FYE Blog Post: Characterization, Survival, and Mark Watney

What makes us root for a character to live in a survival story? In what ways do you identify with Mark? How does the author get you to care about him?

          The fundamental challenge within the survival genre, from Robinson Crusoe to The Hunger Games, is getting the reader to care about the protagonist. Survival stories, by convention, tend to heavily focus on their protagonists. If the protagonist fails to establish a connection with the reader, no matter how technically impressive the work may be, it will end back up back on the shelf. This is the precise issue I had with Andy Weir’s The Martian. The protagonist of a survival story does not necessarily need to be morally good, or even likable, for the reader to root for them; they merely need to be interesting. Mark Watney, the protagonist of The Martian, is none of those things. 

In Weir’s attempt to create a nerd-themed power fantasy for readers to “identify with,” or more accurately, project themselves into, he created a character that is as shallow as a pie-dish and unrelatable. Watney displays no attributes other than those the readers are repetitively informed of. When these alleged traits are demonstrated, it is typically in one of three forms: an awed statement from another character that informs the audience of how impressive Watney is (such as when the psychologist from NASA informs us that Watney was chosen for his sense of humor and ability to get along with the crew), a consulted, jargon-filled exposition of solution to a problem (such as when Watney glues his space-suit together in a collapsible tent with excruciatingly described resins), or when Watney himself makes a joke (such as his dated pop-culture allusions or crude sexual innuendos). 

These disingenuous attempts by Weir to create a character worth the consideration of the audience fail on all accounts. Watney is not demonstrably moral, likable or interesting, and the story of The Martian is significantly weakened as a result. Because of Watney’s poor characterization, there are no actual stakes in the novel. Certainly, Watney encounters life threatening peril, but as I was rather apathetic to him as a character, there was no sense of tension. Furthermore, it was difficult to muster the suspension of belief that Weir would kill off the protagonist with a solid two-thirds of the book left, as much as I would hope otherwise.