What did everyone think of the martian.

[physicskid]

Personally i loved the beginning but i couldn't help but feel they blew the end. Everything before pathfinder was great though.

 

best line "yeah so i blew myself up"

[the winter system]

Did you know that a Martian sandstorm can't do that much? 

[Kobold King]

Did you know that a Martian sandstorm can't do that much? 

 

That's really the biggest inaccuracy of the book. (Though I did see one theory that what the Ares crew encountered was a burst from a gas pocket underground, preserved from when the planet had a much denser atmosphere. They simply had tremendously bad luck.)

 

 

Personally though, I adored this book through and through! By far the best science fiction novel I've read since Michael Crichton passed away. And somehow Andy Weir did it by keeping speculative aspects of the novel to a bare minimum; pretty much every piece of tech and policy in the book is really and truly part of our space program.

 

Of course, part of what made this book great was Mark Watney's commentary. His sense of humor got me through the most technical aspects of his macgyvering, and overall made the book a joy to read.

 

Tiny spoiler:

Mark Watney is fiction's greatest space pirate.

[the winter system]

Yeah, it's awesome. I loved the

space pirate. 

[DanTheSeamonster]

"I'm the King of Mars!" 

 

No, but seriously, wonderful book. I can say with confidence that the Martian is in my top three favorite Sci-Fi books. Admittedly about half the sciencey jargon flew straight over my head, but eh, I didn't really care too much. 

[Left]

I really enjoyed the movie, I haven't read the book yet though. I haven't been reading a lot lately.

[physicskid]

The book was much better. Actually most of my complaints about the movie are a result of having seen the book.

 

I was indeed aware of the realities of the sandstorm as was andy weir, the author of the martian. in the words of mark twain "get your facts straight first, then twist em as you please"

[Blaze1616]

I fell in love with the book, and was super stoked for the movie, which I also enjoyed. Though I enjoyed the book more than the movie, as I told my father, the movie was as good as they could make it, given the constraints of the medium. The book had far more science in it, and of the science they did include in the movie, much was left out due to the time constraint on movies. For example:

 

For the potatoes, Whatney had to first mix his waste with the dirt to make it fertile, then he got to plant the potatoes to grow. The movie just sort of jumped over the science of why, and covered the whole event in a semi-montage. For viewers who do understand the science, it makes sense, and for viewers who don't they just assume it does make sense or it's the fiction part of science fiction, something that happens often with hard science fiction movies.

 

The book was the better experience, but it's not like the movie was bad, or even mediocre. It was a great movie, based on a great book.

[skaa]

I read part of The Martian when Google Play Books offered me a sample of it some time ago. The sample stopped at Watney's Sol 71 entry, enough for me to know the over all tone and style of the book. I liked it, but not enough to buy the whole thing at the time.

 

After seeing the movie, though, I think I'm going to buy the e-book soon.

I loved the Pathfinder scenes. And Project Elrond (with Boromir included!). The last Earth scenes after the rescue kind of dragged on, to be honest, but I heard that wasn't a problem in the book. So that's good.

Edited October 14, 2015 by skaa