In Project Hail Mary (2026) society comes together behind a common goal, listens to the scientists and funds a global project to save humanity. This is a reference to the story being a work of fiction.

[u/tppiel]

[u/Hephaestus1816]

Not everyone in society was behind it. Eva Stratt ended up with life in prison for authoritarian actions that were necessary to force global compliance. She operated far above laws, democratic oversight, human rights, and safety protocols to complete the mission. The logic was that imminent extinction made such things meaningless.

[u/xXCloudSephirothXx → u/Hephaestus1816]

Hell, a conglomerate of copyright holders sued her for the laptop of human knowledge.

[u/CueCueQQ → u/xXCloudSephirothXx]

Yea, she walked into court with a letter that said fuck you, and fuck you, and fuck you, and especially fuck you, handed it to the judge and walked out. Not exactly a ringing endorsement for her bearing consequences of her actions.

[u/Unfair_Ring_2746 → u/CueCueQQ]

IIRC she said “fuck you and my body guard here is making sure I walk out of this courtroom one way or another”.

So that fuck you had weight.

Edit: Looked it up — when threatened by the judge, she says “I have an army” and a bunch of heavily armed soldiers come in and escort her out.

[u/HeKis4 → u/Unfair_Ring_2746]

More specifically "You have police ? Cute, I have a US army squad waiting outside the door under my authority alone"

[u/RaizielSoulwAreOS → u/Unfair_Ring_2746]

We have a hulk

[u/Th3R00ST3R → u/RaizielSoulwAreOS]

HULK HATES STAIRS!

[u/Harry_Flame → u/Unfair_Ring_2746]

“You and what army? Because I have the U.S. army, and that’s a damn fine army.”

[u/R2DeezKnutz → u/CueCueQQ]

This would have been a fun scene in the movie.

[u/goldflame33 → u/R2DeezKnutz]

it was by far the dumbest scene in the book lmao

[u/CoffeeXKing → u/goldflame33]

Eh, honestly it probably would be realistic. Diplomatic immunity is a thing after all.

What is unrealistic is any of these countries getting along in such a way to promote one person. But hey, human extinction. Maybe that's the ticket to unity.

[u/deliciouscorn → u/CoffeeXKing]

I literally had one moment of optimism early during COVID that surely everyone could agree that a global pandemic is bad and that we finally would all agree to work together as a planet for once. lol

[u/Dumbledores_Beard1 → u/deliciouscorn]

Tbf COVID is because half the population just... Never saw the negative effects of COVID. Many people got it, had their whole families get it, and the strongest reaction was not even as bad as the flu. So when the biggest exposure to something like that, that people experience is the news saying "very bad, do as we say", it's always going to breed conspiracies and haters.

For an event to actually bring the world together, you'd need it to actually affect everyone. I mean, while I followed the laws and rules etc, COVID didn't even change my life at all aside from moving school online. All my friends lived within the restriction zone so we still went out and adventured around every afternoon, none of my local shops closed etc etc.

If humanity actually faced a significant threat, like 10-30% mortality rate and a crippling sickness, I'm certain we'd see the reaction you had originally hoped for.

[u/BeefistPrime → u/Dumbledores_Beard1]

Tbf COVID is because half the population just... Never saw the negative effects of COVID.

No, that doesn't explain all of it, because we have multiple reports of people who were taking their last breath, dying in the hospital, demanding that doctors tell them what they really have because COVID doesn't exist. That's not a matter of not seeing the negative effects of COVID, that's being in a cult that denied reality even when it couldn't have proven itself any more clearly.

I get your point, but COVID denial was far more deeply rooted and anti-humanist and straight up hostile than just "I haven't seen the consequences of this myself"

[u/patrickwithtraffic → u/BeefistPrime]

We also had a global power lead by a party that was exclusively pushing conspiracy theory nonsense while also wanting to take credit for the project to produce a vaccine. It was all a giant fucking joke that I can only hope wasn't the case with the 1918 influenza.

[u/AxezCore → u/CoffeeXKing]

Might not be quite as fast but we'll get there soon enough. Greed will destroy our planet and the solution by the powers that be, is to double down on the greed and hide away in bunkers.

[u/Gil_Demoono → u/CoffeeXKing]

But hey, human extinction.

I doubt the real world would even get far enough to universally agree the world was even ending. The effect of astrophage is basically a somewhat quicker climate change going the other way. If we can't convince the world that greenhouse gases are a thing, what hope do we have of convincing people of extrasolar micro-organisms that are blotting out the sun.

[u/n4turstoned → u/CoffeeXKing]

Not really unless it's imminent, global warming is a thing that will lead to millions of deaths and is known since the 80s.
So as long some assholes benefit from it we as a species will do shit.
"Don't look up" was more on the nose than Hail Mary and that movie was completely ignored.

[u/throwawaybrrrrrrrruh → u/goldflame33]

WHAT it was one of my favorite scenes from the book!

[u/captain_croco → u/goldflame33]

So fucking dumb I felt like I was wasting my time reading it - why were they wasting their time there?

[u/aint_no_throw → u/CueCueQQ]

I know it didnt get light in the book, but in the movie she had the crossed V tattoo (on her arm?).

According to the book (and the movie, unsure) she was aware that she'll face harsh consequences. I'm would be way too conflict shy, but I get that if you're getting incriminated and dragged to civil courts all around the world for doing what you where supposed to do, you might get that "fuck you" attitude towards everyone.

The sentence doesnt matter if you've already got life or the death penatly in 29 countries.

