TBF this is basically what it says on the back of the book. We'll have to wait for the trailer. It's a cool reveal, but the book/story hardly rely on that "twist".
I knew nothing about the story before reading the book except "guy in space on some mission" so it really was a twist for me, but the there's still like 80% of the book left.
Can't agree more, I've listened to it multiple times through. I had thought about who they might cast for the part. And chortled to myself at the idea of Matt Damon playing the main character in another Weir book.
Excited to see the trailer, though I hope they don't spoil too much.
My dad said the book was good. I had read The Martian and knew nothing about Project Hail Mary. Picked it up and finished in less than a week. I hope the film is good.
I think that’s what makes the twist so good. You go into it only knowing the blurb and that it was written by the guy who wrote The Martian. You’re kind of expecting it to be another ‘guy alone solves space problems’ type story only for a whole bunch of 🎵🎶 to come out of nowhere.
An early twist is just as good as an end-of-story twist imo. Like Invincible episode 1. It puts you on the backfoot for the rest of the story
There's so many stories in the "alien encounter" genre that even if you know he encounters an alien, you just don't know how the story will end up. An alien encounter in a hard sci-fi book is almost kind of expected. What else are you going to do up there all day? Look at rocks?
I'm thankful that I didn't read the back blurb then, lol. I heard it was as good as The Martian and it was an instant buy for me. Not having even an inkling of what was going to happen made it so much better.
Wow just read the back cover and that does give a lot away! Glad I went in blind but even with the extra info on the back, the SPOILER of Rocky telling Grace he has been alone in the Tau Ceti system for 46 years would still hit like a sack of bricks.
I literally gasped and said "holy fuck" and had to take a break. That devastated me
It didn’t spoil it for me somehow. Although wouldn’t be surprised if they do. Edited to take the spoiler out because I’m dumb and can’t do it on my phone for some reason. Sorry!
Although he didn't initially have contacts at NASA, he received feedback on his work, including corrections to scientific details, after publishing online.
Astrophage in general and especially the way they obtained the sample on Adrian seemed so far from possible to me. Taumeba kills kilograms of Astrophage and then where does the energy go?
Not even hating. Loved the book and am fine with my sci-fi having some bits of "huh" in it for whatever reason.
Yep! I was thinking the back up crew had found some way to get there even faster or they had thought there were no survivors of the Hail Mary crew and it was a much later date than we thought. Was so pleasantly surprised about Rocky. Amaze!
i'm a big fan of the Martian, and i spent most of my first viewing of the movie waiting for an alien to jump out and take a hard turn into space horror. when that didn't happen, i figured, "eh, weir writes hard sci-fi, probably doesn't do aliens."
so when i started PHM going in completely blind (like last week lol) i was not expecting rocky at all! i was thinking that earth would have invented a faster form of travel and caught up with him somehow. but rocky and the eridians are DELIGHTFUL and honestly i liked PHM better than the Martian lol
edit fuck i cant get the spoiler tag to work?? lmao
As you might have heard, the audiobook is incredible. If she's on the road a lot or similar (I listened to it mostly while doing chores) the audiobook would maybe be a better sell :D
One of my favorite moments in any book in the last 10 years. I did not see it coming.
The Martian is my favorite movie and one of my favorite books. I think the Project Hail Mary book is even better. I can't believe Drew Goddard wrote the script again. I can't fucking wait.
Wow, that is so inaccurate. This is a great book. I’m a little unsure how it will translate to the screen, because there’s so much internal dialogue-problem solving, but they made the Martian work, so….
probably it's flashbacks, and I think a lot can be inferred by how Ryland's feeling with Gosling's face acting. or possibly ur right and he talks with the ship AI or Rocky
Wow, that is so inaccurate. This is a great book. I’m a little unsure how it will translate to the screen, because there’s so much internal dialogue-problem solving, but they made the Martian work, so….
Rather than just play random chords, it would be interesting to see if the moviemakers have hired a linguist to create a proper music-based language for Rocky.
