The first official teaser trailer for Blade Runner 2049 has been released, and has us all wondering if we might actually somehow already be living in the sequel to this dystopian classic.

The first trailer for the film, which you can watch here, stars Harrison Ford and Ryan Gosling and opens with a shot of a smoggy cityscape that channels the look and feel of 2019 Los Angeles: the setting of the original Blade Runner.

Wondering whether Los Angeles is in any way similar to Beijing in 2017? In an interview with EW, Canadian director Denis Villeneuve revealed that in this dystopia, the "climate has gone berserk – the ocean, the rain, the snow is all toxic."

Sound familiar?

If Villeneuve needs to cut costs for any reason we'd suggest using this latest timelapse footage for the Blade Runner trailer. Taken on the morning of January 2, it shows Beijing going from relatively sunny and blue to dark and toxic in less than 20 minutes.

Apart from that slight relief from the pollution on Monday, the city has been disgustingly smoggy. Levels last night (Jan 3) breached the AQI 700 mark on the AirVisual app in the latest round of pollution, suggesting that we all don gas masks and head underground.

To make things worse, the government has now also put out a red alert warning for fog, while the city is still under the previous orange alert for smog (which was extended and is still in place through Jan 5). We can't figure out to laugh or cry with the idea that the air pollution is now at least somewhat less visible thanks to the hazardous amounts of fog. Let's hope you're not trying to fly out of Beijing anytime soon.

Although it hasn't yet been announced whether Blade Runner 2049 will be released in Chinese cinemas, if it is, it'll be right around when winter 2017 is rolling in and the film is likely to do well if for no other reason than we'll all looking for somewhere to hide from the smog.

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Email: margauxschreurs@truerun.com

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Images: AirVisual, Twitter, Youku, wsj.net