Netflix Stowaway crewed Mars mission drama

[FutureSpaceTourist]

On a mission headed to Mars, an unintended stowaway accidentally causes severe damage to the spaceship’s life support systems. Facing dwindling resources and a potentially fatal outcome, the crew is forced to make an impossible decision. Directed by Joe Penna and starring Anna Kendrick, Daniel Dae Kim, Shamier Anderson and Toni Collette. Coming to Netflix April 22nd.

[FutureSpaceTourist]

It’s a 1 hour, 56 minute film:

https://www.netflix.com/title/81321986

[ccdengr]

"The Cold Equations"?

[Tomness]

"The Cold Equations"?

Yep, got be Airlocked lol

[illectro]

I was a tech consultant during the development, I’m not sure how near the final version will be to the one I gave feedback on, but, I did a lot of math on the orbits, and consumables to make sure that the story would be plausible.
I generated some of the first visualizations of the spacecraft operations using Kerbal space program, and in the trailer I can see quite a few touches in the final designs that look to be directly from my interpretations.

[illectro]

I just posted a video explaining how the writers ended up designing the spacecraft:

[catdlr]

SPOILER ALERT!!

STOWAWAY Ending Explained!

Think Story
Posted:  April 22, 2021

In this video we explain the ending to Netflix's sci-fi feature "Stowaway" starring Anna Kendrick, Toni Collette, Daniel Dae Kim, and Shamier Anderson.

[Blackstar]

https://io9.gizmodo.com/the-stowaway-soundtrack-sets-a-deceptively-gorgeous-moo-1846726059

[laszlo]

Just finished watching it. They were doing mostly OK until the end. Describing how they messed it up would be a continuous stream of spoilers, so I won't. Suffice it to say, cinematically they snatched defeat from the jaws of victory.

Without spoilers, the biggest howlers were:

The mission-critical piece of damaged equipment was something about the size of a briefcase that was easily removed for examination, so where were the spares?

For most of the movie, weeks mission elapsed time, based on the size of the Earth in the windows they were still within the Moon's orbit. Then, in the duration of a single EVA, Earth was gone and Mars was showing a visible disc.

On the other hand, no screaming or fainting women, no rubber mask aliens and no bogus physics, except for one (slight visual that actually did cinematically enhance the movie so I'm willing to give it a pass). The production values and special effects were quite good, as was most of the writing. The characters were well portrayed. The device of not showing or hearing anyone on the ground after they boarded the cycler was interesting and reinforced the fact that they were on their own. The movie almost hit a homerun.

The other thing that stood out was that it was very definitely in the NASA universe rather than the SpaceX one. It looked like an ISS with artificial gravity.

[ccdengr]

Great production values for such a melancholy and basically pointless end product.

1) why didn't they just stop the spin for a while?  Would have made things a lot easier.

2) timing of the CME was ridiculously plot-convenient.

Between this and MIDNIGHT SKY I may have to quit watching SF on Netflix.

[FutureSpaceTourist]

[tater]

It was OK, but I agree with the other comments regarding places it could have been substantially improved. The cycler spacecraft was well done (nice, Scott).

The failing part seems to have been in the vehicle that delivered crew to the cycler... why? That's like delivering crew to a cycler with Orion, and 100% of the trip's life support is tied to Orion? (assuming I'm remembering right and she saw the problem when he fell on top of her upon opening the compartment (never mind how that got closed behind him)).

And yeah, the size of it relative to the LiOH canisters was odd since any of those used more mass than just taking a spare.

The cycler is shown to despin every trip for docking a new crew, so no reason not to during the flight.

The plot would require more work to close, but I think it could be done.

[Blackstar]

I think the biggest problem was that I didn't really care a lot for any of the characters. They just fell flat, and I like Anne Hathaway.

I didn't feel for any of them the way I did for Mark Watney in "The Martian."

[illectro]

It was a fun project to work on, but I'm the first to admit that shaping everything to fit the story they wanted to tell led to a lot of questions just below the surface without great answers.

I had spreadsheets modeling atmosphere consumption and recycling to try and find a balance where the situation was balanced so that at least one person would have to be eliminated. Breaking the right bits and coming up with jury rigged replacements,  But in the final version they filmed a lot of stuff got moved around to fit the movie into its budget.
At one point there was a massive water leak with a flood and damage to systems, and there was discussion of an oxygen rich fire, but both would be costly and so we get some pretty tame sparks and blue smoke escaping.

