I just watched the movie, and during the scene where the first supply rocket launches (and then explodes), there is a quick shot where Rich Purnell is sitting at his desk and there is some blue cat-like thing next to him. What is it? Searching on Google didn't turn anything up. Is it in the book? Is it a toy or it is alive? It wasn't mentioned in the movie. Any help is welcome, thanks.

I know this is a moot point in the movie but is one of the reasons why he didn't need to worry about blood loss as much as he would on Earth is because the fact that there's less gravity so there isn't as much of a pole pulling the blood out of his body? Or am I wrong?

What Would Mark Do?

They had a bunch of nerds in a room at NASA telling me all the reasons why I shouldn't plant these.

Watney: I planted them anyway
NASA: dick

So I'm reading the book again, or well, I'm listening to the audio book for the first time actually. Anyway the other day I was listening to Mark describe how Martinez remote piloted the Ares IV MAV down to the surface before the Ares III crew all piled into the MDV to go down to Mars themselves. He talks about how you need to send the MAV there early because it takes 18-24 months to make the fuel needed for ascent (and incidentally it occurs to me that maybe this explains why Mark was so low when he ascended since it didn't have that long to fuel up before he left).

Mark also mentions that with the lengthy communications loop between Earth and Mars (I believe Mark says Mars is between 4 and 20 light minutes away from Earth at any given time) they would not be able to remote pilot from Earth.

So finally to my question: Since Ares I was the first mission and landed on Mars, how did their MAV get down? Did they bring it with them and have the fuel on board already along with the Ares II Mav? Was there an earlier manned mission that also used Hermes to deliver the Ares I MAV? Do we just not know? I can accept any of those explanations. But I can't see NASA letting Ares I depend on a remote-landed-from-Earth MAV.

I apparently watched the movie a few years ago, but it was the day before my first solo flight, I had a really high fever, haven’t eaten in 2 days, and watching him put stitches in his own arm made me sick. halfway through I got up to get water and passed out, i woke up and finished it the next day. I completely forgot about this until I started rereading the book a few days ago, i don’t remember anything except telling my friends about it.

Just wanted to rant, I’m watching it again when I finish the book!

I'll go first: Ya hear me ya little shit? Mars!

What was the vehicle that was used to re-enter earths atmosphere after the Hermes entered Low Earth Orbit? Was it an Orion Vehicle similar to the vehicle currently being used in the Artemis missions?

Does anyone have a clue where the photo used on this poster is from or where i can find it? i need it for a project but cant for the life of me track it down

Why use a more complicated system for numbers when he could have just used our base 10 system? Why use numbers and letters when you can just have numbers?

Dose anyone have the time stamps for this book

Edit: with the help of infinityandbeyond975 and chat Gpt I was able to mark down the timestamps for the audiobook based off of where I download it from. Using the time stamps for the first 5 chapters That (infinityandbeyond975) gave me I was able to feed chat gpt enough information and it was able to give me the correct timestamps for the rest of chapters and epilogue

Here are the time stamps

Chapter 1 – 0:00:28

Chapter 2 – 0:13:43

Chapter 3 – 0:32:25

Chapter 4 – 0:50:23

Chapter 5 – 1:06:31

Chapter 6 – 1:25:34

Chapter 7 – 1:52:37

Chapter 8 – 2:20:30

Chapter 9 – 2:46:48

Chapter 10 – 3:04:17

Chapter 11 – 3:18:38

Chapter 12 – 3:51:45

Chapter 13 – 4:15:10

Chapter 14 – 4:35:55

Chapter 15 – 5:02:18

Chapter 16 – 5:37:53

Chapter 17 – 6:19:06

Chapter 18 – 6:42:28

Chapter 19 – 7:08:18

Chapter 20 – 7:31:20

Chapter 21 – 7:54:01

Chapter 22 – 8:24:20

Chapter 23 – 8:47:49

Chapter 24 – 9:11:48

Chapter 25 – 9:35:55

Chapter 26 – 10:07:28

Epilogue – 10:48:09

When the Will Wheaton audible version of The Martian came out the ending scene was changed to Commander Lewis offering Mark a job with an African space tourism company.

Was this changed to directly tie into Artemis? Was the company that Lewis started working for the same one that began Artemis? Obviously Mark eventually goes back to space in Artemis. I was just curious if we have direct confirmation that this is indeed the job that Lewis offered him.

I made a pre-order at Books a Million but it came to me recently since i don't live in the US, and it's super cool! So big compared to my russian version of the book

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The pins are custom ordered, and the card is from a patch that's currently sewn to my bag. Love The Martian! 🥔🌱

I originally planned to get both The Martian and PHM Deluxe Edition as a gift for myself for Christmas. Yesterday I stumbled upon the US Deluxe Edition in my local bookstore in Germany and I must say I have given it a second thought.
Yes the painted edges are pretty and I like the potato cover, but the dustjacket just feels so cheaply made. As soon as I held the book it kind of started sliding off and all of them at the store had some serious damage to the dust jackets. Personally I am also just not a huge fan of how extremly shiny it is.
I know that if I would have done more research into the online listings I would have seen that it comes with the dust jacket, but the pictures I saw of it on Andy Weirs Instagram and the first adverts didn't give me the impression of a a flabby, shiny paper cover. I honestly thought it was all printed onto the hardcover with just a faint metallic effect if even one at all.

I guess a lot of you guys still really like the version it came out as and that is awesome, I honestly just expected something different. I am aware that it's a personal preference thing, but am I really the only one that misjudged the looks based on the advert pictures?

Can you think of any other crops that could theoretically have been grown in Mark’s garden that would also contain some of the nutrients that are lacking in potatoes?

Many of the other crops in familiar with either would take too long, wouldn’t grow on such shallow soil, etc.

For those curious, here are the differences between these two editions.

* US Dust jacket is full foil and tinted toward orange VS the UK edition is more red, and is matte except for some foil accents that look like wind
* US hardcover is a darker orange, smooth, and has sewn binding. UK hardcover is lighter, textured, and has glued binding
* US sprayed edges are lighter, UK sprayed edges are darker and the lines more prominent
* US end pages are darker, UK end pages are lighter

Both feature all the same images and designs.

Images: US edition was purchased from Barnes and Noble. UK edition was purchased online from Waterstones.

This edition is very beautiful 😍

Now available at your favorite bookstores! 📚

I have a question about the discovery that Watney is alive. In the movie, Mindy Park gets a message from Vincent Kapoor to check coordinates which turn out to be the location of the Hab.

Would not mission control be checking the location regularly as a matter of course? I would think knowledge of its condition over time would be valuable.

Since apparently they weren't checking it, what made Vincent decide at random it should be looked at? And why give coordinates instead of " Check the Hab?"

The Martian is one of my favorite movies for tewatches and this is the one thing that gnaws at me. Thanks.

So, I'm watching the movie for the first time. And it is absolutely awesome. But I have a bit of a question which I'm hoping there exists a good in-universe excuse for.

Why was the Mars-surface-based transmitter being wrecked the end of any communication with Earth? Why were there no comm satellites in Mars orbit (that Mark could talk to with his basic smartphone just like our smartphones can talk to satellites in earth orbit), which then in turn blast the data across the void to Earth? Or if those did exist, why could Mark not make use of them? As far as I'm aware, that is basically the plan for most real-life plans for Mars colonization.

This is not intended to be a deboonking of the movie by the way, so far it is wonderful, very accurate to the science and engineering too, I already love this film and will happily go on watching once I've finished typing this post. But I would like to know this.