Keep Hope Alive SCI-FI: in the face of a Dark or Dystopian future, the Hero inspires others –through Human Resilience, Ingenuity, and Unity — to believe that things can get better.
PACIFIC RIM — (2013)
Pacific Rim is an American military SCI-FI Monster film directed by Guillermo del Toro, starring Charlie Hunnam, Idris Elba, Rinko Kikuchi, Charlie Day, Robert Kazinsky, Max Martini, and Ron Perlman.
Storyline
When monstrous creatures, known as Kaiju, started rising from a portal beneath the Pacific Ocean, a war begins that will take millions of lives and consume humanity’s resources for years on end. To combat the giant Kaiju, a special type of weapon is devised: massive robots, called Jaegers, which are controlled simultaneously by two pilots. But even the Jaegers are proving nearly defenseless in the face of the relentless Kaiju.
After five years, world leaders divert funding from the Jaeger program in favor of coastal defense walls due to resurgent Kaiju attacks and the rapid attrition of Jaegers. However, the walls are soon proven ineffective when a Kaiju breaks through the wall in Sydney before being brought down by Jaeger Striker Eureka, piloted by father-son duo Herc and Chuck Hansen.
Pentecost, commander of the Jaeger forces, devises a plan to end the war by using a nuclear warhead to destroy the portal (a Breach at the bottom of the ocean from which the Kaijus cross over from their world to Earth). An expert predicts that while Kaiju attacks will increase in frequency, the Breach will soon be stable enough to permit passage of the bomb. Disregarding orders to wait, a team member “drifts” with a Kaiju’s brain (connecting with it), and learns that they are bioweapons created by an Alien race to help colonize Earth — and the Breach only opens if it detects Kaiju DNA.
Humanity must change its tactics.
On the verge of defeat, the forces defending mankind have no choice but to turn to two unlikely heroes, a washed-up former pilot and an untested trainee. To that end, former Jaeger pilot Raleigh Becket, now working on constructing the wall, is convinced by Pentecost to rejoin the Jaeger program and is brought to Hong Kong, where he meets Mako Mori, director of the Jaeger restoration program. Raleigh and Mako must team up to rekindle hope — their dual-controlled mega-fighting machines are the only thing standing between the deep-sea Aliens and our future.
In the end, Pentecost and another must sacrifice themselves by detonating the nuclear warhead, triggering a meltdown that seals the Breach. In escape pods, the Heroes surface as rescue helicopters arrive, and humanity celebrates the defeat of the Kaiju.
INTERSTELLAR — (2014)
Interstellar is an epic SCI-FI directed by Christopher Nolan with an ensemble cast led by Matthew McConaughey, Anne Hathaway, Jessica Chastain, Bill Irwin, Ellen Burstyn, and Michael Caine.
Storyline
The film opens with a documentary that reveals in the near future, Earth suffers from a crop blight, starvation, and devastating dust storms. Cooper, an ex-NASA test pilot-turned-farmer, raises his children, Murph and older brother Tom, with the help of their father-in-law Donald following the death of his wife from a cancerous tumor. Murph believes a “ghost” is trying to communicate with her through her bookshelf but is met with skepticism. Following a severe dust storm, Cooper and Murph enter her bedroom to find dust is being pulled by gravity into lines of binary that reveal coordinates to a secret NASA facility.
At the facility they meet Professor Brand who reveals that corn will soon die out and the Earth’s oxygen will become depleted – prompting a last-ditch effort to save humanity and find habitable planets outside of the solar system via a wormhole near Saturn. Convinced Cooper is the best pilot for the mission, Cooper reluctantly joins scientists Amelia Brand, Romilly, and Doyle, bidding farewell to Murph and Tom and promising them he will one day return.
The Endurance spacecraft, piloted by Cooper and two artificially-intelligent robots, TARS and CASE, passes through the wormhole and emerges into a faraway galaxy, orbiting a supermassive black hole, Gargantua. Previous NASA explorers have made this journey and three—Miller, Mann and Edmunds—have reported that their respective planets are potentially habitable. The crew, excepting Romilly and TARS, descend onto Miller’s planet, which turns out to be an ocean world. Arriving on the planet they discover Miller’s spacecraft has been ripped to shreds and Miller missing. Realizing a massive tsunami is barreling towards them, they race back to the Ranger but Doyle is swept away. When Amelia and Cooper return to the Endurance, decades have passed in Earth-years due to extreme time dilation caused by Gargantua’s gravity. Alone on the spacecraft, Romilly has aged significantly.