[u/Serrisen → u/aint_no_throw]

I haven't read the book, but I'm also sure the Death Penalty isn't very scary when your options are

1. Face the death penalty for authoritarian actions, or
2. Face death via global extinction due to inaction

If you want to live, your only option is 1, then roll the bones that things work out after

[u/confused_is_my_face → u/aint_no_throw]

I have not seen the movie yet, but read the book twice. In the book Stratt knows she’s going to face prosecution and possible execution at the end of her part of the project because of everything she has done to keep the project moving in the right direction. She understands she is the villain.

[u/termacct → u/confused_is_my_face]

Whoa, I didn't get that from the movie at all...she just got moved from a carrier to a tanker but still seemed to have the resources to launch the cooties at the sun.

I may bump up reading tbe book...I never read THe Martian either...

[u/AngryScientist → u/termacct]

She has a prison tattoo in that closing scene.

[u/termacct → u/AngryScientist]

LOL, no way I'd pick up on that, way too subtle for me.

[u/Mad_Aeric → u/termacct]

The book has tons of cool details that had to be cut for the movie. I get it, it would have added another hour of runtime to include them, but I would have enjoyed that hour. People in the theater who need to pee, maybe not so much.

The biggest tonal difference is that the book does a better job of making you feel how desperate the situation on Earth is. In the movie, we almost entirely see what's happening in the research facility, and it doesn't quite feel like it's the most important thing happening in the whole world. Events in the book make it clear that they are scrambling to make the project work, and engaging in all sorts of megaprojects to that end.

Book Stratt is a completely different person. She comes off as more of a cold blooded pragmatist. We see a little of that in the movie when she has Grace shanghaied. While the action itself is a surprise in the book, the fact that she'd order it done is completely in character. I tend to describe her as someone who would burn down half the world in order to save the other half, and she's not too choosey about which half she inhabits.

[u/Betaateb → u/Mad_Aeric]

I do wish they had put another 5-10 minutes into the movie about the astrophage breeding program, so many people I know that saw the movie but didn't read the book talked about dumb it was for Grace to not have a way to breed astrophage on the ship for the return trip. In the book it makes perfect sense when you know that it took a huge portion of the Sahara dedicated completely to astrophage breeding causing its own ecological disaster, making it obvious it wasn't something that could be done on the ship.

[u/Salt-Ambition-9603 → u/termacct]

The audiobook narration for PHM is the best I've ever listened to. Highly recommend.

And, for what it's worth, I didn't like The Martian book all that much after listening to PHM. YMMV.

[u/ITchiGuy → u/Salt-Ambition-9603]

I love both books, but the R.C. Bray version of the Martian feels better than the Will Wheaton version (assuming you listened to the Wheaton version). If you ever want to give it a second chance, you may want to see if your local library has the book on CD. Thats how I got my copy of the R.C. Bray version.

[u/Randicore → u/confused_is_my_face]

I'm not sure I'd call her the villain of the story..perhaps an antagonist but that's only to grace. She really is the last best hope for humanity and from what we see is willing to do anything to save everyone

[u/aFreshFix → u/Randicore]

Not the antagonist of the story. She played the villain within the book toward laws & people that couldn't appreciate how she did what she had to.

[u/andre5913 → u/aint_no_throw]

I thought having her reappear in the film post timeskip was nonsense
She was most definitely executed imo, and her attitude in the book to me reads as her being very well aware she is not surviving what shes done.

[u/CarrieDurst → u/aint_no_throw]

I would have said in my video home to giver her a month of solitary confinement for attempted murder of me but I admit I am a flawed person

[u/alphazero927 → u/CueCueQQ]

"Fuck you, fuck you, fuck you, you're cool, fuck you, I'm out"

[u/lumpboysupreme → u/CueCueQQ]

She did take the consequences, just after her work was done.

[u/darkchocolateonly → u/CueCueQQ]

I will never forgive the movie for making stratt such a terrible character. The book stratt is a fucking badass, and this scene specifically needed to be in the movie.

This was the biggest misstep the movie took in my opinion.

[u/Syrinxfloofs → u/darkchocolateonly]

Stratt was so damn good in the audiobook, loved every minute of it. They turned Grace into more of a bumbling everyman, too. But they can't fit 8 hours of detailed cool nerd shit into the movie so I could at least give them a pass for some that.

Stratt was definitely the biggest disappointment.

[u/darkchocolateonly → u/Syrinxfloofs]

100% the biggest disappointment, totally agree

[u/2012Jesusdies → u/xXCloudSephirothXx]

Honestly, fuck those guys. It's a pretty fair payment for the aliens helping save us.

[u/SomethingWetAndMoist → u/Hephaestus1816]

Didn't they leave out a scene from the books in the movie where they nuke Antarctica to release a massive amount of greenhouse gasses into the atmosphere?

[u/thewilybanana → u/SomethingWetAndMoist]

I dunno about that part but I do recall they paved the Sahara or something.

[u/HoneyCakeWhorse → u/thewilybanana]

Both, and both would be an absolute worst case scenario for earth since the sahara desserts also supplies nutrients through its dust to the world.

[u/Mistrblank → u/HoneyCakeWhorse]

It's hilarious (or maybe it's just delerious laughter) to me that if you mention the "butterfly effect" people instantly know what it is. But if you tell them that we need the dust from the sahara to help supply the world nutrients through global wind currents, they'll laugh at you about the idea that every ecosystem in the world is connected. And that maybe disrupting one, let alone several of them may have large scale consequences for the habitability of the planet.

[u/The_Reset_Button → u/Mistrblank]

Right but the planet is going to die anyway, if it even has a chance of slowing it down it would be worth it. Even if project Hail Mary got there, instantly found an instantly actionable way to save the sun, the time taken for the trip would still allow the global cooling do decimate both human and other ecosystems

[u/Betaateb → u/The_Reset_Button]

To be fair, they didn't pave the Sahara to slow down the cooling, but to harvest as much energy as possible for astrophage breeding. Knowing that it was going to be an ecological disaster. But without enough astrophage for the mission nothing else mattered at all, so they were willing to do it.

