Project Hail Mary directors think it was important to make sure their end of the world sci-fi drama was funny: "That's part of the human experience"

Phil Lord and Christopher Miller haven't been in the director's chair together since 2014's 22 Jump Street. It seems fair to say, then, that's there's been a bit of a leap from the Jonah Hill and Channing Tatum buddy cop comedy to Project Hail Mary, their new sci-fi blockbuster that sees Ryan Gosling attempt to save Earth from our dying sun.

Based on The Martian author Andy Weir's novel, there's plenty of hard science and serious business in the movie, but Lord and Miller's comedic roots stop it ever getting too weighed down. It's a movie with massive stakes and serious sacrifice, but one that continually recognizes the humor that slips through the cracks of even the most difficult moments.

"We always think that the best dramas, the ones that we love the most, also make you laugh, and the best comedies make you cry," Miller explains to GamesRadar+. "And part of the human experience is we feel multiple feelings, sometimes right on top of each other. And I think that's what humanity is, so we wanted the movie to reflect that."

Lord agrees that "it felt more honest," with Miller adding, "I think we always wanted to make sure that we were keeping the stakes of the movie real, and people weren't flippant about what was at stake. But there can be moments of levity in it, because that's how we experience the world."

In the film, Gosling plays Ryland Grace, a scientist recruited into a project to investigate a mysterious alien microbe that's slowly destroying the sun before it causes temperatures on Earth drop to a catastrophic level. He doesn't remember that, though, when he wakes up on a spaceship hurtling toward a distant star with no memory of why he's there.

When you can't remember your astronaut training, plenty of things about being in space quickly become pretty absurd, too – and then some. "Especially, like, the social anxiety of meeting an alien for the first time," Lord says, referring to Grace's run-in with an alien on a similar mission, whom he names Rocky. "The clumsiness of being in microgravity for the first time. I think all of those things really feel natural to the story."

Project Hail Mary arrives in UK cinemas on March 19 and US theaters on March 20. For more on the movie, check out our Project Hail Mary review, or fill out your watchlist with our guide to the rest of 2026's biggest movie release dates.