On Earth, an older Murph now works as a scientist for NASA. She is distraught when Professor Brand, on his deathbed, confesses that the Endurance crew were not meant to return. Realizing that humanity’s Earth-existence is doomed, Murph feels betrayed by Cooper’s departure. She relays this information back to the Endurance crew on Mann’s planet, prompting Cooper to abandon the mission and decide to return to Earth. Cooper learns Mann falsified data in hopes of being rescued, who attempts to kill Cooper and escape. Rescued by Amelia Brand, they race to the compound but a booby-trapped KIPP, Mann’s robot, self-destructs and kills Romilly. Stealing a Ranger they both race to the Endurance but Mann, attempting to maroon them, initiates an unauthorized, manual docking maneuver which goes catastrophically wrong. The airlock decompresses violently, causing a massive explosion that breaches the station and kills Dr. Mann instantly, while Cooper manages to pull off a daring, last-second rescue to save the spinning Endurance.
Unable to return to Earth, lone survivors Cooper and Amelia Brand chart a course towards Edmunds’ planet. Cooper sacrifices himself and TARS, knowing the Endurance has only enough resources for one crew member. They fall into the black hole, with Cooper emerging inside a higher-dimensional tesseract where time is “physical.” Looking back in time, Cooper sees that he led himself to the NASA facility at the mission’s commencement. Now, he and TARS communicate with Murph in the future, providing her encoded quantum data from inside the black hole, which could help her solve the gravitational problem of mass exodus from Earth. They deduce the tesseract and wormhole are both constructs of futuristic advanced humans, who are communicating with Cooper in a way analogous to his communication with Murph across time. Their mission realized, Cooper and TARS are ejected from both the tesseract and wormhole. They are picked up by spacecraft orbiting Saturn.
Aboard a space-station with a recreated healthy-Earth environment, Cooper reunites with Murph, who is older than him due to the extreme time dilation he experienced near Gargantua. Having assured humanity’s continued existence, (showing that science and exploration can outlast despair) Murph is nearing death but does not wish Cooper to witness it. She suggests he seek out Amelia on Edmunds’ planet instead. Cooper and TARS embark on another journey to reach Amelia, who directs CASE and other robots to erect a new colony on the surface of Edmunds’ planet. She kneels over his grave, takes off her helmet and breathes in the air from the surrounding atmosphere, indicating the planet could be humanity’s next home.
THE MARTIAN — (2015)
The Martian is a SCI-FI survival film directed by Ridley Scott (based on Andy Weir’s 2011 novel), starring Matt Damon, alongside an ensemble cast featuring Jessica Chastain, Jeff Daniels, Kristen Wiig, Chiwetel Ejiofor, Sean Bean, Michael Peña, Kate Mara, Sebastian Stan, and Mackenzie Davis.
Storyline
In 2035, the crew of the Ares III mission to Mars is exploring Acidalia Planitia on Martian solar day (sol) 18 of their 31-sol expedition. A severe dust storm threatens their Mars Ascent Vehicle (MAV) and in the ensuing evacuation, astronaut Mark Watney is struck by flying debris and presumed dead. Facing imminent peril, the remaining crew takes off for their orbiting vessel, the Hermes, which will then return them to Earth. Watney awakens after the storm, having narrowly survived his injuries. As he recovers within the crew’s surface habitat (“Hab”), he begins a video diary to document his thoughts on survival. Unable to communicate with Earth, his only chance of rescue is the next Mars mission in four years, when Ares IV will land at the Schiaparelli crater. The Ares IV MAV has already arrived on the site in preparation for the mission. With this timeframe in mind, Watney’s main survival concerns are food and travel. Being a botanist, he cultivates a potato garden inside the Hab using the crew’s bio-waste with Martian soil, and creates water from leftover rocket fuel. He also modifies a rover for the journey to Schiaparelli.
On Earth, NASA satellite planner Mindy Park notices Watney’s activity from recorded satellite images, and suspects he must be alive. NASA director Teddy Sanders releases the news to the public but decides not to inform the Ares III crew en route to Earth, over flight director Mitch Henderson’s strong objection. Watney explores the surrounding terrain and studies his maps, but he quickly journeys out to retrieve the Pathfinder probe, hoping to restore its communications. Mars missions director Vincent Kapoor realizes this strategy, and quickly visits Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) director Bruce Ng to use their replica of the probe. The agency makes contact with Watney and instructs him to link Pathfinder to the rover, where he can now communicate by text. With this breakthrough, Henderson is finally allowed to inform Watney’s crewmates.
