The Martian

You may have already read my semi-review here on The Martian, Andy Weir’s best selling debut novel (I'm jealous!). The film by the same name starring Matt Damon is a decent rendering of the book and a runaway hit. Of course, some things are punched up for a movie audience (and perhaps some Hollywood egos) and go a little beyond reality –(would the captain of the rescue ship really venture from her spacecraft to capture the elusive astronaut or would she send another one of the crew? – sorry about the spoiler).
 
Go see this flick, even if you aren’t a sci-fi fan. Actually, in some ways, it isn’t a sci-fi movie, like Gravity or Interstellar. The Martian is about a guy stuck in a bad place who must use intelligence and ingenuity and a lot of luck to get out. That should interest just about everyone. The message in the movie comes directly from astronaut Whatney:

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 “I guarantee you, at some point, everything’s going to go South on you, everything is going to go South and you’re gonna say, ‘This is it. This is how I end.’ Now, you can either accept that, or you can get to work. That’s all it is. You just begin. You do the math. You solve one problem, and then you solve the next one, and then solve the next, and if you solve enough problems, you get to go home.” 

​Pretty good advice.

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