By nightfall, Cooper and Murph reach a large fence and gate that block their path. Cooper approaches it with bolt-cutters, but he’s intercepted by a blinding white light and a voice telling him to step away from the fence. We hear an electrical buzz that knocks him unconscious, and then whoever is wielding the light approaches the truck. Murph screams.
We watch as the truck rolls into the facility beyond the gate, and then Cooper wakes to a machine named TARS interrogating him. TARS is large and box-shaped, resembling a wide, thin refrigerator with two screens for eyes and that speaks with a human-like voice. TARS asks how Cooper came by the coordinates of their location. Cooper says that TARS isn’t in the Marines anymore and that he doesn’t scare him. They’re interrupted by Dr. Amelia Brand, the daughter of one of Cooper’s old professors, who has TARS back off. Cooper warns that older military technology like TARS is unpredictable, but Brand says that it’s all the government could spare. She explains that Murph is fine and leads him down a hall with TARS in tow (to walk, TARS splits into a series of narrow, conjoined columns to use as legs).
Brand takes Cooper into a conference room where her father, Professor John Brand, sits at a table with Murph, along with a host of others, including astronauts Doyle and Romilly. (For the remainder of this guide, “Dr. Brand” and “Brand” will both refer to Amelia, while “Professor Brand” will refer to her father, John). Cooper embraces Murph, relieved. They sit, and a man at the table asks Cooper how they found the facility. Professor Brand implores him to cooperate, so Cooper tells them that an almost supernatural anomaly gave them the coordinates. Murph clarifies that it was gravity. Doyle presses for more information, but Cooper refuses to say anything more until he’s assured that they’ll be allowed to leave. Dr. Brand reassures Cooper by revealing that they represent NASA. Her father presses a button that opens up a wall behind them, revealing a massive spacecraft under construction. Cooper is shocked.
Professor Brand leads Cooper into the launching chamber. Cooper recalls NASA being shut down for refusing to drop bombs from the stratosphere on starving people. The professor says that that’s true, but that they were later reinstated to pursue space exploration, but in secret to avoid public criticism for the use of the tax dollars. He shows Cooper a facility where scientists are studying corn. He says that despite the present plethora, the Earth’s corn supply will soon die the way the wheat, okra, and other plants did. As the blight reduces Earth’s oxygen and feeds on the planet’s nitrogen-rich atmosphere, Murph’s generation will be “the last to starve” and “the first to suffocate.” Cooper asks how they plan to save the world. Professor Brand says they’re not meant to save the world, but to leave it.
As they observe the enormous spacecraft in the chamber, the professor explains that NASA already sent multiple astronauts on an expedition called the Lazarus missions to find other habitable planets for humans. Before agreeing to divulge more, however, he asks for Cooper’s promise to pilot the last craft, since the current team of astronauts only has simulation experience; they need a pilot with real experience, like Cooper. He theorizes that “they” sent Cooper to NASA for this purpose. Cooper asks who “they” is, but Professor Brand doesn’t answer. Cooper asks how long he’d be gone. The professor doesn’t know, but guesses years. He implores Cooper to pilot this mission to save his children. Cooper asks again who “they” is.
Back in the conference room, Romilly explains to Professor Brand, Cooper, Dr. Brand, and Doyle that nearly 50 years ago NASA began detecting unusual gravitational disturbances, including the one that caused Cooper’s crash. NASA ended up discovering a wormhole near Saturn that leads to another galaxy, artificially placed there by an unknown “they.” Initial probes sent into the wormhole showed 12 potentially habitable planets beyond it, and 10 years ago the Lazarus missions sent 12 astronauts through the wormhole, one to each planet to verify their habitability. The expedition was lead by a “remarkable” scientist named Dr. Mann. Each astronaut was sent with 2 years worth of supplies, but could use hibernation to extend that period up to a decade to study the planet. They were to signal Earth if they found their planet to be a candidate for humanity’s new home, and then hibernate until they were rescued. If their world wasn’t a viable option, they were doomed to die there.
