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NASA Finds Liquid On Mars, How ‘The Martian’ Director Ridley Scott Knew Months Before News Went Public

By Niki Cruz
Published on: 11:09 PST, Sep 29, 2015

As Inquisitr reported, it was revealed that there’s water on Mars. It was a shock to everyone, but more importantly it revealed that there’s a chance that we’ll find life on Mars. That said, it wasn’t a surprise to one person, and that’s The Martian director Ridley Scott.

According to Yahoo Movies, Scott knew months ago that there was water on Mars! The director, who’s currently promoting The Martian, which stars Matt Damon trapped on Mars, said that he had talked to NASA about the possibility when researching for the film. His first NASA conversations were an attempt to get the science behind the film completely realistic. Those conversations quickly turned into a realization that there might have been an ocean on Mars.

“When I first talked to NASA, we got into all kinds of stuff and I said ‘So I know you’ve got down there [these] massive glaciers,’ and [NASA] said, ‘Yeah, that the massive white thing [on the surface of Mars] that gets covered with dust, we think that’s ice.’ I said, ‘Wow! Does that mean there was an ocean? Are we right now what Mars was 750 million years ago?’ And they went, ‘Uh, good question.'”

Although the information didn’t really come at a time where Scott Ridley could change the details in the movie, the director said that it’s fine because he would have lost a sequence where Matt Damon’s character makes water from a streaming device.

The Martian is a sci fi film about astronaut-botanist Mark Watney (Matt Damon), who gets left behind on a mission with only a small amount of supplies to last. In order to survive, Watney must rely on his wit, skill, and spirit to survive on an otherwise hostile planet. Back on Earth, NSA members and other scientists are tirelessly working to find a way to bring Watney home, while Watney’s own crew prepares for a rescue mission. In addition to Damon, the film stars Jessica Chastain, Kristen Wiig, Jeff Daniels, Chiwetel Ejiofor, Kate Mara, Donald Glover, Sean Bean, and Michael Pena.

The news that NASA had found water on Mars happened at the top of the week during a press conference. It’s said that finding any kind of liquid on Mars suggests that there is life on Mars. At the press conference it was said that the discovered water is briny, which was discovered by a Reconnaissance Rover. The Rover used an imager to determine through analysis that they had discovered water. Various Twitter users reacted to the news about there being water on Mars.

Although this is huge news, this isn’t the first time that NASA has found water on the planet. Prior to the find on Mars, frozen water was found on Mars’ poles, which was a huge game changer as well. Along with finding life, NASA hopes to find bacterial life living on the Red Planet, and now this may very well be a possibility. Before this, people believed that the most NASA would find was remnants of ancient life forms, which wouldn’t help scientists.

As for The Martian, many are saying that the film is a “love letter to science,” which is something that Scott told Variety he agreed with. “When I decide which film to get involved with, it always has to do with the script. It’s all about the material. I got the script that Drew [Goddard] had written, and that was it.”

[Photo by 20th Century Fox]

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