Project Hail Mary: Ryan Gosling Stars in New Sci-Fi Epic

In 2015, audiences were won over by The Martian, Ridley Scott’s gripping, funny, and weirdly sentimental adaptation of Andy Weir’s bestselling debut novel. Starring Matt Damon, the film was both a critical and box office hit, even taking home a few trophies along the way. So, naturally, when fans learned that a new Weir adaptation was in the worksbased this time on his 2021 bestseller Project Hail Marythe same smart, character-driven science fiction crowd had reason to rejoice.

Amazon MGM Studios has now dropped the first official trailer, which, in many ways, seems to have re-created the perfect formula of science, humor, and heart that led to The Martian’s big-screen success. Introducing viewers to the world of Project Hail Mary, it’s obvious from the opening moments to the final frame that this is a top-dollar, big-ideas kind of space adventure. And with Ryan Gosling leading the cast and Drew Goddard adapting for the screen, while directorial duties fall to Phil Lord and Christopher Miller, the signs for a major sci-fi event are all there.

The studio was hot to get on the project before Weir’s book had even hit shelves. Amazon MGM not only purchased the film rights in advance, but they also had Goddard on board to write the screenplay well ahead of the novel’s publication. Fans of the former will recall Goddard’s smart and faithful work adapting The Martian to the screen, an effort that netted the scribe an Academy Award nomination. His return for Project Hail Mary was a no-brainer for filmmakers and fans alike. The addition of directing duo Lord and Millera team who made a name for themselves with Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs and The LEGO Movie, among other projectsmay seem like an odd fit for such hard sci-fi. But their proven track record for blending humor with heart could be just the right way to approach Weir’s tale.

Project Hail Mary sees Gosling playing Ryland Grace, a mild-mannered middle school science teacher who wakes up one morning in a spaceship with no recollection of how he got there. With the trailer leaping immediately into his thoughts and fears, we quickly learn Grace is a long way from his apartment back homeon a starship several light-years away from Earth, to be exact. Piecing together his past life through flashes of memory, we see a clean-shaven Gosling on Earth, spending his days with a classroom of students. His routine is upended, however, when he’s approached about a mission the likes of which he’s never encountered before: a dangerous voyage to save the world from a sure extinction.

The problem? The Sun is dying, and that’s not an exaggeration. We’re not only talking about Earth being in danger; several other nearby stars are winking out, with one glaring exception. It’s a problem scientists can’t explain, but have reason to suspect some strange and hitherto unencountered cosmic phenomenon is responsible. Grace, a former molecular biologist, may be just the man to figure it out.

Grace, it turns out, is not at all excited about his mission. “I put the ‘not’ in astronaut,” he says at one point. “I can’t even moonwalk!” The reason, or lack thereof, matters little to Eva Stratt (Sandra Hüller), an official Grace encounters as he begins being courted by the powers-that-be. Stratt’s pitch is direct: “If you don’t go, you die with the rest of us. If we do nothing, everything on this planet will go extinct.” The chance to lose his students, not to mention all of humanity, is one Grace can’t stomach. So, against his better judgment, he agrees to the mission.

After going through a crash course of space training, he’s suitably prepared and up for his interstellar voyage. Only by the time he awakens on the ship, a temporary case of amnesia has set in. And, as the first shock of confusion passes, he and the film’s audience discover Grace is completely alone. The rest of the crew, it seems, have died sometime on the journey from Earth. Casting details revealed Milana Vayntrub would be playing a Russian crewmate, Olesya Ilyukhina, meaning that character is, in fact, another victim of the mystery they’ve all been sent to solve.

Grace won’t be alone for long. The mystery is solved when Grace spots another spacecraft, and to his surprise, a completely new form of life. The alien, nicknamed Rocky by Grace, is far stranger than anything humanity has ever encountered. But despite this, he’s not the murderous alien invader audiences might expect. “He’s kinda growing on me,” we hear Grace say in a recorded video file. “At least he’s not growing in me, you know?” If there’s a critique of the trailer, this moment of interspecies bonding may be the best of them, as Grace teaches Rocky how to use the thumbs-up.

Sci-Fi with Sardonic Humor and Warmth

Project Hail Mary will almost certainly strike the same balance of high-concept space drama with sardonic humor and surprising warmth that audiences found so refreshing about The Martian. If the trailer is any indication, Project Hail Mary has a combination of talent in Gosling, Weir, and Lord and Miller to make this a sci-fi movie to remember.

Release date has already been set, too: March 20, 2026, giving viewers plenty of time to either avoid the movie’s inevitable spoilers or to get into the book before the film comes out. Given the story’s mixture of mystery, danger, and unlikely friendship, it seems certain that Project Hail Mary will be one of the most highly anticipated sci-fi films of the decade. Whether or not it can live up to the novel, only time will tell. But with any luck, based on the first bit of footage, this will be a mission well worth following.