After a nearly 300-million mile journey, NASA’s Perseverance rover touched down on Mars. This is where Matt Damon’s character becomes stranded in ‘The Martian,’ leading Twitter users to get creative with memes.
Sorry, but there is “no sign” of Matt Damon on Mars, where the NASA Perseverance rover landed on Feb. 18. This was a quip from rugby player Brian Moore, who joined the many other people who flooded Twitter with memes about Matt’s character in The Martian on Thursday. In case you forgot, the 50-year-old actor played an astronaut who gets left behind on Mars in the 2015 film.
The Perseverance rover sent back its first photo from Mars after it touched down on the planet, and sadly, Matt was nowhere in sight. Some Twitter users got creative and edited a photo of a spacesuit-clad Matt into the photo. “This is awesome. Huge congrats to everyone who helped find Matt Damon. Let’s bring him home,” one such person joked in a tweet.
The Federal Government continues to spend far too much money trying to rescue Matt Damon. He knew what he was getting into https://t.co/DN3ob6eiOV
Fark founder Drew Curtis joined in on the Twitter-wide joke, writing, “The Federal Government continues to spend far too much money trying to rescue Matt Damon. He knew what he was getting into.” Meanwhile, NFL analyst Jamey Eisenberg asked NASA how the Good Will Hunting star is doing: “Is Matt Damon OK? How are the potatoes?” For those who didn’t watch the movie, Matt’s character was able to survive on Mars thanks to a hobby of growing potatoes on the planet.
Matt’s name just so happened to be trending right alongside Ted Cruz‘s on Twitter. While the Texas senator didn’t star in an outer space movie too, he did leave his state amid a power crisis on Feb. 17, leading people to joke that the politician actually caught a ride to Mars. However, others joked that Cruz should actually be sent to Mars. One such person tweeted, “We’ve made history. #NASAPerseverance has landed on #Mars2020 Now can we bring Matt Damon home & send Ted Cruz there, please?”
Matt Damon as astronaut Mark Watney in the 2015 film The Martian, which was directed by Scott Ridley. [Everett Collection]
The Martianwas a box office success after its release in Oct. 2015 and earned Matt a Golden Globe Award for “Best Actor” in a motion picture, musical or comedy at the 2016 award show. The film (based on the science-fiction novel of the same name by Andy Weir) follows an astronaut named Mark Watney who gets left behind on NASA mission to Mars in 2035. [SPOILER ALERT] Matt’s character eventually gets rescued, so, it would make sense that the Perseverance rover would not capture a photo of the Hollywood star on Mars.