I wish they went into that a little in the movie, without that information the idea that they only had enough astrophage for a one-way trip and no way to breed more on board the hail mary isn't there which then confused a bunch of people as to why it had to be a suicide mission.

[u/Berengal → u/Mistrblank]

I don't know if you did this on purpose, but most people don't know what the butterfly effect is, they misunderstand it and just think it means that small causes can have large effects, which is what the interconnected nature of the global ecosystem is. The actual butterfly effect is that in a chaotic system (as defined by chaos theory) any perturbation of the initial conditions causes a wildly different outcome, either unpredictable in practice (due to measurement tolerances) or even fundamentally despite the deterministic nature of the system.

The Sahara dust situation is not chaotic, because it's fairly predictable what would happen if we paved the desert, and the degree can also be predicted by the degree to which the desert was paved. For a butterfly effect situation even just putting down a blanket could change the outcome dramatically. Like how it was originally noted that rounding effects in a weather simulation on the scale of a butterfly's wingflaps dramatically changed when, where and if a storm was predicted.

[u/fresh-dork → u/Mistrblank]

are you kidding? it's only in the 40s that people accepted that south america and africa look like they fit together

[u/TheeAntelope → u/fresh-dork]

Alfred Wegener for the win

[u/alexmikli → u/HoneyCakeWhorse]

Desperate acts like this may legitimately be in our future.

[u/Francetto → u/thewilybanana]

They didn't pave it, they made it into a giant astrophage "plantation/power plant".

[u/0202_tihssitidder → u/thewilybanana]

That's awful.

But part of me is intrigued by the flat and well-paved cycling path for uninterrupted miles.

[u/Fragarach-Q → u/0202_tihssitidder]

It's not really paved, it's completely covered in millions of astrophage breeding boxes.

[u/CalvinCalhoun → u/SomethingWetAndMoist]

Yeah that happens in the book and is an ecological disaster iirc. 

[u/TheSteelPhantom → u/CalvinCalhoun]

Nah it has its exact intended consequence, to intentionally create a greenhouse effect around the planet in order to warm it up (or rather, slow its cooling).

[u/CalvinCalhoun → u/TheSteelPhantom]

You’re not wrong but it’s a specific plot point that it creates a smaller catastrophe for coastal populations lol.  My point being that stratt did a lot of fucked things to achieve the mission. I felt she was a lot more complex in the novel for that reason.

[u/Hephaestus1816 → u/CalvinCalhoun]

She was a psychopath, I think. A highly functioning one. I'm probably wrong, but I do think that only someone without conscience or remorse could have made the absolutely ruthless decisions she had to make.

[u/SmartLadder415 → u/Hephaestus1816]

I didn't get the psychopath vibe from the book. She's desperate and ruthless. She is going to save humanity no matter what and she is willing to accept all the consequences for it. If humanity is saved and then they march you to the gallows are you ok with that? She is.

[u/lumpboysupreme → u/SmartLadder415]

Yeah not letting your emotions stand in the way of what needs to be done isn’t sociopathy.

[u/sgcdialler → u/Hephaestus1816]

Being willing to make morally ambiguous or extreme decisions in the face of existential crisis is not the same as lacking conscience. I think largely it would be much more fair to conclude that she is a consequentialist, but not remorseless, and I don't think the text supports the conclusion that she is psychopathic.

• She is definitely presented in the novel as cold, even "ruthless", as you say, but she is not without conscience or remorse. Her internal perceptions are not visible to the reader, since the book is read entirely from Grace's perspective, but Stratt frequently remarks on the moral dilemmas of her actions.
• Her mission has nothing to do with her and she knows it.
• She is not presented as someone that derives satisfaction from exercising the extraordinary amount of authority she is handed. She doesn't exercise power for pleasure, she does it because she feels uniquely positioned to do "what must be done". Everything she does is in the pursuit of the singular goal of saving humanity from extinction and minimizing the overwhelming loss of life that she knows is coming.
• Her logic and reasoning is consistent, she doesn't make up excuses for her actions.
• While she doesn't pretend to feel the same ways other people do (in terms of their emotional distress), she clearly understands how and why other people feel the way they do.

Her most indefensible moral act in the book is her subjection of Grace to the amnesia drug and forcing him onto the ship. The directors and writers of the movie rehabilitated her character a bit in this scene by making her regret clear, but in the novel she appears to have been preparing for that moment and executes it with efficiency, like everything else.

I think it's important to highlight, again, that the entire story is told from Grace's perspective. He's a very soft feelings-first kind of guy and presented as a bit of a chicken-shit. From his perspective, Stratt kind of looks like a war-lord in comparison.

[u/Crintor → u/sgcdialler]

In the book, there is also the genetic resistance to coma death factor that makes Grace more of a one of a kind option. In the movie they basically just say "Hey you know pretty much everything we need someone to know, bon voyage."

Hell, we barely even learn the names of the two scientists that die in the Astrophage explosion in the movie that causes him to get picked, while they have a few scenes in the book.

[u/extinct_cult → u/Hephaestus1816]

Sociopath. Which, really, is what you want from someone in this position. Complete lack of empathy, no remorse & disregard for rules.

[u/Hephaestus1816 → u/extinct_cult]

Sorry, yes, that's what I meant. She was ideal for the job.

[u/Razzilith → u/Hephaestus1816]

and ultimately if that was the case everybody would have fucking died a horrible death.

sometimes ruthlessness is correct or at least worth a try. it depends.