As Watney enters the Hab on one evening, a leak in the airlock causes an explosion that injures him and destroys the potato garden. Although he repairs the airlock, he is again threatened by starvation. NASA scrambles to procure a resupply ship for Watney, with Sanders ordering routine safety inspections bypassed to expedite the mission. This oversight results in catastrophe as the ship disintegrates shortly after launch. The China National Space Administration decides to offer a launch vehicle – originally intended for the Taiyang Shen space probe – to resupply Watney. Astrodynamicist Rich Purnell devises an alternative plan: send the Taiyang Shen launcher to resupply the Hermes, which will then use Earth’s gravity to “slingshot” back to Mars two years earlier than Ares IV. Sanders flatly rejects the idea, considering it too risky for the Ares III crew. Henderson surreptitiously sends the proposal to the crew, and they unanimously vote in favor and divert the Hermes. Sanders is forced to support them publicly, but demands Henderson’s resignation after the mission.
After waiting several months, Watney embarks on the long journey to the Ares IV MAV. He plans to use it to rendezvous with the Hermes, but needs to lighten the load considerably by partially dismantling the cockpit. He takes off to orbit, but the Hermes crew find that they remain too far away and moving too fast to retrieve him. Commander Lewis quickly improvises to explode the airlock in part of the ship, resulting in air violently escaping and slowing them down. Lewis also pilots a tethered Manned Maneuvering Unit to personally reach Watney, but they are still too far apart. Watney quickly improvises by piercing his pressure suit, and propels himself with the escaping air, reaches Lewis, and manages to hold on. NASA and spectators across the world all celebrate the successful rescue (turning an impossible crisis into a testament to Human will.)
After returning to Earth, Watney becomes a survival instructor for astronaut candidates. Five years later, as the Ares V is launching, those involved in Watney’s rescue are seen in their current lives watching the launch footage.
TOMORROWLAND — (2015)
Tomorrowland is an American SCI-FI film directed by Brad Bird with a screenplay by Bird and Damon Lindelof (based on Tomorrowland from the Disney Parks) — starring George Clooney, Hugh Laurie, Britt Robertson, Raffey Cassidy, Tim McGraw, Kathryn Hahn, and Keegan-Michael Key.
Storyline
At the 1964 New York World’s Fair, a young inventor Frank Walker attempts to showcase his homemade jet pack, but it fails and does not impress the judges. However, a mysterious girl, Athena, sees potential in him. She gives him a lapel pin marked with a “T” and directs him onto the Disney It’s a Small World ride, where the pin triggers a hidden transport to Tomorrowland—a dazzling futuristic city in another dimension. There, robots repair his jet pack, allowing him to soar through the city and join its secret community of innovators.
In the present, Casey Newton is an idealistic teenager. She continually sabotages the demolition of a NASA launch platform in hopes of saving her father’s job. After she is arrested, she discovers a Tomorrowland pin among her belongings. Touching it transports her to the futuristic world, but only as a projection; when the pin’s power is expended, she abruptly returns to her normal reality. Determined to understand what she saw, Casey follows clues to a memorabilia shop in Houston, where the owners attack her for information about the pin. Athena bursts in and defeats the owners, actually Audio-Animatronics, who self-destruct, blowing apart the shop. After Casey and Athena steal a car, Athena reveals she is also an animatronic, purposed to find and recruit people who fit the ideals of Tomorrowland.
Athena brings Casey to Frank Walker (now an adult) who is a bitter recluse living in upstate New York. Banished from Tomorrowland years earlier, Frank wants nothing to do with the place. Casey discovers he has built a device predicting the imminent end of the world, but her refusal to accept that future causes the probability to drop—something Frank has never seen. When robotic assassins arrive to eliminate them, Frank reluctantly joins Casey and Athena. Using a teleportation device, they travel to Paris and launch an old Plus Ultra rocket hidden beneath the Eiffel Tower. Frank explains that Tomorrowland was created by a secret society of visionaries—Gustave Eiffel, Jules Verne, Nikola Tesla, and Thomas Edison—who sought a place free from political and commercial interference.
Arriving in Tomorrowland, the trio finds the once‑utopian city in decline. Governor David Nix greets them and leads them to a tachyon machine Frank invented which can view possible futures. It has been broadcasting visions of global catastrophe to Earth. Casey realizes the machine’s warnings have become a self-fulfilling prophecy: humanity, overwhelmed by doom, simply stopped trying to prevent disaster. Nix admits he intended the images as a wake‑up call, but when the world ignored them, he gave up and decided to let the apocalypse unfold. Casey, Frank, and Athena attempt to destroy the machine, but Nix fights to stop them. During the struggle, Athena foresees Nix killing Frank. She sacrifices herself to save him by triggering her self‑destruct sequence. The explosion destroys the tachyon device, and the falling wreckage kills Nix.
