Just as a preface, this is more me gushing about my favourite characters and why I like them, and less info dumping about lore
ryland grace
gahhh I love Grace sm his character is like the main reason I like this book/movie so much !! (mainly the movie in this case. Movie Grace is ARGHHG I LOVE) My first impression was the haha fun character with lots of optimism who tries to run away from everything which is a trope i LOVE. I now understand his character better and while I still love that trope, it's also the way he's so socially inept and genuinely kind and oblivious to how he's stratt's second in command and literally everything else lmao. Also love how the neurodivergent and aroace community has just adopted this fella lmao- I definitely see him as audhd and one of my favourite things about this movie is how the two main relationships are both platonic !!
And the fact that he's a molecular biologist and a science teacher??? I want to maybe study molecular biology and I want to be a science teacher. There's also a lot of teachers that I really like and look up to so him being in this profession kind of makes me love his character even more LMAO? Idk but the fact that I relate a lot to him (even tho I seem nothing like him externally lmao) and that he has the degree/job that I want to become- he feels like someone I want to be in the future.
One thing I hate about the movie is how they made him react to finding out astrophage is water based. He doesn't care as much in the book (if I'm remembering correctly), and wants to go back to help because of his students. He cares so much about his kids and I wish the movie showed that more because I love that about him sm
This is like.. the most attached I've gotten to a charaacter who isn't my oc in a very long time lmao.
eva stratt
Ohhhh I LOVE the stone cold perfectionistic character that does actually care. I know some people hate how she's softer in the movie, but I actually really liked it. I like how it humanised her a lot. I love how selfless she is- she does everything she can to save as many people as possible, even if it means making really difficult choices and her getting punished for it as the scapegoat later.
Also, I love how the movie shows different types of platonic relationships. I'm SO GLAD Grace and stratt's relationship wasn't romantic- I've never really seen this kind of relationship portrayed before and I really liked it. I kind of relate to it with certain people, and it's also something I kind of want??? which I get to live vicariously through grace with hahahaah. Oh, and I saw somewhere that someone said Grace's relationship with Stratt is reminiscient of him definitely being the teacher's pet at school who had no friends and hung out with the teacher a lot- going right into my grace headcanons lol