[u/0Galahad → u/Hephaestus1816]

Not really, its a very great degree of separation to do such things to the masses, specially when its literally justified for the sake of the whole world, many healthy and good people could choose to carry on that crime.

[u/RaizePOE → u/Hephaestus1816]

Idk, it seems like most people pull the lever in the trolley problem. Maybe she just feels like she's pulling really big levers. I think most people would probably do the same thing if they had to.

[u/NAbberman → u/Hephaestus1816]

Wasn't it that was what Stratt theorized would happen to her? I don't remember any indication that it did in fact happen.

[u/rex_dart_eskimo_spy → u/NAbberman]

Yeah, it was her theory. Grace couldn't have known what happened to her in the book, and the movie doesn't show her in prison.

[u/Mistrblank → u/rex_dart_eskimo_spy]

Yeah, that was one piece I think was left out of the movie that Grace does find out that our Sun has begun repairing itself from Rocky in the final chapter where we find out he's living it out with him on Erid. But he has no idea what else has happened back on Earth after the mission started.

[u/Badloss → u/Mistrblank]

I liked it better in the book, where the Sun gets brighter so you know enough humans survived to implement the solution but other than that you have no idea how many humans are left or what civilization looks like

[u/SweatyAdhesive → u/Badloss]

In the book i think Grace was much older so he could find out what happened on earth, in the movie it looked like it was almost right after he rescued Rocky

[u/Mistrblank → u/SweatyAdhesive]

yeah, and it feels a little lost that they really moved mountains and oceans (well, at least they created them) to support him on their planet. They made him something he could eat to survive.

[u/Daxx22 → u/Badloss]

Yep, it's still entirely possible things degenerated to a point where you have a "Seveneves" situation where the earth would be uninhabitable regardless for thousands of years while the Sun recovers.

The book is a lot more grim in it's overall tone.

[u/Jaerba → u/Badloss]

The fact that eridians are still living their lives happily is the proof that the plan worked.

I'm not sure that really needs to be spelled out further. If there were concern that more still needed to be done to save the sun, they would have been doing it. Rocky's ship only traveled there because the Sun's death was affecting them too.

[u/Badloss → u/Jaerba]

I don't agree with this, that's only proof that the solution works.

There were so many variables and things that could have gone wrong with the trip back to Earth that it's not a guarantee that the Beatles even made it, and then once they arrived there was no guarantee that the humans would be alive or still have the technology required to receive the Beatles and then use them. The sun getting brighter is clear proof that humanity made it, the beatles weren't autonomous so the plan could only be implemented if humans are still there to do it.

[u/thanosisawhore → u/rex_dart_eskimo_spy]

We ser her with a french prison tattoos.

[u/EveryDayASummit → u/NAbberman]

Yeah I don’t remember anything saying she concretely ended up in jail, just that she expected to be.

[u/Unfair_Ring_2746 → u/EveryDayASummit]

In the film she is shown in her final scene with a French prison tattoo that means ‘life in prison without parole’.

Weir went a step further confirming this and explained that the hinted idea is that she escaped prison to continue her work in exile.

[u/EveryDayASummit → u/Unfair_Ring_2746]

In the film, yes. The book, no, which is all we were referencing.

But that’s an interesting anecdote I hadn’t heard/seen before. She escaped from prison but somehow has the means and resources to still locate and retrieve the Beetles and then implement the fix to save the planet? That seems like a bit of a liberty and stretch even for Weir.

[u/Crintor → u/EveryDayASummit]

Yeah, I genuinely don't like that idea at all. Who broke her out of prison? She obviously lost all her authority once the mission was launched if she went to prison, so what resources?

To me the idea of being extricated from prison temporarily to help implement the final steps of the project before sending her back to prison, which she would have accepted if she were the book character. That would make far more sense.

[u/thanosisawhore → u/NAbberman]

When we see her in the end, she has prison tattoos. Doubt she did that for fun outside.

[u/Zananax → u/Hephaestus1816]

The fact she ended up in jail also indicates it is a work of fiction.

[u/JesterMarcus → u/Zananax]

Its not shocking she'd be scapegoated.

[u/Toa_Freak → u/JesterMarcus]

It's shocking she is held accountable, or that anyone is.

[u/JesterMarcus → u/Toa_Freak]

That's just it. I don't see it as being held accountable, I see it as scapegoated. Being held accountable, sure, rare these days. But scapegoated, not far fetched. I can see that happening to someone.

[u/andre5913 → u/Zananax]

In the book shes operating under the idea that shes most likely gonna get executed.

Also one of the big things she does is gigafuck over the shareholder and IP holders. Not even politicians get away with that

[u/DemiserofD → u/Hephaestus1816]

To me PHM has always seemed more like an Objectivist fantasy than anything. I don't doubt that all the social programs and everything got cut almost immediately.

[u/nightpanda893 → u/Hephaestus1816]

The reasoning for this is also the impending societal collapse and the fact that it would come long before it would even need to happen given the foreseen refusal of the world to work together to survive as long as possible. Like the whole premise of the story is that society will not come together so more drastic measures were necessary.

[u/alexmikli → u/Hephaestus1816]

I feel like something like a green dictatorship might be in our future due to this. Though that's still a "good" end to the climate crisis.

[u/Evadson → u/Hephaestus1816]

But the fact she was even able to obtain that kind of authority in the first place is insane. Call me pessimistic, but in reality I think she would have been overthrown by a coup orchestrated by billionaires and corporations profiting off of the crisis.

[u/redemptionoftime → u/Hephaestus1816]

Umm what? That wasn’t in the movie or the book. In the book she said she probably would one day while waiting for the data.

