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Take a cursory look at the release history of Blade Runner (which originally came out in 1982) and you might begin to think that Ridley Scott has caught a George Lucas-sized case of Special Edition-itis - you know, that terrible disease that afflicts some directors and causes them to keep tweaking and re-editing and re-releasing their films in different versions, over and over and over. Wikipedia lists seven different versions of Blade Runner, for God's sake, including the original theatrical edition, and the Director's Cut, which is what most fans probably own on VHS or DVD. But supposedly Scott did not have complete artistic control over any version of the film - even the so-called Director's Cut - until this version, the one being released to theaters today: the Final Cut.
Personally, I've loved every version of the film I've ever seen. Scott takes a typically surreal mind-fuck by author Phillip K. Dick, about cops and humanoid robots in a medicated future where nothing is what it appears to be and nobody knows what's real anymore (Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? - which is a pretty bad book, by the way), steals some of the basic story elements and concepts, and uses them as the basis for a brilliant reimagining of film noir set in the future - a film whose ultimate subjects are no less weighty than life and death; reality and artifice. More specifically, it speaks of what it means to live knowing that death is inevitable, and whether there's a difference between appearing in every way to be a thing, and actually being that thing.
Blade Runner has everything every film noir has: the anti-hero detective, a search for killers that takes the form of a difficult puzzle, the femme(s) fatale, the love affair with the mysterious woman, brutal violence and murder, a journey through the sleazy and the weird, a big dark city, and a look into the blackest corners of the human soul. But here it's set in a time when real living animals are a priceless rarity, and people are therefore obsessed with expensive robotic simulations of animals. Nearly human simulations also exist, but are confined to off-world colonies. If they're found on Earth, they're immediately executed by a special police force known as blade runners. When a gang of particularly smart and dangerous replicants of a new, more advanced model come to Earth and start causing havoc, retired blade runner Deckard (Harrison Ford) is called back by his rather slimy boss (the inimitable M. Emmet Walsh) for one last job. During his investigation, he finds himself falling for an employee of the company that makes the replicants, the doll-like Rachael (Sean Young), and clashing with a fellow blade runner (Edward James Olmos - who's still hunting toasters and skin jobs to this day!). Character actor James Hong has a memorable cameo as a designer of artificial eyes, and William Sanderson does a wonderful job as the elderly child, and toy aficionado, J.F. Sebastian. Finally, the whole gang of twisted, seductive, brilliant, bestial replicants - Rutger Hauer, Daryl Hannah, Brion James, and Joanna Cassidy - put in unforgettable performances.
But there's another very important character in the film, and that's Scott's future city. It's in some areas overcrowded with a crushing throng of humanity, and in other places hollow, pockmarked, and deserted. It's awash in perpetual night, every scene lit only by flickering neon advertising lights or jets of flame from industrial waste pipes. The visuals are weird, breath-taking, beautiful, and are only made more so by the accompaniment of the eerie, evocative, new age soundtrack by Vangelis. If you've never seen the film before on the big screen, you owe it to yourself to do so now; you need to examine the details and bask in the full grandeur of Blade Runner's incredible landscapes, models, and set pieces.
But all this could really be said of any version of the film. Those of you who are already fans of the movie may be curious to know just what is different about this one. Well, Wikipedia has a detailed summary of the various versions and the differences between each one, but the main difference between the theatrical release and the Director's Cut is that the former had an over-explanatory narration track read by Harrison Ford (apparently against his will) which the studio added because they were afraid no one would understand what was going on. The studio also tacked on a happy ending - a shot, completely out of pace with the rest of the picture, of a car driving along a hillside in broad daylight, which is rumored to have been stolen from The Shining. The Director's Cut excises both of these things, but adds in a unicorn dream that is meant to suggest that Deckard is himself a replicant.
Since I had originally fallen in love with the theatrical version of the movie, and had been expecting the Director's Cut to only add things and not take things away, I was initially unhappy with it. But over time I came to realize that it's the superior version of the film. It forces the viewer to interact more with the movie; to make his own interpretation. It's far more complex and subtle and artistic.
Having made my peace with the Director's Cut, I was extremely curious to see what other changes Scott had made in the Final Cut. And I was a little disappointed - though also slightly relieved - to find myself unable to see any obvious differences. Disappointed because the Final Cut essentially is the Director's Cut, and I had been hoping for something new and exciting. 
But relieved because he hasn't added in entirely new special effects shots, or replaced one actor with a different actor.
I appreciate that (according to the Wikipedia run-down, at least) some continuity issues have been fixed, and some of the more violent scenes that were taken out of the theatrical release have been put back in. This is a slightly more polished and perfected version of the movie that it will be good to own on DVD. And due to its visual beauty, and the fact that it's a great movie, it's certainly worth a viewing in a movie theater. Just don't expect a totally new and different experience.
Image via Screaming Lamb
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I would be able to take your "pretty bad book" comment more seriously if you had gotten the title right. Just throwing out a guess here, but you've never read it, have you?
Yo, it's a typo. We police them pretty heavily around here, but sometimes they slip through the cracks. Relax. It's one letter.
I can assure you, I have read the book, and it is indeed pretty bad. But I do regret the typo. I shall fix it now.