We had some discussions about how to explain why Michael was stuck in there, behind a panel unnoticed before a launch, and you know I couldn't come up with any sane answer other than to point out that if they were chasing a cycler they might be more concerned with a launch window than an engineer who hadn't badged out. In my mind Hyperion's a private corporation running a space program and occasionally cutting corners, like when they cut back on extra support hardware to add a 3rd crew member.

The other question I never had a good answer for was why they'd not stop the spin and retract the cabling. I had an idea that they might built a jury rigged life support system, but that it needed gravity to operate properly but, that never made it into the final version either.

Still, It was a fun way to approach problems, trying to make them fail in a way that enabled the story.

[ccdengr]

Thanks for the insight.  I really wanted to like it, and all the technical attention to detail really was showing and making it work in the first half.  And I thought the actors did a great job with what they were given.  But I honestly had a hard time even watching the last third because it was pretty obvious where it was going.

I found the big burn where they match velocities with the cycler to be a little odd -- what was your thinking on how that was done?  Seemed like lots of g's and shaking.

[illectro]

The whole launch sequence is intentionally short, and the vibration is excessive because it's supposed to be disorienting for the new crew, it's supposed to be launched into a parking orbit and then make the burn to the escape orbit, but all that is ignored in name of getting the crew to the spacecraft. Realistically they'd have a few launch windows in the days running up to departure, because if they don't make the departure burn close to when the cycler hits perigee it's hard to catch up. So, their particular flight is probably the last opportunity, which might go some way to explaining why they might choose to overlook an engineer who hasn't signed out.

The launch site is in Brazil BTW. Not that I ever specified this. In one of the displays the inclination is less than one degree, and the abort mode is supposed to put them in the Atlantic. I pointed this out to Joe after seeing the movie, and he had a laugh because this was mostly accidental but he's from Brazil so it seems intentional.

I was initially skeptical about using a cycler, because I didn't think you could reasonably keep someone unconscious and yet still have them recover in the time it would take to rendezvous and dock with something flying past on a hyperbolic trajectory, however I found some studies that showed sub 24 hour profiles.

[libra]

I think the biggest problem was that I didn't really care a lot for any of the characters. They just fell flat, and I like Anne Hathaway.

I didn't feel for any of them the way I did for Mark Watney in "The Martian."

You must have appreciated Interstellar then - although her character was quite irritating at times...

[Frogstar_Robot]

I think the biggest problem was that I didn't really care a lot for any of the characters. They just fell flat, and I like Anne Hathaway.

Do you mean Anna Kendrick?

[Blackstar]

I think the biggest problem was that I didn't really care a lot for any of the characters. They just fell flat, and I like Anne Hathaway.

Do you mean Anna Kendrick?

Yeah, I wrote that while tired.

[Johnnyhinbos]

I think the biggest problem was that I didn't really care a lot for any of the characters. They just fell flat, and I like Anne Hathaway.

I didn't feel for any of them the way I did for Mark Watney in "The Martian."

I like Anne Hathaway too - though I'm not sure how germane that is to this movie... :-)


I gotta tell you - I was quite disappointed in this film. And I really liked the cast (though I'm glad they left Hathaway out of it!) It started off poorly when they left their visors open during launch. I mean, that said a lot right there. They cherry picked a few technical elements to hinge the story line on and simply ignored the rest. To me that tells me that the writer, producer, and director have no faith in the intellect of the viewer, so they don't bother to put in the effort.


I can 100% say I could write a much better version of the same plot line, while keeping science and technology real, and taking the action and suspense up several layers - and do it without adding any more production cost to the film. This is the type of half-a$$ed writing that caused me to become a novelist in the first place...

[Blackstar]

The failing part seems to have been in the vehicle that delivered crew to the cycler... why? That's like delivering crew to a cycler with Orion, and 100% of the trip's life support is tied to Orion? (assuming I'm remembering right and she saw the problem when he fell on top of her upon opening the compartment (never mind how that got closed behind him)).

Yeah, this was something that bugged me too. I understand why they wrote it that way--because then the stowaway caused the problem, creating the conclusion that if any one of the four should die, it should be him for putting them in that predicament. If it was just some other random piece of equipment, then it's a toss-up, and a greater moral dilemma. But I think that one of the problems with the storytelling is that they then took him out of the equation when it was clear that he could not climb the wire. At that point, he's not going to die, because he's safe and inside. Once the other two went outside, it became pretty clear for the audience that one or both of them would die. So the writers made the outcome relatively obvious.

I think the problem with the movie isn't the minor technical issues, because 99% of the audience is not going to spot them and not going to care about that (and let's admit it: those technical issues are pretty small when compared to lots of other space movies). The problem is more with the writing and characters. There were only four actors in this movie, and only the one set. No flashbacks, no scenes of them with their families or on Earth; all that was done with dialogue. So the movie was clearly done on a limited budget.