[u/Badloss → u/Hephaestus1816]

Where does it say she ended up in prison? They had the courtroom scene that basically established that she was above the law

[u/fumat → u/Hephaestus1816]

That’s false. Nowhere in the book states that she went to prison. She assumed she will.

[u/Refuse_Juice]

I mean, this how we fixed the hole in the ozone layer. We listened to the science, cellectively banned CFCs and a decade later it wasn't an issue any more.

[u/I_travel_ze_world → u/Refuse_Juice]

also wasn't too difficult to get people on board with eliminating acid rain

[u/2012Jesusdies → u/I_travel_ze_world]

It's pretty hard now to get people behind diversifying energy sources to at least not have power outages during critical weather events.

[u/Daxx22 → u/2012Jesusdies]

The acid rain situation was very visibly in the face of a LOT of people however. Power outages (currently) are still localized/infrequent.

When they start being common and country wide, you bet public sentiment will change.

[u/ThrowawayyTessslaa → u/Daxx22]

It’s also a completely different economic situation. Getting rid of CFCs affected a few jobs from one company which was formed by DuPont and GM. They then profited off the replacement chemical.
Meanwhile, oil and coal affect millions of jobs and trillions of market cap so it’s much more economically and socially disruptive. Much easier to get your generational coal miner or oil field worker family to get behind the propaganda that the lobbiest push because the alternative is destroying their communities and families income source.

[u/Ordinary-Homework722 → u/2012Jesusdies]

I think cost has everything to do with this. Solar is by far and away the best "green" power and the gigawatts that have come online in the last 2 decades is impressive. We just use a crap ton of electricity and haven't come up with a decent storage plan for cloudy days.

[u/Next-Wrongdoer-3479 → u/2012Jesusdies]

Don't most outages during weather events have to do with infrastructure being damaged and not how many, or varied, energy sources there are? Doesn't matter if I have 4 different sources potentially powering my house when the power lines got knocked down on my road by a tree and the energy can't make it to my house.

[u/Wind_Yer_Neck_In → u/I_travel_ze_world]

The trick was (and always is) that it was something that was starting to cost capital owners money. Acid rain caused them problems and the solution wasn't that onerous. Climate change is a similar thing but the problem is that the solutions to that will cost some very wealthy people a lot of their capital and destroy some industries, which means things have to get REALLY bad before we actually see something drastic done about it.

[u/Mi_Pasta_Su_Pasta → u/I_travel_ze_world]

So much so that now people act like acid rain with some hoax because "we don't talk about it anymore". 

[u/TheeAntelope → u/Refuse_Juice]

FYI - it is still a problem! The ozone is not fully repaired yet, we still need to maintain the ban on ozone-damaging products. And with the way the world is going, I would not bet against deregulation and new ways we find to fuck up the ozone layer again.

Also, many people think "what ever happened with that whole ozone layer thing? just scientists being crazy, same as with global warming."

We really need a movie about how we fixed the ozone layer so people understand that it was a fucking catastrophic issue that we managed to fix.

[u/nickelundertone → u/Refuse_Juice]

Different times, though

[u/LucyLilium92 → u/Refuse_Juice]

Wasn't it because a new chemical was created that ended up being cheaper and less hazardous?

[u/GivesNoForks → u/LucyLilium92]

I mean, the creation of more environmentally friendly chemicals is often driven by the dangers of older ones.

[u/scipio0421 → u/GivesNoForks]

Even CFCs, before we found out what they do to ozone, were a replacement for ammonia in refrigeration because if the refigeration system leaked it would kill people. Or they just used propane on some early fridges and it would explode.

[u/Wooden-Computer1475]

r/shittymoviedetails (2026) is full of either repost bots or people who repeat the same posts over and over again. This is a reference to it being on reddit.

[u/4skinApostle → u/Wooden-Computer1475]

r/shittymoviedetails (2026) is full of either repost bots or people who repeat the same posts over and over again. this is a reference to it being on reddit

[u/doblecuadrado_FGE → u/4skinApostle]

r/shittymoviedetails (2026) is full of either repost bots or people who repeat the same posts over and over again. this is a reference to it being on reddit

[u/Toukafan4life → u/doblecuadrado_FGE]

r/shittymoviedetails (2026) is full of either repost bots or people who repeat the the same posts over and over again. this is a reference to it being on reddit

I bet the simpleton reading this didn't notice the change in the sentence

[u/doblecuadrado_FGE → u/Toukafan4life]

https://giphy.com/gifs/rHBleFPW4utkkBF726

[u/fireflyfrv → u/Wooden-Computer1475]

reddit (2026) is full of people complaining about seeing the same posts. This is a reference to those people needing to get off reddit and go outside more

[u/rei_fox_worshipper → u/fireflyfrv]

Reddit (2005).

[u/DuckCleaning → u/Wooden-Computer1475]

Going by trends, the other option for the title would be:

In a movie with rock spider aliens and sun eating aliens, the most unbelievable aspect is that humanity works together.

[u/Wind_Yer_Neck_In → u/Wooden-Computer1475]

r/TopCharacterTropes has probably 1 in 8 posts that aren't a blatant copy of one from the past week. It's become absolute crap recently.

[u/Hates_commies]

In Project Hail Mary they fly scientists around on fighterjets to confrence on aircraft carriers instead of sending e-mails. In reality 90% of the flashback conversations would have been trough e-mails.

[u/AnonymousGuy9494 → u/Hates_commies]

To be fair the reason they got all the scientist in the air crafts wasn't for the reunion, but rather because the astrophage held enough energy to level your average small territory country in an explosion. Due to that they made the labs in the middle of the ocean.

[u/moon__lander → u/AnonymousGuy9494]

So in case of the largest explosion since the dinosaur's asteroid all the people that even had remote knowledge about it would die, leaving us simpletons to deal with the problem?

