Hey, I'm Flor Lichten, and you're listening to Science Friday.

A few weeks ago on the show, we talked about the sci-fi space exploration movie Project Hail Mary,

and I was particularly obsessed with the sounds that the alien in the movie Rocky was making.

They're distinctive and they're funny, and Rocky talks a lot.

And so I asked Andy Weir, who wrote the book, Project Hail Mary,

and who's a producer on the movie, if the sound designers actually made a real language for Rocky, like if it was internally consistent.

And here's what Andy said.

I don't think so.

I'm so disappointed.

I didn't get the answer I wanted, but then, almost like in a movie, we got this very surprising message on our listener line.

Hello, Science Friday. This is Eric Adol calling from Los Angeles, California.

I'm a longtime listener, and I recently enjoyed your interview with Andy Weir and Dr. Wong about the science of Project Hail Mary.

A question came up about the sound design of Rocky's alien language, and as the sound designer

of Project Hail Mary, I'm in a unique position to answer. Love your show. Keep up the good work.

Eric is not just the sound designer behind Project Hail Mary. He also did sound on 2014's Godzilla, Transformers, and a quiet place.

And he's here to tell us all about the art and science of making movie monster roars and more.

Eric Adolph, thank you for being here.

It's a pleasure to be here.

I'm genuinely so happy you called us. This is like the center of my nerdiness. It seems like

the best job. Is this the best job? Well, I don't have too many frames of reference,

but yeah, I would say it is one of the best jobs I can imagine.

Are you that person at the restaurant who's like always listening?

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