Ryan Gosling and an Alien Sidekick Star in Project Hail Mary

In 2015, people came to adore The Martian, a tense, witty, and unexpectedly touching adaptation of Andy Weir’s bestselling first novel. The Ridley Scott-directed, Matt Damon-led movie drew solid audience scores, strong box office figures, and a couple of awards. A sequel from Weir has been rumored over the years, but a 2021 announcement that the author had a new book on the way was sure to get fans of realistic science fiction with a strong character focus very excited.

When Weir revealed that his 2021 bestseller, Project Hail Mary, would be adapted to the big screen, things only looked rosier. And now, with the first trailer for the project available, it seems very likely that Amazon MGM Studios has a big winner on its hands.

Adaptation Plans Were in the Works Well Before Release

Amazon MGM has been working on bringing Weir’s book to the big screen for some time. It acquired the rights to the story before the novel was even released. In addition to claiming rights, Amazon MGM signed Drew Goddard to the screenplay duties as well.

Goddard is an Academy Award-nominated screenwriter who worked on a number of big studio projects before this. The movie adaptation of Weir’s previous book allowed Goddard to shine, and his faithful and intelligent work on the script won him an Oscar nomination. As such, signing him to work on this film was a sure bet. With Goddard signed, the next move would be to hire a director, and for that, Amazon MGM turned to the filmmaking team of Phil Lord and Christopher Miller.

The name duo behind Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs and The LEGO Movie are not the first people that will likely spring to mind when thinking of hard science fiction or space epics. But on past form, these filmmakers are sure to bring some welcome humor and heart to the story.

Ryland Grace (Ryan Gosling) Has a Big Problem

The first teaser trailer for Project Hail Mary is, like most first trailers, short on detail but does a great job at quickly giving viewers a feel for the action they will be seeing.

The film opens with Gosling’s character, Ryland Grace, waking up on a spaceship. The first thing viewers see after Grace (sans helmet) is an apartment, but before long, it becomes clear that it is a false memory. In reality, Grace is several light-years away from Earth and in danger of dying. Grace is desperate and breathless, and it quickly becomes clear that we are in for a tense ride.

Viewers learn that Grace is a mild-mannered middle school science teacher who was drafted into the space mission by an organization with several different players. One of them, Sandra Hüller’s Eva Stratt, makes the pitch pretty quickly: “If you don’t go, you die with the rest of us. If we do nothing, everything on this planet will go extinct.”

Grace relents, in part because the safety of his students and the entire world is on the line. The newly minted astronaut doesn’t fare all that well in his training either, and quickly launches into space. The story of his journey there is less clear-cut, but the alien life and mystery that will form the core of the project as a whole begin to emerge.

The Sun Is Dying. Multiple Suns. We Don’t Know Why.

One of the initial reveals is that Grace has suffered from temporary amnesia. This is a useful premise for what would otherwise seem like the extremely isolated journey into space, as it means that viewers have as much information about where he is going as Grace.

Project Hail Mary gives some details about the overarching goal of the mission, though. The Sun is slowly dying. The problem is that it’s not just Earth that is suffering. Other nearby stars are also dimming, save for one single one.

Scientists can’t find a cause for this phenomenon, and after taking a look at Grace’s training as a molecular biologist, they also figure he might be just the man to find a solution. The character rejects the idea out of hand in one interview when he says, “I put the ‘not’ in astronaut.” As the ad says, “he can’t even moonwalk.”

Grace is launched into space after training and wakes up alone on his journey. Before long, he makes contact with another ship and with another form of life. The first hint that this new life is alien is that it has four eyes.

But while this is an encounter with something never seen on Earth before, he is not greeted with hostility. The entity, which Grace dubs Rocky, appears to be just as confused as Grace and is not portrayed as a threat. Rocky begins as a mystery in the trailer, and the fact that Grace can train the alien in the art of the thumbs-up is a charming hook.

Project Hail Mary Trailer Predictions

Viewers will have to wait some time to get more details on the film, but the trailer gives viewers all they need for a space epic full of mystery and the very real threat of extinction.

Weir has written a film that balances humor and heart with clear threats to both individual and global safety. But with a great cast in Gosling, Hüller, and also newer names like Roy Choi’s Dave Johnston and Kitana Kiki Rodriguez’s Amy, along with a proven filmmaker and screenwriter team in Phil Lord, Christopher Miller, and Drew Goddard, Project Hail Mary has all the makings of a big sci-fi hit.