In the midst of everything the space epic, The Martian, offers lies an interesting question regarding the inherent value of life. The movie’s plot revolved around a rescue mission of an astronaut that was mistakingly left on Mars during an emergency evacuation. As implausible as such an event may seem today, the implications of how to tackle the situation is something that is quite relevant. This brings us to the question that arises when viewing the film: is it worth risking lives and vast resources for one individual’s life, and if so, why? Say NASA decided that it wasn’t worth the money and risk of losing more lives to save Watney (the protagonist) of the film. Likely, as this news was released, media attention and public outrage would only worsen NASA’s reputation to the public, which could very well lead to even more cuts in aeronautics & space research funding. On the other hand, if NASA did attempt a rescue mission, and failed to bring Watney back, or worse, resulted in more lives lost, NASA would have again faced global scrutiny. The film conveniently shows us the results of what a successful rescue of human life could entails, though such success would be very improbable given the circumstances. Crowds of individuals across not only the nation, but the world, stood together cheering for the success of the mission. Although the movie describes the safe return and progression of Watney, we are told very little about the large-scale impacts of the mission. Does this successful rescue increase financial and public support for NASA? Do we see more transnational collaboration focusing on space exploration and inhabitance? Regardless, looking at all the outcomes, the logical conclusion seems to be that the risks for a dramatic rescue mission are too high to be worth taking a chance on. Humans aren’t always drawn to logic, however, and emotion plays a large role in the decisions we ultimately make. Plus, changing The Martian to a movie where the world simply doesn’t try to rescue Watney would be very puzzling.