive it its failings, and then watch the Final Cut.