In the imagined universe of the new space thriller I.S.S., the International Space Station doesn’t seem too different from the actual football-field-sized habitable satellite orbiting above our heads. At least, not initially. In the glow of post–Cold War collaboration, astronauts and cosmonauts conduct scientific experiments side-by-side and playfully correct each others’ English and Russian. In the crew’s off time, they joke around, listen to music, and slurp down liquor as it floats in zero gravity. Two are even hooking up.
Of course, the trick to getting along in space is avoiding any discussion of international politics—or whatever is going on down there right now. Because, as American commander Gordon Barrett (played by The Mindy Project’s Chris Messina) poignantly notes while wondrously staring down at the planet below, “You look at the Earth, there’s no borders.”
This is all fairly obvious foreshadowing. Soon, the plot of I.S.S. arrives at its central (and compelling) premise when explosions so destructive they’re visible from space start peppering the Earth’s surface. The astronauts and cosmonauts quickly learn that what appears to be a nuclear war has broken out between the US and Russia, and are ordered by their respective countries to take control of the station “by any means necessary.” The mirage of international friendship dissolves, and for the astronauts aboard, things get awkward, then violent.
Space movies typically aren’t realistic, and director Gabriela Cowperthwaite’s new film is no exception—most importantly, perhaps, because the idea of astronauts turning on one another and violently stabbing their colleagues seems unlikely. Former NASA astronaut Mike Massimino, who traveled to space to service the Hubble telescope, says he doesn’t think social relations aboard the station would “rise to the point” where that happened. Scott Pace, the director of the Space Policy Institute at George Washington University, told WIRED via email that despite “some impressive CGI effects, the film’s premise is not plausible.”
Still, I.S.S. has landed at an awkward time for the actual ISS. Russia and the US are far from a nuclear conflict, but they are on opposite sides of a brutal war in Ukraine that’s gone on for nearly two years and resulted in hundreds of thousands of casualties. While the Russian and American space programs, Roscosmos and NASA, have managed to keep operations aboard the ISS going—scientists from both countries have traveled to and from the station on Soyuz and SpaceX spacecraft—the ISS’s unique situation hasn’t gone unnoticed.
In fact, the station has turned into something of a political bargaining chip. During the 2014 invasion of Crimea, the then-head of Roscosmos, Dmitry Rogozin, responded to US sanctions by suggesting that US astronauts start traveling to the ISS via “trampoline” (at that point, NASA was dependent on Russia’s Soyuz). After the onset of the broader Ukraine war, Rogozin suggested that, without Russia’s help, the ISS could have an uncontrolled deorbit. Recent Russian anti-satellite missile testing—which typically involves shooting down old satellites from Earth—has also created space debris that has endangered astronauts and forced them to shelter, according to US officials.
“There are clear allusions [in the movie] to the conflicts that are happening today between the United States and Russia over Ukraine … and thinking about how the astronauts and cosmonauts are getting along up on the space station now,” says Wendy Whitman Cobb, a political scientist at the US Air Force School of Advanced Air and Space Studies who studies public perception of space.
Could the ISS really become a centerpiece of international world war? A direct nuclear conflict breaking out between the US and Russia seems unlikely right now. But even in that devastating scenario, space policy experts say the space station is designed so that Russia and the US are dependent on each other. The ISS can’t work without both countries’ participation, making the predicament sketched out in I.S.S. improbable. For its part, NASA, when asked about the movie, pointed to the historical success of the station, which, as of November, has been hosting humans for 23 years.
“Through this global endeavor, 276 people from 22 countries have visited the unique microgravity laboratory that has hosted more than 3,000 research and educational investigations from people in 108 countries and areas,” Joshua Finch, a spokesperson for the space agency, told WIRED. “NASA continues to maintain a professional relationship with its space agency counterparts to ensure the safety of the astronauts and cosmonauts aboard the International Space Station and ongoing safe operations.”
It’s not clear the ISS would matter that much to anyone amid such an immense catastrophe, especially since the station is a base for civilian science research. In the film, it’s suggested that the ISS might be storing a cure to radiation sickness that could be helpful in the aftermath of a nuclear war. But I.S.S., space policy expert Namrata Goswami says, did “a poor job of explaining why, when the US and Russia are nuking each other, anyone from Earth would bother to send a message to their respective teams on the ISS, to take control of it, by any means possible.”
Also, the ISS is getting old—so old, in fact, that there are already plans to dispose of it. NASA is working on a transition plan for the station, which may involve deorbiting the ISS and letting much of it burn up in the atmosphere before dropping into a remote portion of the ocean, according to a FAQ on NASA’s website. The United States is now funding several concepts for new corporate space stations, and Russia has plans to build its own replacement, too. China has already built its own space station, which astronauts have now visited.
In broad strokes, the film does get some things right. Aboard the station, there really is an effort to avoid politics as much as possible and promote internationalism, so much so that the program isn’t limited to Russian and American scientists and includes astronauts from many other countries—though not, namely, China. In fact, NASA social media guidelines instruct astronauts to avoid using politicized terms for certain regions and borders, out of fear of offending anyone on Earth.
Even within the American crew, astronauts are discouraged from talking politics, Massimino says. From what he has heard from friends who’ve recently visited the ISS, the astronauts and cosmonauts aboard today have stuck to discussing “business.”
I.S.S. is correct to ask about what happens to low Earth orbit in wartime, even if its answer to that question—inter-astronaut murders and a Hail Mary return to Earth—isn’t particularly interesting. The film serves as an unlikely reminder of just how remarkable an international collaboration the actual ISS really is, especially amid real geopolitical conflict.