But how much do we the audience know about these individuals and what they care about, like, dislike, do for hobbies, etc.? Very little. Take Zoe, played by Anna Kendrick. What do we know about her? She's a doctor. She once got rescued while drowning. She applied for the program as a joke. That's it. We don't know if she has a husband, boyfriend, brothers or sisters. We don't know what her hobbies are, what she does for fun, what kinds of movies she watches, etc. She could be lots of fun, boring, or a total jerk. We just don't know. And in fact, we know less about her character than we do the botanist or the stowaway. We know pretty much nothing about the commander and about Zoe. And so why should we actually care about her? That's the problem with the movie.

[Blackstar]

I like Anne Hathaway too - though I'm not sure how germane that is to this movie... :-)

I like brunettes. And Kendrick seems like she's more fun than Hathaway.

started off poorly when they left their visors open during launch. I mean, that said a lot right there. They cherry picked a few technical elements to hinge the story line on and simply ignored the rest. To me that tells me that the writer, producer, and director have no faith in the intellect of the viewer, so they don't bother to put in the effort.

I don't have as big a problem with that. I read and listen to a lot of discussions about screenwriting, and I understand that at times screenwriters have to take visual shortcuts to show things that they don't have time to explain. In that case, the director needed a way to illustrate that something was going wrong and it was serious. So the commander's order to lower their visors was a shortcut way to let the audience know that this was a dangerous situation. There were other ways to do that, like having the commander say "This is a dangerous situation," but they decided that the visual was more powerful.

And I see stuff like that all the time that bugs me, but I understand why they do it, because most of the audience is not technically educated, and also because the director/producer/writer/etc. is trying to convey emotions, not simply information.

To use another example from a similar show that bugged me: in "For All Mankind" the Moon Marines are using lightly-modified M-16s on the Moon. That annoyed me, because that's just not practical. Any weapon built for space use would be custom-designed to handle the heat and cold. Plus, it would have a much better sight--no way that you could hold up an M-16 in front of a bubble space helmet and look down the sight at your target. Just not possible. But then I saw something that indicated that the show creators thought that the M-16 was an iconic Cold War weapon, so they were more interested in the look of the weapon than in the technical accuracy. Okay, I didn't agree with that approach, but I at least understand it.

And of course there are lots and lots of examples of movies and television that toss technical accuracy out the door completely. So I don't think we should get too wrapped up in a show that gets it mostly right and then cuts some corners.

[Jarnis]

To use another example from a similar show that bugged me: in "For All Mankind" the Moon Marines are using lightly-modified M-16s on the Moon. That annoyed me, because that's just not practical. Any weapon built for space use would be custom-designed to handle the heat and cold. Plus, it would have a much better sight--no way that you could hold up an M-16 in front of a bubble space helmet and look down the sight at your target. Just not possible. But then I saw something that indicated that the show creators thought that the M-16 was an iconic Cold War weapon, so they were more interested in the look of the weapon than in the technical accuracy. Okay, I didn't agree with that approach, but I at least understand it.

This could also be explained away with a rush to get something shipped up there. The need for the guns may have come somewhat unexpectedly, without time for designing custom equipment. They did paint them white to reflect heat.

The whole Shuttles-around-the-moon bugged me far more. That was just lazy - they wanted iconic spacecraft on screen and couldn't be bothered to work out a real Shuttle-based moon architecture - which almost certainly would've involved using the Shuttle just as a ferry from ground to LEO and using other hardware past that. Problem there being that they would have needed to come up with something new... and average viewer would not have then recognized the hardware and style-over-substance says that is no good.

Still a good show, but just good instead of excellent. Due to lack of quality shows it is still at the top end of what is around, but... only The Expanse gets "excellent" from me right now for genre shows.

[Blackstar]

The whole Shuttles-around-the-moon bugged me far more. That was just lazy - they wanted iconic spacecraft on screen and couldn't be bothered to work out a real Shuttle-based moon architecture - which almost certainly would've involved using the Shuttle just as a ferry from ground to LEO and using other hardware past that. Problem there being that they would have needed to come up with something new... and average viewer would not have then recognized the hardware and style-over-substance says that is no good.

http://www.collectspace.com//news/news-042621a-for-all-mankind-space-shuttle-moon.html

"But there was also a practical reason to use the space shuttle.

"If we didn't use the shuttle and we had to create a whole new vehicle for travel, it was going to cost me a lot more," said Moore. "There would be no clips that I could use. There is an existing set that replicates the interior cockpit of the space shuttle. The spacesuits are available."

