Arts & Culture
Laughing in the Face of Solitude: The Martian
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By JACK JONES
I’ve never seen a space movie that made me want to go to space. In space movies, astronauts never head into the unknown, have a pleasant and informative trip, and return on schedule to their families. Instead, nearly every conceivable disaster strikes, leaving the astronauts with the unsettling prospect of their lifeless bodies floating, weightless and irretrievable, somewhere beyond the sky. As a result, space movies are generally grave and somber affairs, from Apollo 13 to Gravity to last year’s Interstellar. Opportunities for humor are scarce when the characters are surrounded by a seemingly limitless abyss which threatens at all times to swallow them.