I’ve mostly tried to stay away from reviews of Project Hail Mary as much as possible, but as perhaps the first “major” sci fi movie to come out in 2026, it’s hard to completely tune out the noise. Third hand — my friends and coworkers talking about reviews that they had read online — I was hearing everything from “pretty good” to “Ryan Gosling’s best role to date!” (which holy cow that’s a huge endorsement).

Compounding expectations was (of course) my own experience with Andy Weir’s books and this particular adaptation’s source material. I enjoyed The Martian (novel) enough to . . . write bunch of Buzzfeed style headlines about it? (still one of my favorite posts!)

I also loved the film adaptation of The Martian, but apparently never wrote a review, and I thought Artemis was good as well, but also didn’t give it a review.

Andy Weir’s stories — that I’ve read — have a kind of optimism surrounding science and human ingenuity which feels a bit like a throwback to classic Science Fiction, only without all the baggage that most stories from those early days seem to trade in without realizing it.

By 2021 when Project Hail Mary (the book) released, I was a confirmed fan, if maybe not a raging zealot. My experience with that book was positive over all, with just one small complaint regarding Weir’s gendering of the alien: he acknowledges that Eridians may have a whole different system/conception of gender than humans, and then just defaults to he/him. But past me was taken with watching Grace solve problems and “do science” in humorous and engaging ways. Also this book both referenced AND used a 3D printer, so I felt seen professionally as well hahah.

Needless to say I was pretty excited to see Project Hail Mary on the big screen. I was also very curious to see how one major twist would play out since it was pretty much blown from the first trailer (I’m talking about Rocky lol).

Since it has been about five years since I read the book, I’ll admit that my memory of the book’s finer details are pretty hazy. So I won’t spend any time in this review trying to compare the similarities and differences between the novel and the movie, or how faithful the movie was to the book. I don’t really remember, and I’m sure there are others out there doing exactly that.

What I will do is comment on how many other movies this movie seemed to reference. For instance, the ship’s computer — Mary — was giving me Jarvis vibes (from Iron Man), but also some Hal vibes (from 2001: A Space Odyssey). I’m really glad it didn’t go that way, but I would be curious if 2001 was an influence of author Andy Weir, or an influence of the directors (Phil Lord and Chris Miller).

Also Rocky and Grace had several Kirk/Spock moments touching hands through the clear crystal barriers etc. I’m always curious if these things are intentional, or if I’ve just seen too many movies.

The last film this movie reminded me of was Arrival. A major part of the plot is “first contact” though the film — and I remember feeling this in the book too — kinda breezes right by it and gets Rocky and Grace talking pretty quickly. For anyone who has tried to learn a language, and I’ve tried to learn several at this point, this feels a bit too convenient, but perhaps since I was expecting it, I didn’t really let it bother me.

However it wasn’t just the “first contact” plot that reminded me of Arrival, but the way in which Grace is pulled out of scientific obscurity, and plopped in the middle of massive global task force working on a world threatening problem. The way he’s able to solve problem after problem . . . it’s well worn territory but also very GOOD territory (now that I think about it, this is also kinda the plot of Godzilla (1998) lol).

I’d say this is probably not Ryan Gosling’s greatest role ever, (that would be The Nice Guys jk jk), but I certainly don’t think anyone could have done it as well as he did. It’s hard not to notice the physicality he brings to the role. Something like putting on a space suit to go on a space walk, could be handled sooo many different ways — for instance focusing on each piece in slow motion to heighten the drama — but this movie speeds through it with Gosling acting like a bull in a china shop. It was hilarious.

Give Project Hail Mary a Watch?

Absolutely! I don’t think Gosling will be winning an Oscar for Project Hail Mary any time soon, but I CAN say that this was the most fun I’ve had at the movie theater in a long time.

Two Eridian thumbs way down (which is the equivalent of a human thumbs way up). Amaze. Amaze. Statement.

That’s all I have for this week! Has anyone seen this one yet? What did you think? Do you have a favorite “first contact” story? What’s your favorite Andy Weir book?

Leave your thoughts in the comments! Looking forward to talking about this one! Until next time!