Project Hail Mary has received rave reviews and proved Ryan Gosling can still turn a movie that’s not a part of any existing franchise into an opening-weekend box office hit. So novelist Andy Weir, who wrote the book it was based on, should be taking a victory lap. Instead, he’s apologizing for being a dumbass.
He recently appeared on the Critical Drinker podcast and pitched his brand of hard-nosed science fiction as a remedy for what’s currently ailing modern Star Trek. The latest Trek series, Starfleet Academy, has proved divisive among fans. While critics have generally approved of the show, season 1 only has a 51 percent score on Rotten Tomatoes among average viewers. There will be a second season, but Paramount has already confirmed it won’t continue the show beyond that.
“And here’s another thing: I pitched a Star Trek show to Paramount, and I was in Zoom with the showrunners with all the shows and spent a lot of time talking to [executive producer Alex Kurtzman],” Weir said at one point in the recent episode. “I don’t like a lot of the new Trek. He, as a person, is a really nice guy. But at the same time, those shows are shit. He is a nice guy. But they didn’t accept my pitch, so, you know, fuck ’em.”
This has also led to people resurfacing a 2018 interview Weir gave in which he argued against always weaving political and social commentary into science fiction. That included Star Trek, a show many associate specifically with that kind of thing.
“I put no politics or social commentary into my stories at all,” he said at the time. He later added, “For instance, as a lifelong Star Trek fan, it’s always bothered me that there is a presumed ‘responsibility’ within Star Trek shows to talk about social issues. I just want to watch Romulans and the Federation shoot at each other.”
A backlash has been bubbling up as a result, and Weir is now trying to turn the temperature down on it. He went on Facebook earlier today to apologize to Paramount, whom I’m guessing he still definitely wants to write a Star Trek script for. “I was trying to be funny, but in retrospect it comes off as disrespectful and mean,” he wrote. “So I’m sorry for that. I was also trying to be self-deprecating when I said ‘But they didn’t like my pitch so fuck ’em!’ but out of context it can read like I actually meant it.”
He continued, “I’m a blunt person – always have been. And it’s been 10 years since the media cared what I had to say about anything so I kind of forgot to watch my words when I have a film in theaters. In a couple months I’ll be back in my cave writing novels and no one will care again. Anyway, if you want to talk about it in real time – even if it’s just to rip me a new one – I’m happy to hop on the phone or zoom.”