Escape from Mars story
The story concerns five astronauts who make the first manned trip to Mars in 2015.
13 total · 4 major · 9 minor
| Theme | Level | Motivation |
|---|---|---|
| colonization of Mars | major | Five astronauts went on a pioneering mission to Mars in order to lay the foundation for a human colony. |
| interplanetary space travel | major | The film follows five enterprising astronauts as they make the first manned trip to Mars. |
| mass consumerism | major | A point was hammered home about the first manned mission to Mars being overly commercialized. The spaceship was emblazoned with a corporate logo, Mars mission memorabilia was being peddled in news reports, etc. |
| working together under stress | major | The five astronauts had to keep it together under various nail biting situations (e.g. a computer malfunction, a meteor shower, a breakdown of communications with Earth) in order to complete their mission of flying to Mars and back. |
| Catholicism | minor | It was revealed that the pope had publicly prayed for the Sagan crew to make a safe landing on the Red Planet. |
| coping with the death of a lover | minor | Lia wept shortly after being informed that her fiancée Robert had perished in an automobile crash. |
| divorce | minor | John had kept quiet that he was going through a divorce. |
| funeral rite | minor | The mission co-commander John Rank was laid to rest by his fellow crew members under a simple cairn. |
| hallucination of a non-existing person | minor | John experienced a vivid hallucination of his estranged Stephanie while on the surface of Mars. |
| human vs. speculative environment | minor | The five astronauts struggled to survive on the harsh Martian surface after a meteor shower hit their landing site. [planet with unbreathable atmosphere] |