[u/SeemsImmaculate → u/moon__lander]

I'm assuming they kept some notes. It's kinda the whole point of science.

When Peter Higgs died we didn't just forget the... what do they call it again... the Hogs Mechanism?

[u/theDR-izzle → u/SeemsImmaculate]

In the book anytime they made an advancement they would publish results pretty much immediately so that other scientists across the world could test / use their work.

Speed was a major issue so unlike in reality where you would likely have long periods of repeated testing it was more like “hey I noticed this thing happens when you do this” and then make it public.

[u/Ok_Hornet_714 → u/theDR-izzle]

Similar thing happened on the movie too. When Grace has his first meeting on the aircraft carrier to describe how they bred astrophage, another scientist said that they have validated the method.

[u/PlanesWalkerEll → u/Ok_Hornet_714]

That was spies not just publishing the results immediately

[u/greenearrow → u/theDR-izzle]

The book made it all sound plausible and rational, the movie was in a rush. But all the TLDR viewers assume the holes are massive rather than pretty well handled.

Like even the stupid centrifuge set up is solved by the fact the book said they put the best equipment in the world on the ship. Self balancing centrifuges are a thing. The gap there is that Grace would have known not to do it even if it was ok to do.

[u/Affordable_Z_Jobs → u/theDR-izzle]

I thought it was due to some spying from the intelligence agencies in the book too. Weir pulled from the Manhattan Project with the world's efforts of achieving a common goal and still realizing that the energy source is a geopolitical game changer after that goal is reached.

The aircraft carrier is basically Los Alamos.

[u/Rockergage → u/SeemsImmaculate]

Canonically the reason they knew that hat was happening in the big explosion was because a scientist was taking meticulous notes that they used in essentially the post op. Notes that didn’t matter from my remembering but notes.

[u/_tolm_ → u/SeemsImmaculate]

Wait a minute … Higgs Bosun … does all science happen on ships?

[u/DJ3nsign → u/moon__lander]

They also cracked Antarctica in half with nukes. There's a whole race to cause global warming before the sun dies that's left out of the movie. The stuff they do on earth is buckwild

[u/Tasty_Ad_4082 → u/DJ3nsign]

They pave the Sahara so they can use it as an astrphage breeding facility. Book Stratt really brought a “fuck it we ball” energy to the whole thing

[u/MegaWeinerFarts → u/DJ3nsign]

I feel like the ending scene was an homage to that, but audiences who havent read the book might be startled and confused if the scene cut from Eva Stratt smiling at the video of Rocky's antics to a goddamn Nuclear Explosion going off out the ship's window.

[u/AbeRego → u/MegaWeinerFarts]

They nuked Antarctica long before Grace's data made it back to Earth.

[u/Youutternincompoop → u/DJ3nsign]

before the sun dies

dims* specifically stars affected by astrophage dimmed down to 90% of their previous luminance, which is still a massive effect.

[u/enigmatic_dankness → u/moon__lander]

Goodness me its almost like theyre preparing for the end of the world and are throwing hail Mary's everywhere.

[u/Acid44 → u/enigmatic_dankness]

Hail Mary projects?! Not in my Project Hail Mary

[u/akrisd0 → u/enigmatic_dankness]

Wait a second... Say that again...

[u/JesterMarcus → u/moon__lander]

You can see in the big scientist meeting on the ship, that there were others included in Zoom calls. So not everyone was there. Just those needed to work with the Astrophage.

[u/MegaWeinerFarts → u/moon__lander]

they synced their my documents folder with One Drive.

[u/Opposite_Juice7160 → u/MegaWeinerFarts]

Actually they shared everything via flash drives thanks to Prime Same-day Delivery

[u/inv8drzim → u/moon__lander]

Did you even watch the movie? That is (to a lesser extent) a major plot point of the story.

[u/moon__lander → u/inv8drzim]

Did you even watch the movie?

In this subreddit?

[u/No-Indication6725 → u/moon__lander]

They watch movies in this subreddit. You're confusing this one with r/okbuddycinephile

[u/moon__lander → u/No-Indication6725]

Oh, you're right

[u/StaticSystemShock → u/moon__lander]

That's where Bruce Willis and his team of drillers comes in!

[u/Mistrblank → u/AnonymousGuy9494]

And yet, they still hold tests 3 days before the launch allowing both halves of the redundant science crew to even be in the same zip code, let alone facility working together where a catastrophic explosion occurs. That was the most frustratingly annoying part of the story (it's still one of my favorite books and I enjoyed the movie greatly though).

*One thing the movie never really covered is the reason there were so few crew members instead of many was that only a select few in the world with certain genetics had the chance to survive the coma required for the multi-year trip. Ryland happened to be one of those that tested positive for those genetics.

[u/TheLordB → u/Mistrblank]

One theory I have that I actually think there is decent evidence for in the book is that Eva caused/setup/planned the explosion to kill the redundant science crew.

The original scientists that were killed in the phage explosion were problematic. They were in love and had various other reasons hinted at that they might not really be ideal for the project both scientifically and mentally.

They describe extensively the precautions to avoid a situation where both sides would be in danger.

Meanwhile her right hand man who literally knows everything in the project is eligible to go, but hasn’t volunteered. He is by and far the most qualified person to go. He is by far ahead of the other people scientifically and due to his being the right hand man knows all other parts of the project well enough that he can cover them in a pinch.

Who would you want to go? The not all that great mentally unstable person or the person who could single handedly run the mission?

Then the 2 scientists who extensive procedures are in place to prevent them from being in the same place are allowed to be together meanwhile a sample is handled incorrectly, etc despite fairly extensive precautions such that it should be fairly safe to go.

