With this new book by John David Ebert, Blade Runner Scene-by-Scene, Ebert performs an archaeology of Ridley Scott's main thematic concerns: death, origin, genesis and the quest for immortality. In doing so, he compares the film to such ancient and classic texts as The Gilgamesh Epic. Scott's vision of the Los Angeles of 2019 is seen as a type of decaying, late stage cosmopolis; and the Replicants as slave labor manufactured to work their modern latifundia.