If you're a science-fiction fan looking for a great book, Project Hail Mary by Andy Weir is a novel that you should be adding to your "To Be Read" list immediately. Like The Martian (Weir's first novel), it's a story that is thrilling, hilarious, and fascinating in equal measure, and every chapter succeeds in getting you more invested in the plot and characters. Being such a big fan, I have naturally been hotly anticipating the upcoming adaptation from director Phil Lord and Chris Miller starring Ryan Gosling – but after actually getting to see footage from the movie this evening, my excitement has reached extreme levels.
Amazon MGM hosted its first ever presentation at CinemaCon today, and the studio's bullishness about Project Hail Mary showed via the fact that an extended look at the 2026 blockbuster started playing on the big screen at The Colosseum at Caesar's Palace before even a single executive, filmmaker or actor stepped on stage. The reel clearly established what the movie is about and demonstrated its mixed tones, and by the time it was finished, the entire audience erupted in rapturous applause.
Unlike the book, which is constructed non-linearly, the footage spooled out the story in chronological order, starting with the introduction of Ryland Grace (Ryan Gosling) as an elementary school teacher who gets selected to join a collection of scientists who have been tasked with trying to save the world. Across the universe, suns are being consumed by a mysterious alien microbe dubbed Astrophage, and a solution must be found to stop them before our galaxy's central star dims and causes catastrophe that ends all life on Earth.
Ryland is recruited by a woman named Eva Stratt (Oscar nominee Sandra Hüller), who shows up at his classroom, and though he is in denial about his ability to help what has been dubbed Project Hail Mary, she insists that he be an essential part of the team. He gets taken to a military freighter where he meets everyone else that has signed on, and it's there that he understands why the mission got its name: the plan is to create an interstellar spaceship that can cross the cosmos and travel to what seems to be the only sun in the universe not being affected by Astrophage.
But it's not just Ryland's science skills that are needed. After a montage of science experiments, the protagonist gets the news from Stratt that he is going to be one of the crew members on the ship – a job that he vehemently refuses ("I put the 'not' in 'astronaut'" is one of his registered excuses). His denials are for naught, however, as he ends up waking up aboard a spaceship that has traveled beyond the limits of the Milky Way – his hair long and sporting an out-of-control beard.
As crazy as it is that he finds himself nearing the central star of the Tau Ceti system, things get far crazier when his computer picks up readings of something massive approaching. It turns out to be humanity's first interaction with an alien ship... and when it launches a mysterious cylindrical object toward the Earth vessel, it causes Ryland to freak out as he wonders if it might be a bomb. It gets closer and closer, and the hero curls into a ball expecting his imminent death... but when the object clangs off his hull, he excitedly realizes that it is some kind of message.
A bridge is made between the two ships, and Ryland cautiously moves his way down it to a wall with a small window – and he screams and totally freaks out when an alien claw slaps up against it. The scene then cut to the protagonist recording a video message saying, "I met an alien. He's really growing on me. He's not growing in me, which was a concern for a little while." And that moment concluded the footage.
Simply put, Project Hail Mary looks like it's going to be the exact movie that I had playing in my head as I read the book, and I feel like I need to start working on a time machine or look into cryogenics so that I can reduce the amount of time left to wait before it finally arrives in theaters. The only significant parts of the novel that weren't featured in the footage were A) all of the science Ryland does to survive out in space, and B) the full look of the alien (whose name is Rocky), but I have full faith that the adaptation will ultimately deliver magic.
The wait is going to be long for the film, as Project Hail Mary won't be hitting the big screen until almost a full year from now – specifically on March 20, 2026 – but based on what was shown off today at CinemaCon 2025, I have unflappable faith that it will be a perfect adaptation of the source material.
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