still adore the fakeout the movie did with grace's willingness to sacrifice himself due to his relationship with stratt vs relationship with rocky. not sure how intentional it was, but man is it great either way
grace remembers yao telling him that there is no bravery gene the hail mary crew has and grace lacks that makes them willing to embark on the project's suicide mission, he just needs to find someone to be brave for. so he writes on his identity whiteboard: "WHO WOULD YOU DIE FOR?" because there had to have been someone, right? he did end up on the ship, after all
the first scene after grace and rocky's talk about mates is grace's memory of reaching out to stratt while the crew sings karaoke downstairs. stratt reached back just a bit, just for a moment, to sing for the crew. and as she sang, she and grace exchanged looks across the room. it looks like oh, she became grace's "someone to be brave for" by becoming romantically involved with him, didn't she. at some point between that day and the launch, grace found the strength to step up and do what he never thought he could because of the budding relationship between him and stratt. that's how it would normally go, right? so it's not shocking that that's what's being set up here.
except...no, actually. not at all. when the time came, grace still couldn't bring himself to give up his life. he still insisted on dying at home on earth in a few decades with everyone else, not in space within a fraction of that time. not for the millions and billions of people at risk he had no connection to. not for his kids. and certainly not for stratt—that wasn't even brought up as a possibility.
grace never found that "someone to be brave for." that "someone to die for."
he was sent off to die in space for the sake of the rest of humanity, and even holding the mistaken belief that he must have volunteered for it, he can't make peace with his impending doom. he's overwhelmed with relief when rocky gives him a way to unsuicide his suicide mission. he's ashamed when he finally remembers the truth about how he really joined the crew, and he keeps that fact to himself.
then he's on his way back to earth, something that used to be an impossiblity, with the fresh memory of having never been willing to leave it in the first place. and the alarm goes off. and he realises the taumoeba can escape xenonite. and he realises that rocky will die if left alone out there. he erases everything he'd written down on his identity whiteboard, replaces it with the calculations for the journey back to rocky, and concludes that it will come at the original cost: dying in space.
he sends his final farewell to earth along with everything necessary to hopefully save it. then he turns that ship around and he counts down the days until he's near enough to rocky's ship to find it. this time, the one-way journey he makes is entirely of his own volition. even though he is still afraid of dying, he's willing to give his life to save rocky's. to be brave for him in a way he couldn't for anyone when he was still on earth.
and yknow what? the movie had actually already told us that.
the first thing we see after grace asks himself "WHO WOULD YOU DIE FOR?" is him opening the airlock to rocky, the person who would go on to become his best friend.
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