One of the best science fiction stories in recent years,Project Hail Maryis getting its own movie treatment, but some people are already up in arms about it. Thefirst trailerwas released earlier this week, withRyan Goslingplaying high school teacher-turned-astronaut Ryland Grace, who suddenly wakes up all alone inside a spaceship far from Earth in the near future with the mission to save it from extinction. It’s a trailer, so there’sonly so muchit can show, butwhat was actually featured has been reason enough for controversy among those who have read the original novel. By the end, Gosling meets a strange alien aboard a different starship that looks mostly like a giant rock, and the two of themseemto hit it off. This is what a few readers are angry about, as they feel it has spoiled the story for non-readers. But how much ofAndy Weir’s original book has actually been spoiled?
The ‘Project Hail Mary’ Trailer Barely Goes Beyond the Third Act of the Novel
Not much, really. Trailers naturally have to reveal at least some of the story in the movie they are trying to sell, otherwise they completely betray their purpose. But what and when to reveal isn’t the kind of decision that is (or at least shouldn’t be) taken lightly. It’s not about randomly selecting moments that are funny or look cool and splicing them together, as editing footage is a more complex process than that.Trailers shouldhave a narrativeof their own to entice the audience, but leave the punchline out, so people will want to watch the movie. Truth be told, a Hollywood star being funny while trying to save the world isn’t that enticing anymore, so this trailer had to give the audience something else to see. WhatProject Hail Maryreaders are complaining about is how, in the end, one of the twists of the book is seemingly spoiled, but is it, really?
Around the two-minute-and-ten-second mark, Ryland Grace is surprised by the emergence of a huge rock-shaped object in front of the Hail Mary, his starship. As it turns out, that object is a starship itself, too, and Grace even makes first contact with an alien.We don’t see much of that being, only that he is apparently short, has rocks for limbs, and can’t do the thumbs-up sign. The trailer also implies that this being isn’t hostile and that it even works together with Grace toward his goal of saving the Earth. Indeed, this scene is very important in the book, and that little alien is one of the best characters in recent science fiction literature (really, everyone will love it). But this moment isn’t the plot twist in the novel, and it also doesn’t happenat the end— it isn’t the titular Hail Mary, so to speak — otherwise, there would be no reason to show it in a trailer other than downrightwantingto spoil the story.
As someone who has readProject Hail Marymore than once and loves every bit of it, yours truly can promise you that none of what is featured in the trailer spoils the book. Instead,giving us that alien right off the bat is supposed to evoke feelings of doubt about other aspects of the trailer’s narrative. What is killing our Sun? What is that alien, and what is it doing at the exact same spot in the cosmos as Ryland Grace? Do the people on Earth know about it? And how the hell does one communicate with a rock? These are the questions that the trailer, after having built its own small-scale narrative, is eliciting. If that reveal isn’t there, then the trailer doesn’t have a narrative at all, because it happens so early in the book, that there isn’t much left to show otherwise; there is no narrative for the trailer to build.
There Are Many Plots and Twists in ‘Project Hail Mary’ Beyond What the Trailer Shows
What’s interesting about the discourse around how revealing theProject Hail Marytrailer is that, ever since the book came out and people first read it, there are plenty of spoilers around the internet. When the movie was announced, countless people were excited, curious to know, for example, who would play that little rocky alien (it’sJames Ortiz, guys), and talking at length about its role in the story and specific plot points. That’s natural, of course, but those are also spoilers that are up for grabs for anyone who wants them.Even right now, there are some synopses of the movie available that reveal way more crucial aspects of the storythan anything the trailer gives us, so if you have only watched it and didn’t read anything else, you’re good.
The truth aboutProject Hail Maryas a book is that it’s so fun and accessible that showing our rocky friend in the trailer is actually a way to ease us into what is a much larger adventure.Andy Weir has a way of building adventures in space that dive deep into thescientific aspectof it like no one else, and that’s the novel’sgreatest merit, and, hopefully, it will be the movie’s, too. He builds protagonists that are as complex as they are competent in their skills, and it’s a delight to see them in action. From then on, their journeys are as interesting (if not more) than the outcome. InThe Martian, for example, everyone expects Mark Watney (Matt Damon) to make it out of Mars somehow, but what’s fun is watching “science the sh*t out of” (his own words) this problem — if you want to talk about trailers that are too revealing, by the way,The Martian’s spoils a lot more of its story thanProject Hail Mary’s. All of Weir’s stories follow this line, including his other novel with an upcoming adaptation,Artemis.
In the end, the only people who think theProject Hail Marytrailer has spoiled the movie are the ones who have read the book and want you to know it, regardless of where they are on the internet. For those people,any trailer for any story will definitely spoil things, because they want to be surprised even though they already know the outcome. But adapting stories likeProject Hail Maryinto a movie isn’t just about pleasing previous fans, but also introducing the story to audiences at large, and the trailer is merely the first step in that direction. As a book reader, yours truly can say that, yes, you can tell what happens in the story by moments in the trailer, but only if you know where to look. That’s what a trailer is all about, and, in that sense,Project Hail Mary’s is actually a great one.
Project Hail Marywill be released in theaters on July 31, 2025.
Project Hail Mary
