Why Project Hail Mary Used An Animatronic Rocky Instead Of A Puppet In One Scene [Exclusive]
by Rafael Motamayor · /FilmAdd SlashFilm on Google:
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"Project Hail Mary" is one of the best sci-fi movies ever made. Based on Andy Weir's novel of the same name, the film has a deep love for science and human ingenuity (much like Weir's "The Martian"), as well as a lot of empathy. The film follows middle school teacher-turned-astronaut Ryland Grace (Ryan Gosling) as he is tasked with stopping a mysterious organism from killing Earth's sun. After the rest of his crew dies, Grace eventually teams up with the undisputed best character of 2026: Rocky the alien.
Rocky is, simply put, a perfect character. He's adorable, funny, tragic, super smart, and he also has a disturbing and gross way of eating. Seeing Rocky come alive as a character is one of the greatest joys of watching "Project Hail Mary," with impeccable practical and visual effects used to bring the character to the screen.
Rocky is mostly a puppet, which is rare for a big-budget movie in 2026, and only rarely utilized an animatronic version of the character. /Film's Ben Pearson recently interviewed James Ortiz, the lead puppeteer and voice of Rocky, who explained why the animatronic was used:
"It actually helped us in scenes where we just didn't want to see the puppeteers," Ortiz said, referring to the animatronic "WALDO" system used for Rocky. (You can briefly see this technology at work in the bonus features of the film's home video release.) Ortiz specially mentions the mental health room inside Grace's ship (where Grace goes to see footage of Earth, including fireworks and an ocean) as the reason the animatronic version was utilized on screen. "Because there were actual LED screens playing content, it would've been a nightmare for VFX to erase all of the puppeteers around it."
Animatronic Rocky was a practical solution
As James Ortiz explained it, the sheer amount of LED screens in the Mental Health Node would make it essentially impossible to digitally erase the reflection of all the Rocky puppeteers and retain the fidelity of the images that were playing on those screens. Instead, the decision was made to "put the animatronic Rocky in a real ball and put him on the set, there was usually a cable holding him in place, that was erased," Ortiz said. "We used it a handful of times, but for the most part, everything else, especially to help with the improv and the playfulness, it's mostly me and my team. We are improvising, but operating this rod puppet, and then in post, they went very carefully and erased all of us around them."
The fact that Rocky was mostly just a puppet, the oldest and most practical of creature effects, and was only brought to life sparingly using more advanced technology, feels like a reversed "Jurassic Park." According to Ortiz, the original idea was to actually have Rocky be an animatronic the entire time.
"When I showed up, I actually said, 'I have a sense — the animatronic is beautiful and can do a lot of incredible things, but sometimes it's a little rigid, and I needed this character to be really fluid.' So I sort of said, 'Let's make a theatrical rod puppet in addition to this.' So basically it was the same design, but a hollow shell and handles wherever we could screw them in or take them out."
Project Hail Mary is a miracle
"Project Hail Mary" feels like a miracle. The film adapted a challenging book full of hard sci-fi concepts and turned it into a mainstream box office hit. Sure, the adaptation lacks some of the specific science jargon of the book, but it nevertheless keeps the source material's immense love of science and those who use science to make the world a better place. It's an ode to science teachers, mathematicians, physicists, and engineers.
Like most movies, "Project Hail Mary" wasn't exactly a sure-fire hit from the start. The initial assembly cut of the film was almost four hours long and got some brutal reactions, for example, before directors Phil Lord and Chris Miller trimmed down the film in the editing room and found the true meat amid the fat of the initial cut. In fact, one of the most impressive aspects of the movie is how brisk it feels, never bogging you down with science talk or heavy plot details. Instead, the film keeps you engaged by focusing on Grace's journey, and once Rocky arrives, it essentially becomes a buddy sci-fi comedy with an incredible character dynamic.
It works in no small part because of Rocky primarily being a puppet rather than an animatronic. James Ortiz is right in saying that an animatronic Rocky would be too rigid in his movements, too robotic. And when you already have an alien being that's basically made out of rocks, too much rigidity would have hampered his emotionality to a degree that could have ruined what makes the movie so magical.