I saw Ad Astra as a story told with a backdrop of a near-future humanity that has established permanent settlements on multiple terrestrial bodies. At the time

I saw Ad Astra as a story told with a backdrop of a near-future humanity that has established permanent settlements on multiple terrestrial bodies. At the time of your comment, I had not yet seen the movie - I'd only seen the cover poster displaying a well-known space-suit-clad citizen chosen by society throughout the past couple of decades to demonstrate ideas and experiences (Brad Pitt, same with Matt McConaughey). Movie, television, music, and now algorithmic news feed themes are my preferred methods of gauging public sentiment (programmed or natural). The final detail of the end credits says that there were "15,000 jobs created by this film". This verifies the interest and subsequent investment channeled into a theory and demonstration of the interstellar human experience. Now I am fresh out of the movie theater, and have consumed the media in it's entirety. The first person narration of Roy began the film with this line: "I always wanted to be an astronaut... at least that's what I told myself." This seemingly confirmed my theory of "propaganda meant to inspire current generations". But then the protagonist's ailments became apparent post-primate-attack when he is conducting his psychological evaluation. He describes how he is familiar with the rage of the primate. He understands their pain, but unlike them he is able to discard it and carry on, "remain calm" as he says at the beginning (debrief psych eval describing the fall from the antennae). This is the first instance of violence committed by a life-form confined to a metal tube in a vacuum for an undisclosed amount of time (the Norwegian craft was meant for biomedical research, and perhaps the primate aggression was exacerbated by human experimentation). Then there are the comfort rooms - a solution meant to simulate conditions on Earth so as to soothe the distressed extra-terrestrial-human. To paraphrase one of the final quotes of the movie, Roy describes the need to "rely on others and share their burdens as they share his". The pain of solitude was not worth the prospect of discovering "other life". He has no children to orphan in the name of relentless exploration ("yes, yes, yes"), as his father did - yet he realizes he is living out a similar life while underwater on Mars sneaking his way onto the Neptune-bound ship...