Project Hail Mary: “The Most Unbelievable Theme Is Acceptance”
Illustration by Jaydah Victor-Morse
As the U.S. celebrates the safe return of Artemis II, taking humans the farthest they’ve ever come, films continue to imagine what more we can do in space. And rather, the friends we can meet along the way.
Since the March release of sci-fi blockbuster Project Hail Mary, based on the 2021 novel by Andy Weir, it’s rapidly entered conversations online cementing itself as one of the “greats” in Goslings’ discography and as (perhaps) the greatest sci-fi thriller since Interstellar.
I didn’t go into the movie expecting much – while the Interstellar comparisons were definitely intriguing, the glowing reviews I saw online were mainly driven by men talking about how a movie about a white man in space was one of the best films they’ve ever seen.
But I suppose Project Hail Mary is meant to defy the preconceived. Over the course of three hours, the audience is taken through the intergalactic adventures of a once-middle school science teacher Ryland Grace who wakes up as the sole survivor of the spaceship he was forced on, with the task to save the fate of Planet Earth from a Sun-eating organism by himself. Except, not entirely.
Unexpectedly, Grace finds himself next to an alien spaceship, where all but one of its inhabitants have died trying to also save their planet from the same threat. The ship's sole survivor, a rock-appearing figure Grace calls Rocky, teams up with the scientist to save their planets, launching a journey full of self-discovery, heartbreak, and at the root, a budding friendship that serves as an anchor to the film's ending when a tough choice needs to be made.
The film is defined as an “American epic.” One where this time, the alien becomes the savior. And despite the intergalactic adventure that unfolded before me, this felt to be the most unbelievable part of the plot to me.
As ICE raids ramp up across the country, forcing residents out of homes and harming the workforce, the concept of the “foreign” and “unknown” hasn’t been allowed room to be considered as an ally. Rather, the “aliens” are our enemies. And they’re not Eridians. They’re human.To not give away so much of the ending, though Grace gets to connect with Eridians, Rocky does not experience Earth at all. But fictional or not, maybe that isn’t so much of a bad thing. While Eridians welcomed Grace, it’s unlikely that same affection would’ve been shared to Rocky by us. He probably would’ve been held in a lab in some U.S. governmental base. But at least he would’ve been safe from ICE.
The tone set by Project Hail Mary is one that was needed during this time, though it’s uncertain whether that message landed to a broader audience. Will leave that up to interpretation.