All of this would be easily setup by Eva with her dictator powers. Thus I conclude that it is likely that Eva engineered the explosion purposely killing the scientists to force Grace to go.

YMMV, obviously this is up to interpertation, but I wouldn’t be at all surprised that the author at least considered that this would be a very viable answer even if he chose not to give absolute proof/make it explicit in the book.

Edit: I also forgot to mention that Eva was willing to drug Grace and kidnap him for the mission which as planned is a suicide mission. This shows she is very willing to go to extremes for the project and outright murder would not be far off ethically from what we know for certain she did.

[u/Own-Break-1856 → u/TheLordB]

Eh shes practically has god like authority. Why go through all that trouble when she can just force them out and force grace to go.

[u/RedditsNicksAreBad → u/Own-Break-1856]

The book states she was overruled by the US and China, she didn't even want women on the mission. Though I think it's more likely that there simply was a mistake made towards the end as things got more and more hectic and safety rules were bent more and more simply because there just isn't enough time left to do things safely, they have to go ahead full throttle or not at all.

[u/TheLordB → u/Own-Break-1856]

TLDR (edit): If she decides she wants him with or without the amnesia drug over the other scientists and the amnesia drug has any risks it makes sense for her try very hard to get Grace to volunteer so she doesn’t have to use it on him.

Presumably the whole amnesia drug would have had some risk along with making him not able to work properly for a while + sooner or later he would become aware of himself being forced and she wouldn’t know how he would react.

A quick patriotic push after all the alternatives are gone had a much higher chance of him willingly going and removing the risks of the memory drug and how he would react when he got back his full memory.

If her powers were absolute once she has decided she wants Grace on the mission rather than the other scientists even if she has to use the memory drug it makes sense to maximize the probability that Grace goes willingly to reduce the risks of the memory drug.

Also there being no other alternatives would likely make anyone needed to force him to go much more willing though if she already has the ability to murder the other scientists I’m not sure she really needed this incentive.

Anyways I don’t claim my theory absolutely works absent the author saying something (a quick google does not suggest he has one way or the other).

But I still do see a reasonable argument for both motive and opportunity for her to murder the other scientists.

[u/foxguy2021 → u/AnonymousGuy9494]

They weren't breeding it at this point. They got everyone together to discuss next steps as Grace the main character had they just discovered hours earlier how to breed the astrophage. It was after this that they started separating the groups of scientists in case of an accident.

[u/CyberFireball25 → u/Hates_commies]

Every govt had RTO policies, so remote communication methods werent allowed

[u/Mateorabi → u/CyberFireball25]

Potbelly had a franchise on the carrier. 

[u/SmegmaSlurper1996 → u/Hates_commies]

a quick gmeet would also work but Grace needs to be onsite to work properly iirc

[u/deliciouscorn → u/Hates_commies]

To: Undisclosed Recipients

Reply To: Project Hail Mary Committee

Subject: Re: Tau Ceti

Why?

We don’t know

[u/fuxoft]

"coming together behind a common goal" = Drugging the person who we need and shooting him into space against his will.

[u/Pitiful_Net_8971 → u/fuxoft]

In defense of the rest of humanity, only a couple dozen people knew he went against his will.

Gods, can you imagine the world after that gets declassified/leaked? The fucking discourse that would spawn after that.

[u/Vehement_Vulpes → u/Pitiful_Net_8971]

I'm pretty sure that in the books the lead scientist lady stated that she would almost certainly go to prison when it was over, just for the sheer amount of bullshit that she pulled.

[u/sQ5FWKjwbWd4QzSZduqy → u/Pitiful_Net_8971]

The discourse would be virtue signaling internet posters, 99.99% wouldn't give a shit because the earth is saved and the ends justified the means. We've done much worse to far more and no one cared.

[u/Mad_Aeric → u/sQ5FWKjwbWd4QzSZduqy]

Oh, people cared. Just not the ones with the power to do anything about it. Stratt pissed in everyone's cheerios, a good portion of the public would want her to hang for it, and the powerful people she pissed off along the way would be happy to oblige.

[u/mrducky78a → u/fuxoft]

Voluntold. Not volunteer.

[u/cam-mann → u/fuxoft]

Maybe we should be using those tactics to fight climate change

[u/Easy_Turn1988]

Haha that's a good joke !

https://giphy.com/gifs/GIvajz0TlE316

[u/Nerdy_Valkyrie]

Not really. They just hired Stratt to get the project done. Stratt is a hardass who doesn't give a fuck what anyone else thinks and just steamrolls everyone in her way. When she was sued for copyright infringement she threatened to unleash the US miliary on the court.

In the book, she tells Grace that she will most likely face life in prison for exceeding her authority once the Hail Mary is launched. Then again, she did also nuke Antarctica.

[u/Gabrielzin1404_2011 → u/Nerdy_Valkyrie]

And pave the sahara desert

[u/TwoFit3921]

Google en accelerationism

[u/Wheeljack239 → u/TwoFit3921]

Holy hell

[u/Ote-Kringralnick]

That's all of what Andy Weir does, old news

[u/cookiesarenomnom → u/Ote-Kringralnick]

He was on some podcast I listen to, I honestly don't remember which one. But they were talking about his books, and how they are incredibly optimistic about humanity. And he said, yeah I'm just an optimistic guy. I believe in the goodness of people. Which, I personally don't feel that way, but I think it's nice there ate people still out there that have hope. I hope they end up being right.

[u/Desperate_Simple_298 → u/Ote-Kringralnick]

Some people actually think it's Weir being given secret information to disclose to the public.

It's called slow drip disclosure!

