(Warning: This post does contain some spoilers for “Away” on Netflix).
Do you need faith in a higher power to get through a strenuous mission to Mars? In Netflix’s Hilary Swank-led space drama series “Away,” showrunner Jessica Golberg found the oh-so-subtlest ways to ask that very question with an intertwining theme of faith and religion — which we just couldn’t help but notice.
For instance, consider how one of the five astronauts on the mission to Mars, Dr. Kwesi Weisberg-Abban (Ato Essandoh), was left orphaned when his birth parents died and was then adopted by a Jewish woman and her husband. Throughout the eight-month mission, Kwesi often prays openly, and in the final episode he even ends up swaying the usually agnostic Dr. Lu Wang (Vivian Wu), who asks him to lead them in prayer as they approach their difficult and potentially fatal landing on Mars.
Then there’s that scene where Commander Emma Green’s (Swank) daughter Alexis (Talitha Eliana Bateman) attends a Catholic mass with her boyfriend — not your average activity for a couple of love-struck 15-year-olds.
Throughout the series, the astronauts are guided through every terrifying moment where something goes wrong by a sense of “hope,” which might as well be synonymous with faith — whether that’s in God, science or something else entirely is up for interpretation.
“When you talk about the universe, it’s hard to eclipse those questions of faith,” Goldberg told TheWrap. “We did a lot of research, we talked to a lot of astronauts, and one thing we kept hearing was when you’re up there, if you’re atheist, you’re even more of an atheist, or if you believe, you become a deeper believer. I think because we were having those conversations in the [writers] room, they just worked into the larger fabric of the show.”
It should come as no surprise to fans of the sci-fi space travel genre that a mission to Mars also brings up the ultimate question: are we alone?
“When you’re questioning about going to the moon or Mars or other planets, you’re questioning, ‘Is there life in other places? Are we the only life?’ The sort of Russian doll of questions that you start to ask ends up always coming around to faith in some way,” Goldberg continued. “We felt that a lot of scientists are agnostics, are atheists, but it felt important to have someone up there who had faith and believed. And you hear about people having experiences in space.”
Even astronauts who don’t necessarily believe in God have reported feeling something close to the divine when peering out of that little window down at that blue marble, Earth, Goldberg said.
“We talked to Don Pettit, who didn’t believe in God, who’s been in space for hundreds of hours, and he felt more a spiritual sense with the Earth,” she said of the American chemical engineer and NASA astronaut. “Some people experience little lights and have more of a religious experience.”
“In our [writers] room, we’d be talking about these things, and then it would definitely evolve back to, ‘Is there a God? Do you need faith to get through these kinds of missions? What happens if you believe in nothing? What if there is other life out there?'” she continued. “If we get to go on and have a Season 2, that question will play even more deeply because the question of life on Mars is the scientific basis, you know, it’s the holy grail of what Mars could possibly hold.”
Could there be little green men on Mars? Do they know something about a higher power that we don’t? Let’s hope “Away” gets a second season so we can find out.
'Blade Runner' and 11 Other Sci-Fi Films Set in a Future That's Already in the Past (Photos)
The future is now. From "2001: A Space Odyssey" to "Blade Runner" -- which begins on "Los Angeles/November, 2019" -- Hollywood has depicted a sci-future that now seems very dated. But in some cases, these films even got some things right.
"2001: A Space Odyssey" (1968)
Stanley Kubrick's magnum opus did not manage to predict a future of commercial space travel or intergalactic exploration that led to a new paradigm of existence and meaning in the universe. But, it did predict that we would have intelligent computers. Thankfully, Siri and Alexa are not as murderous and conspiring as HAL 9000.
Warner Bros.
"Death Race 2000" (1975)
While the new millennium did not bring about TV shows that featured violent street races to the death as imagined in this David Carradine and Sylvester Stallone thriller, we have seen a surge of reality TV programming not unlike the one in the film. "Death Race" was later remade in 2008 with Jason Statham starring.
New World Pictures
"Escape From New York" (1981)
John Carpenter's "Escape From New York" imagined that all of Manhattan has been turned into a giant, maximum-security prison to manage violence and crime run amok -- and that we'd realize this future by 1997.
20th Century Fox
"Blade Runner" (1982)
Perhaps realizing that we would not have lifelike, sentient robot "replicants" by the year 2019, "Blade Runner" actually got a sequel in 2017 that kicked things forward to 2049.
Warner Bros.
"1984" (1984)
A recurring theme on this list is that movies whose titles are years are inherently dated. And there's no better example of that than the adaptation of George Orwell's dystopian novel "1984." The book was first adapted to the screen in 1956, then again in 1984 itself. But the year still has an unusual connotation with the future, as the latest season of "American Horror Story" was subtitled "1984" and even the second "Wonder Woman" movie with Gal Gadot was set in 1984.
MGM
"The Running Man" (1987)
Another example of how reality TV has taken over the airwaves, Arnold Schwarzenegger stars in this campy sci-fi set in 2017 where he's recruited for a deadly, futuristic game show in which he's forced to fight for his survival.
TriStar Pictures
"Akira" (1988)
The futuristic anime "Akira" is set three decades after a nuclear bomb fell on Tokyo and started WWIII, causing gangs of motorcyclists to take to the streets in a battle against oppressive government forces. That didn't happen, but then neither has a planned live-action remake of the film, which has been in development hell for so long that it has passed when the time when the movie is set to take place (2019). Fun fact: The main character of "Akira" awakens to start the film underneath a stadium that's currently under construction in Tokyo, and Japan built a stadium for the pandemic-delayed 2020 Summer Olympics.
Toho
"Back to the Future Part II" (1989)
Damn if scientists haven't tried hard to give us hoverboards by the year 2015, when Robert Zemeckis' "Back to the Future" sequel is set. But we did get an obscene amount of "Jaws" sequels, some of them in 3-D no less. The movie was also a year early on the Chicago Cubs winning the World Series as the team broke a 108-year drought to win the World Series in 2016.
Universal Pictures
"Terminator 2: Judgment Day" (1991)
The events of "Terminator 2" are set in 1995 with the expectation that Judgment Day and a nuclear apocalypse triggered by sentient machines was right around the corner in August 1997.
Paramount Pictures
"Freejack" (1992)
In "Freejack," right before a race car driver played by Emilio Estevez is about to die in a horrible car wreck, he's transported to the year 2009 where wealthy billionaires harvest young bodies and implant their own minds inside them so they can live forever. The trailer explains that they harvest people from the past who aren't poisoned by years of a deteriorating ozone layer. Anthony Hopkins, Mick Jagger and Rene Russo also star in the sci-fi film.
Warner Bros.
"Strange Days" (1995)
The events of Kathryn Bigelow's "Strange Days" are set in 1999 just four years removed from when the movie was actually released. It played early on Y2K paranoia and predicted that technology would advance so quickly that we'd have advanced virtual reality and the ability to live within other people's memories in no time at all.
Lightstorm Entertainment
"2012" (2009)
Roland Emmerich didn't get the year right, but he was ahead of his time when it comes to imagining a global catastrophe tied to climate change, a story he also told with "The Day After Tomorrow."
Warner Bros.
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Movies like ”1984,“ ”2001: A Space Odyssey“ and ”2012“ have inadvertently dated themselves
The future is now. From "2001: A Space Odyssey" to "Blade Runner" -- which begins on "Los Angeles/November, 2019" -- Hollywood has depicted a sci-future that now seems very dated. But in some cases, these films even got some things right.