Project Hail Mary Author Andy Weir Blasts Kurtzman’s Star Trek, Reveals Paramount Rejected His Pitch

Andy Weir, the author behind The Martian and Project Hail Mary, has no patience for what Alex Kurtzman has done to Star Trek, and he said so plainly on the Critical Drinker podcast last week. He also dropped a detail that makes the whole situation worse: he pitched Paramount a Star Trek show, and they turned him down.

Project Hail Mary is one of the best science fiction films in years. Ryan Gosling anchored a smart, hopeful, character-driven story about exploration and human ingenuity, the exact qualities that made the original Star Trek a cultural institution. It earned the praise it received. That the man who wrote that story went to Paramount with a Trek pitch and got rejected tells you everything you need to know about how that studio makes decisions.