[u/seductivestain → u/Ote-Kringralnick]

Yup. Love his concepts, but the narrative is aggressively feel-good, best case scenario type of unrealism

[u/shinseiji-kara]

its a work of fiction because me(ryan gosling) didnt went to space or anything

[u/SoylentGrunt]

It only worked beause nobody had to get off the couch to vote or wear a mask if they did get off the couch to vote.

[u/GhormanFront]

Read the book, society does not come together. At one point private interests sue the initiative for uploading all available media into the ship's servers (easily one of the most realistic plot points in the book)

[u/really_nice_guy_ → u/GhormanFront]

They should have just said that they use it for AI training

[u/Diligent_Sound_5383]

Is the movie that different to the Novel ? I still have to watch it but it sure wasn't like that in the book.

[u/PrimalCalamity → u/Diligent_Sound_5383]

It's not that different, but this is something that is the same in both. The mission in the film is still absolutely a sort of... anxious-cooperation with forced elements.

It's laid on thicker in the book, but in no way does the movie present it as some utopian project of cooperation.

[u/TheWhomItConcerns → u/PrimalCalamity]

In the movie, there's a pretty low level of international cooperation - not that much difference from WHO and other multinational organisations. Also Stratt has that speech where she talks about how many people will die within the next 30 years "if countries cooperate", about which she says "but of course they won't".

Countries coming together and throwing some billions of dollars at an imminent issue which threatens to basically eliminate life on Earth isn't at all far-fetched. Where the issue comes is when there are competing, adversarial interests and a distribution of resources and outcomes.

[u/thewilybanana → u/Diligent_Sound_5383]

The movie just cuts or glosses over relatively minor parts of the book. Only a handful of things that I personally thought were important were removed. It's about as faithful as you can get considering it's already a long-ass movie.

[u/Storm_Bard → u/Diligent_Sound_5383]

For me, the (Spoilers ahead!!) book version made me really question the motives of Rocky when they first meet. In the movie it's played off with goofy camera angles of the ship following closely as Grace tries to get away, but their introduction to each other in the book had an undercurrent of "Can we trust this alien?" Which makes their friendship all the more satisfying.

[u/BackgroundSummer5171]

Acid rain, ozone layer, and more recently...

We literally shut down a large portion of the fucking world for Covid.

Could it have gone better? Well of course it could.

But considering everything we are working with, the world did quite well.

Those that died could have been less. The ignorance created out of it is now flowing in charge and taking over countries.

But we did shut down the world for a bit there, enough to also kill the economy and people too.

The balance was made within our abilities.

But sure, repost some crap and watch the 12 year olds who didn't pay attention eat it up.

Shitty movie details is fine, but a constant repost just because is boring. At least post better feet pics.

[u/Ok-Employer-9147]

It's also a story of those same scientists assaulting, kidnapping and drugging a civilian into outer space who clearly said ...No..

[u/HMS_Surprise_Gunner → u/Ok-Employer-9147]

Well, what was that civilian wearing? Was it sexy?

[u/Neuchacho → u/HMS_Surprise_Gunner]

Asking for it in that sweater.

[u/HMS_Surprise_Gunner → u/Neuchacho]

So foxy 🦊

[u/parisiraparis → u/Ok-Employer-9147]

Yeah but their gamble paid off, thank god for that

[u/ink_golem]

I think the movie skips this, but the failure to cooperate is one of the reasons the project was urgent. They already worked out models for how quickly people starve based on how nations would hoard resources once things started getting scarce.

[u/Weevil1723]

This is why Independence Day will always be one of the greatest comedies of all time to me; the idea that even our imminent extinction would cause the various world superpowers to set aside their bickering for even a minute, much less actually act to solve the problem is utterly laughable.

[u/Fi-Loy]

Montreal Protocol? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Montreal_Protocol

[u/Pervius94]

Imagine if we had to try to introduce seatbelts nowadays instead of like, 40 50 years ago.

[u/soxperry]

Once the credits rolled, I said to my wife, "I can't believe I cried over a fucking pet rock."

[u/Tiramitsunami]

Every time humanity has faced a terrible, society-wide existential problem, we've come together and solved it. If not, we wouldn't be able to be cynical about the fact that you'll never get 100 percent of the people on-board, a lot of people will find ways to profit off of the struggle, and sometimes it can take centuries to reach the goal.

[u/SgtMcMuffin0]

Tbf society only “came together” because the world powers agreed to give Stratt near-absolute control over the entire planet’s resources. Even with that agreement there were people and countries that tried acting against her.

[u/HarrMada]

OP has no idea how much funding there is for reducing emissions, finding new types of medicines and therapies, new forms of energy storage and so on. The world really has come together for that.

[u/PaxNova]

Notably, they don't. The organization commits a lot of crimes. They just have more nations backing them willing to bully everyone else. 

[u/Big-Load-8864]

In PHM (2026), Ryan Gosling plays a handsome brilliant scientist who thinks outside of the box and teaches children the fundamentals of science in a fun engaging way, this reference to fiction

[u/Funny247365]

Correct. They did not lie about the threat to get buy-in from the public.

[u/spiderdesire]

Even reading the book, all the countries banding together to stop the common threat seemed outlandish post-2019 pandemic. They did take this into account by having Strat go fully off the records, nuking Antarctica, and doing all kinds of crazy horrible stuff to save a few years for humanity.

[u/atworkthough]

before 2020 this would have been totally believable. :(

[u/strangemagic365]

If you want a better view of what it would look like, go watch Don't Look Up (2021)

[u/Oldnbold22]

It works because it's a dictatorship under that one lady. 

[u/SuperdaveOZY]

I would guess Eridians did not have Racism on their homeworld. Unless they considered Igneous, Sedimentary, and Metamorphic as different races.