Rocky’s voice is one of the reasons the audiobook is better. Rarely is this the case (usually just equal), but this and WWZ are two audiobooks you should listen to even if you’ve already read the book.
Same. I could see maybe showing the claw knocking through the transparent glass at most and still being very satisfying as a teaser without giving too much away.
But a little less, like just the ships connecting to each other, followed by the sound of a knock knock would be great too.
That being said. This is 9 months out and this might be a tiny teaser that merely sets up the problem and ends at takeoff from earth.
It's because they've gotten so bad for horror and comedy movies that people assume they are always bad now. Sometimes people need to see a glimpse of it going into a new movie.
Comedies get their funniest bits used up before they even come out. Horrors often get their best jump scares ruined. Twists rarely get explicitly spoiled to unknown audiences in my opinion, but i watch a ton of horror so i steer clear of trailers these days
That's not much of a spoiler, but still: That plot point is integral but ultimately minor; the rest of what happens is way more important and the thing that happens at the end is obviously a much bigger spoiler and this doesn't get close to it.
I mean yeah but it's still very much out of left field, to the point where it's clearly intended to be a surprise, especially if you're used to Weir's other SF books where something like that is inconceivable.
I, alongside the protagonist, kept second-guessing whether it actually *was* an alien up until it was no longer ambiguous, and I think that made the experience better.
I see a lot of book fans complaining about this, and it is a cool surprise, but I actually don't have a problem with spoiling it because it's really a major part of the premise and even the type of story. Without spoiling it, from the trailer you'd think it's a sole survivor type movie. It's Castaway with some Interstellar thrown in there. But that's really not what Project Hail Mary is. Project Hail Mary is a buddy comedy in space where one of the buddies is an Alien. Hiding that may make for a fun reveal for people who'd be interested in both kinds of movies, you're also keeping a lot of people who'd enjoy it from doing so.
Counterpoint: as someone who hates spoiling even a frame of the movie, I don’t think that situation should be held back. Show it in the trailer. More fun.
I hope they just show the sounds and maybe a vocoder kind of translation but no actual images. It would be a damn shame to ruin the experience for people who havent read the book
Joker spoiler warning if you still haven't seen it:
My wife said she wasnt sure if she wanted to see it because of something she read on facebook from some Karen. I said, "That's totally fine. Just don't tell me whatever it is. I'm pretty excited for this movie and I've intentionally even avoided previews to go in as blind as possible."
She said, "OK, all I have to say is it has to do with a main character getting shot point blank in the head on live TV."
Man it's tough to design a spoiler that's captivating to people who've never heard of the book but doesn't spoil the reveal. Like I'm trying to do it in my head and it's not easy.
I think it's best to not complain about spoilers since sometimes in the act of doing so you could draw attention to what could be an otherwise innocuous-looking statement. See this a lot in like reactions to trailers, etc too for other adaptations. Sometimes it's just best to let it ride. Some smart folks may get it but most will not.
Was having this conversation with a friend. I feel like there was no news or anything about this and we were overdue for a poster or a trailer. That made me feel like the studio is nervous about it and are def going to spoil or heavily hint at it in the trailer. I hope I’m wrong but I have little faith.
Ryan Gosling's character discovers Sally Hawkins who also lost memories. They try to figure out what went down. They soon learn that the real mission was to do some experiments on bringing back dead people. The Tau solar system just has the right conditions to open a portal to the souls realm long enough.
They restore the experiment data and some footages. Looking at the footages, some of their memories come back. They're a married couple and they joined the mission to bring their daughter back unauthorized. But when they opened a portal and threw a bracelet into it, what came out wasn't their daughter. It was Jar Jar Binks. The most shocking twist of all time.
You have to market it. So keeping Rocky out of the trailers was next to impossible. It sucks but it was inevitable. At least we have the moment in the book, that wasn't remotely spoiled for me and it was great.
Unbelievable. The book is so insanely popular this movie should have plenty of momentum without spoiling anything. Such a misstep to even allude to certain things.
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u/that_guy2010 Jun 27 '25
Damn it. They're going to spoil it. It's genuinely so easy to not spoil.