Sure, there’s the special thrill of making huge discoveries (like the first alien life), but the mix of isolation, cramped spaces in the International Space Station, and an anti-gravity experience that must eventually get exhausting must compound into an experience that is maddening on at least a tiny level.
Had the making of Life changed what could have been Ryan Reynolds and Jake Gyllenhaal’s enthusiastic ideas of space travel, it would have been more than understandable.
Basically, director Daniel Espinosa’s movie leaves the idea of science being an exciting thrill up to titles like Ridley Scott’s The Martian.
Even if you cut out the monster element of the story — which finds the main characters desperately running away from a quickly-evolving, extremely dangerous extraterrestrial — it still doesn’t make being an astronaut seem all that appealing.