--- title: The Martian Movie Gets Honest Trailer: Video description: "Climb aboard for a two-hour NASA commercial" canonical: https://time.com/4168240/martian-honest-trailer/ author: Samantha Grossman article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2016-01-05T22:38:30.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-04-13T07:28:20.067Z og:title: 'The Martian' Honest Trailer Shows It's Just 'Cast Away' in Space og:description: "Climb aboard for a two-hour NASA commercial" og:url: https://time.com/4168240/martian-honest-trailer/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltde093bcdab65f2d0/6988d9b9bc6cfc69913e2a3c/time-logo.jpg?branch=production og:image:width: 1200 og:image:height: 675 og:image:alt: TIME og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: 'The Martian' Honest Trailer Shows It's Just 'Cast Away' in Space twitter:description: "Climb aboard for a two-hour NASA commercial" twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltde093bcdab65f2d0/6988d9b9bc6cfc69913e2a3c/time-logo.jpg?branch=production --- # The Honest Trailer for _The Martian_ Shows That It's Really Just _Cast Away_ in Space by [Samantha Grossman](https://time.com/author/samantha-grossman/) ## Samantha Grossman Jan 5, 2016 10:38 PM UTC by [Samantha Grossman](https://time.com/author/samantha-grossman/) ## Samantha Grossman Jan 5, 2016 10:38 PM UTC Screen Junkies released its very first “honest trailer” of 2016, and its subject is last year’s sci-fi hit _The Martian._ (Some people, you may recall, [apparently thought](http://time.com/4066689/the-martian-tweets-true-story/) the film was based on a true story.) “Climb aboard,” the voice-over guy says, “for a two-hour NASA commercial that really wants you to know that scientists are just as cool as superheroes.” [**Read more:** What _The Martian_ Gets Right (and Wrong) About Science](http://time.com/4055413/martian-movie-review-science-accuracy-matt-damon/) The trailer also points out that this is yet another movie in which Matt Damon needs to be rescued—from space, from war, from his terrible Boston childhood. “Now, Matt Damon will need to be saved, again, in space, again.” Ultimately, the trailer concludes that _The Martian_ is really just _Cast Away_ in space, even though all Tom Hanks needed to survive was a volleyball and an ice skate. Other recent movies that have gotten the honest trailer treatment include [_Inside Out_](http://time.com/4089679/honest-trailer-inside-out/)and [_Ant-Man_](http://time.com/4141070/honest-trailer-ant-man/). ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/4168240/martian-honest-trailer/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/4168240/martian-honest-trailer/"},"headline":"The Honest Trailer for The Martian Shows That It's Really Just Cast Away in Space","datePublished":"2016-01-05T22:38:30.000Z","dateModified":"2026-04-13T07:28:20.067Z","description":"\"Climb aboard for a two-hour NASA commercial\"","url":"https://time.com/4168240/martian-honest-trailer/","keywords":["Newsfeed","movies"],"thumbnailUrl":"","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Samantha Grossman","jobTitle":null,"url":"https://time.com/author/samantha-grossman/"}],"articleSection":"","image":[],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/tag/time-section-newsfeed/","name":"Newsfeed"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/4168240/martian-honest-trailer/","name":"The Honest Trailer for The Martian Shows That It's Really Just Cast Away in Space"}}]}] ```