In the aftermath, Casey and Frank take leadership of Tomorrowland. They recruit Casey’s father and brother, and they build a new generation of Athena‑like animatronics. Given Tomorrowland pins, these childlike robots set out across the world to find new dreamers, thinkers, and inventors—people capable of building a better future.
ARRIVAL — (2016)
Arrival is an American SCI-FI drama directed by Denis Villeneuve, based on the 1998 novella “Story of Your Life” by Ted Chiang — starring Amy Adams, Jeremy Renner, Forest Whitaker, and Michael Stuhlbarg.
Storyline
When twelve Extraterrestrial spacecraft suddenly arrive, hovering over various locations around the Earth, it causes widespread panic, affected nations send military and scientific experts to monitor and study them. In the United States, US Army Colonel Weber recruits linguist Dr. Louise Banks and physicist Ian Donnelly to study the craft above Montana. On board, Banks and Donnelly make contact with two cephalopod-like, seven-limbed aliens, whom they call “heptapods”; Donnelly nicknames them Abbott and Costello. Banks and Donnelly research the complex written language of the heptapods, consisting of phrases written with logograms, and share the results with other nations. As Banks studies the language, she starts to have flashback-like visions of her daughter.
When Banks is able to establish sufficient shared vocabulary to ask why the heptapods have come, they answer with a statement that could be translated as “offer weapon”. China interprets this as “use weapon”, prompting them to break off communications, and other nations follow. Banks argues that the symbol interpreted as “weapon” can be more abstractly related to the concepts of “means” or “tool”; China’s translation likely results from interacting with the heptapods using mahjong, a highly competitive game. Meanwhile, the Russian team receives a message that they translate as “there is no time,” which they interpret as a possible threat.
Rogue soldiers plant a bomb in the Montana craft. Unaware, Banks and Donnelly reenter the alien vessel, and the aliens give them a more complex message. Just before the bomb explodes, one of the aliens ejects Donnelly and Banks from the vessel, knocking them unconscious. When they wake, the heptapod craft has moved beyond reach and the US military is preparing to evacuate in case of retaliation.
General Shang of China issues an ultimatum to the alien craft in China, demanding that it leave within 24 hours. Russia, Pakistan, and Sudan follow suit; communications between the international research teams are terminated as worldwide panic sets in.
Donnelly discovers that the symbol for time is present throughout the message and that the writing occupies exactly one-twelfth of the 3D space into which it is projected. Banks suggests that the full message is split between the twelve craft and that the heptapods want all the nations to collaborate in order to decipher it.
Banks goes alone to the Montana craft, which sends down a transport pod. Abbott has been mortally injured as a result of the explosion. Costello explains that they have come to help humanity, because in 3,000 years’ time they will need humanity’s help in return. Banks realizes the “weapon” is their language. Learning the language alters humans’ linear perception of time, allowing them to experience memories of future events. Banks’s visions of her daughter are revealed to be premonitions; her daughter will not be born until sometime in the future.
Banks returns to the camp as it is being evacuated and tells Donnelly that the aliens’ language is the “tool” that was meant by the word “weapon”. She experiences a premonition of a United Nations event celebrating global unity achieved by finally deciphering the heptapods’ language. At the event, General Shang thanks Banks for persuading him to stop the attack when she called his private number and recited his wife’s dying words. He then shows her his private number and whispers his wife’s words into her ear.
In the present, Banks takes CIA agent Halpern’s satellite phone from a table and calls Shang’s private number to recite the words. The Chinese announce that they are standing down and releasing their twelfth of the message. The other countries follow suit, and the twelve spacecraft depart. (The story thus frames the Heptapod visit as an exercise in empathy and communication, inspiring global unity and a hopeful perspective on time and the Future.)
From what she has learned, Banks writes and publishes a book called The Universal Language, a guide to the heptapod language, which will eventually teach humanity to perceive time the same way as the heptapods.
During the evacuation, Donnelly expresses his love for Banks. They talk about their life choices and whether he would change them if he could see his life from beginning to end. Banks knows that she will agree to have a child with him despite knowing their fate: that Hannah will die from an incurable disease and that Donnelly will leave them both as a result of her revealing that she knew this. As they embrace, Banks reminisces about the last time Donnelly will hug her.
Keep Hope Alive SCI-FI gives us all a reason to hang on in the face of Dystopian Threats — whether they be … giant Monsters from the sea, Extinction on a dying planet, Doomsday thoughts, Death far from home, or Alien Invasion.
To survive, we must believe that things can get better. Hope lies in our own Resilience, Ingenuity, and Unity. In the immortal words of Commander Taggart (Galaxy Quest):
“Never give up. Never Surrender.”
Pass it on.
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