"So, in just a dollars and cents, producer part of me, it was like, if I give that up, I'm going to have to cut back on a lot of other things. Suddenly I won't have as much money to build a moon base. Suddenly I won't have as much money for a lot of other things. But if I can figure out a way to justify the use of the shuttle, it's going to help me a lot. It's not free, but it's a significant savings in terms of the production budget."

[LaunchedIn68]

"The mission-critical piece of damaged equipment was something about the size of a briefcase that was easily removed for examination, so where were the spares?"

This one I can see happening.  The mission wasn't NASA (think risk averse/over anticipate everything) but a private BO/SpX like company "Hyperion".  Toni Collete's character makes a comment, "This ship was underbuilt for 2 and they put 3 on board, let alone 4".  Plus the fact that the unit was behind a sealed panel that most likely was never intended to be removed in flight, let alone being damaged by the body of a trapped 230 lb astronaut.  I can see the Hyperion CEO saying something like "Oops yeah we never though of needing to include a spare!". 

SPOILER ALERT

I think too many people are wrapped up in the technical aspects of these types of movies, to just sit back and enjoy them and take something away.  This was not 'Gravity' with its action packed endless destruction and stretched plot lines.  It conveyed a different idea entirely.  That something going wrong in space, with no prospect of rescue or immediate abort to earth, can result in a very drawn out slow lonely death.  The three US Space disasters (as far as we know and can assume) were not like this.  There was fire and instant destruction.  But what if Mission Control couldn't come up with a solution to scrub the CO2 from the LEM built to support 2 not 3 people on Apollo 13?  What if Aldrin couldn't reset the breaker and arm the LEM's engine and they got stuck on the moon?  Stowaway was this type of contemplative disaster situation.

I guess I liked it because it reminded me of 'Marooned'.  Also 'Countdown' to a certain extent.  I did NOT have any idea where this movie was heading, unlike 'Gravity' where the trailers pretty much ruined the movie.  Would the Stowaway on learning his fate turn into a homicidal maniac?  Was he on the ship because he murdered someone on the pad and was hiding but became incapacitated?  That would have been predictable and disappointing.  For a time I though simply that the Commander was going to dump the cabin when they all went to sleep.  Possibly out of guilt and the need to not have anyone make the decision?  That would have been depressing and very disappointing.

I liked how the only true solution to obtain O2 after the algae died, involved the risky and strenuous "climb" to the booster.  This added the needed action sequence, and again unlike 'Gravity' was realistic.  I liked the way they argued about it but finally agreed there was no other choice.  Not to mention Anna Kendric's character making the ultimate sacrifice to save her fellow crew members.  I came away from this movie saying, yeah a 7-9 month trip to/from Mars is not for me!  Kudos to those who will eventually make that trip!

[illectro]

I liked how the only true solution to obtain O2 after the algae died, involved the risky and strenuous "climb" to the booster.  This added the needed action sequence, and again unlike 'Gravity' was realistic.

I don’t know if you watched my video, but the climb across the cables was the ultimate result of the writers trying to make a space movie that wouldn’t be full of expensive zero g sequences. They wanted gravity, didn’t want it to be sci-if future artificial gravity. But rotational gravity systems needed to be big, and that would have meant too much room to explain a crew of 3. So the cable & counterweight system was the result of that, which then lead them to figuring out that a spacewalk across the gap might be a great set piece.

[Blackstar]

But rotational gravity systems needed to be big, and that would have meant too much room to explain a crew of 3.

I liked that it was big, because so many other movies and TV shows have cheated at that. "Mission to Mars" had a small centrifuge, as did "Europa Report" and "Away." Of course, you don't need a full one-g. Lots of speculative designs have proposed 0.3-g for a Mars cycler.

[Blackstar]

I think the biggest problem was that I didn't really care a lot for any of the characters. They just fell flat, and I like Anne Hathaway.

Do you mean Anna Kendrick?

[Blackstar]

I did not realize it, but the movie's plot is essentially lifted from a classic science fiction short story, "The Cold Equations."

This article rather bizarrely makes a sexist claim that in the original story, the author secretly wanted to kill a woman, so he wrote a story where that happened. Then the movie updates the gender politics a little bit, but still kills a woman (I guess because the writers hate women?). Sigh.

https://slate.com/culture/2021/04/stowaway-netflix-cold-equations.html

Robert Meyer Burnett has some thoughts on this:

[Kaputnik]

Just watched this tonight. It's certainly not perfect, but I enjoyed it and it's better than many other films on this category. I struggle to name a single hard sci fi film that manages to be entertaining, gripping, and completely scientifically plausible.
The Martian is probably my pick of the bunch but even that relies on a pretty contrived plot device to create the initial premise. Apollo 13 scores well on accuracy but my non spacey friends find it too dull, and anyway we all know the story inside out already.

