Prospect takes place not in our future, but in that of an alternate universe that has evolved under the same constraints or laws as ours. Mouselike creatures on a planet in this other universe became primates. That order branched into monkeys and apes. A line of apes became humans who culturally evolved an economic system that we on Earth call capitalism. And like the capitalism of earthlings, it’s driven not by necessities but by luxuries. One such luxury in Prospect is a valuable root gem that grows on a moon that orbits around a planet on the solar system’s perimeter.
Directed by Seattle-based filmmakers Zeek Earl and Christopher Caldwell, Prospect opens with two humans—a father, Damon (Jay Duplass), and his daughter, Cee (Sophie Thatcher)—traveling on a commercial freighter that, for a fee, drops prospectors onto that moon in a “sling-back maneuver.” Once there, the father and daughter have a short amount of time to find the gems, return to their pod, launch, and catch the freighter before it departs to other parts of the solar system.