I like these lower budget Netflix films because they are a bit unpredictable. They don't always follow the standard formula of happy endings for the lead character. I wasn't expecting that ending, and wasn't convinced it was really going to go that way until almost the last moment.

Some of the plot holes bugged me a bit, though. That rocket stage should have been vented. A single bottle of oxygen surely can't support someone for weeks. Once filled, the bottles could have been left on the kingfisher and retrieved safely after the storm had passed. And going slightly past the point of credibility, why not undock the launch capsule and go chase down the escaping bottle- after all it would only be drifting away at about 10m/s.

[Zed_Noir]

....
Some of the plot holes bugged me a bit, though. That rocket stage should have been vented. A single bottle of oxygen surely can't support someone for weeks. Once filled, the bottles could have been left on the kingfisher and retrieved safely after the storm had passed. And going slightly past the point of credibility, why not undock the launch capsule and go chase down the escaping bottle- after all it would only be drifting away at about 10m/s.

According to Scott Manley's you-tube video about his small part in this movie. He implies that the writer was trying fitted science and spaceflight operating procedures into the contrived plot of the movie.


The movie is loosely based on a very old sci-fi short story. Which boils down to someone have to die for the lack of consumables for 2 persons on emergency medical mission delivering vaccines to a distant planet with manually piloted spacecraft.

[laszlo]

Just a nit - Saying this story is based on Cold Equations is like saying that The Martian is based on Robinson Crusoe on Mars. Other than having an unexpected passenger and a consumables crisis in space there's not a whole lot in common. It deals with a superficially similar situation but is certainly not based on it, any more than Apollo 13 is based on From the Earth to the Moon and a Trip Around It (3 men leave Florida for the Moon, an unexpected accident occurs in space, they have a life support issue that they solve, to avoid being stranded in space they use the landing rockets to change their course and they land in the Pacific).

Stowaway is its own story.

[su27k]

Well at least The Cold Equations is mildly interesting - for a short story.

This movie on the other hand is quite boring, despite its attempt to be authentic.

[RanulfC]

I did not realize it, but the movie's plot is essentially lifted from a classic science fiction short story, "The Cold Equations."

This article rather bizarrely makes a sexist claim that in the original story, the author secretly wanted to kill a woman, so he wrote a story where that happened. Then the movie updates the gender politics a little bit, but still kills a woman (I guess because the writers hate women?). Sigh.

https://slate.com/culture/2021/04/stowaway-netflix-cold-equations.html

Slate (and the author) need to up their research and opinions:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Cold_Equations

Twas NOT the "author" who insisted on killing the girl in the story but the Editor of Astounding John W. Campbell who insisted on not accepting the story where the writer found a way to save the girl. As the critics note, this wasn't about the "laws of physics" but about how bad designs kill people.

I'm glad the wikipedia article mentions the 'counter' story of "The Cold Solution" which I was trying to remember the name of because I read that shorty after reading "The Cold Equations" again after many years.

I'd say it is also a commentary about how 'we' got about space exploration because really the majority of our missions have always been rather 'marginal' after all. Remember this little 'gem'?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stowaway_to_the_Moon

Hell yes the mission would be scrubbed, they didn't have the life support for a fourth person but no way TV programmers or NASA was going to follow through on the real consequences of such an action!

And in truth ANY realistic space exploration story is likely to be boring to those of us who know enough to BE bored with a 'realistic' space exploration story and know too much to 'entertained' by an un-realistic one That's pretty much a given with out level of knowledge. (I have SO much trouble trying to watch 50s and 60s Sci-Fi on youtube and more than a few 70s-80s-and beyond 'drek' as well. I used to be able to suspend my disbelief a bit better but... )

Randy

[Kaputnik]

Morbid thread drift: how quickly would somebody from exposure to solar radiation? The fastest death caused by Acute Radiation Syndrome that I can find from a bit of a googling is about 38 hours.

[laszlo]

Depends on the size of the solar flare and where the spacecraft is when the radiation hits.

[missinglink]

It was a good but not great movie.

Best part: the harrowing climb to retrieve the oxygen bottle. I would actually put it up there with 'Gravity' for believably realistic action in space.

Least good parts: (A) how did that engineer get himself stuck behind an access panel if not on purpose. This made me dislike him instantly and (B) surely there is a 3D printer on board to manufacture mission-critical parts for which there are no spares?