One system, containing 3 potentially habitable planets, now shows promise. It’s Cooper’s mission, along with Dr. Brand, Romilly, and Doyle, to travel through the wormhole and discover which planet to inhabit. Professor Brand explains that if they do that, they then have two plans to get humanity there: Plan A and Plan B.
He shows Cooper that the entire, massive launching chamber in which the space craft sits is a huge centrifuge, a space station that can launch into space as a temporary home for humans as they travel to the new world. This is Plan A: to get everyone still alive off the planet and take them to the new world via the station. Professor Brand has spent the last 50 years working on how to harness gravity to get the station off the ground. Though he is close to a breakthrough, he hasn’t yet figured it out. If he can’t, they’ll have to go with Plan B.
Dr. Brand explains that Plan B is to create a “population bomb” by bringing 5,000 fertilized eggs to the new world to incubate and raise as a colony of new humans. She brings Cooper and her father into a lab to show them the eggs. The plan would be to raise the first 10, and then through surrogacy allow the colony to grow exponentially such that within a few decades there would be hundreds of people. Cooper points out that Plan B involves leaving everyone currently living on Earth behind to die. Professor Brand says that that’s why they would prefer Plan A.
Cooper observes the wall-length blackboard of equations in Professor Brand’s office through which he’s been attempting to figure out how to harness gravity. The professor says that he’s almost succeeded, and asks Cooper to trust him. He gives Cooper his word that if he pilots the mission to find humanity a new home, by the time Cooper returns, he’ll have solved the problem of gravity.
Cooper and Murph return home and Murph immediately runs inside, angry and hurt. Cooper follows her upstairs and tries to enter her room, but she’s barricaded the door. She yells at him to “just go.” That night, Cooper and Donald sit on the porch again and discuss the mission. Cooper admits that it excites him, but Donald warns him not to do the right thing for the wrong reason. Cooper says that humanity’s attempt to farm the Earth back to life is futile, and that it’s time for them to leave. Donald says that Tom will be okay, but that Cooper needs to make things right with Murph without making promises he can’t keep.
The next morning, Cooper pushes through Murph’s barricade and sits on her bed. He tries to comfort her, but she’s inconsolable. Cooper recalls that Murph’s mother once said that she and he were meant to become “the ghosts of [their] children’s future.” Murph reminds him that he doesn’t believe in ghosts. She opens her notebook and says that she figured out that the spaces created by the books falling off her shelf spell out “STAY” in Morse code. She cries as Cooper holds her and asks when he’s coming back. He gives her a watch identical to the one on his wrist and says that when he’s up in space, time may run more slowly for him, and if it does, then his watch will run differently from hers, and when he gets back they can compare them. He says that they may even be the same age when he comes back, which horrifies Murph, who realizes that he has no idea when he might return. She throws the watch at the wall in anger and begins sobbing into her blankets. Cooper tries unsuccessfully to calm her, begging her not to make him leave under such sad conditions. She refuses to answer, and he eventually gives up. As he goes to the door, a book falls from Murph’s bookshelf. He pauses only for a moment to look at it, and then leaves.
Section 2 Analysis
Section 2 is the catapult by which we transition from an Earthbound story to a primarily interstellar one. We learn much about NASA from Cooper’s talks with Professor Brand and the other astronauts: the distraught populations surviving on Earth would’ve expressed outrage at their tax dollars being used to fund space exploration during such catastrophic times, and so the Administration was reinstated in secret. Their mission, though daunting, gives Cooper some hope for the future, though this hope is fraught with personal complications for him. As a skilled engineer, pilot, and astronaut doomed to a life of trying to save the Earth through farming, Cooper feels the weight of his extinguished aspirations and his desire to be something more (a desire contrasted by Tom’s casual acceptance of becoming a farmer like his father). When Professor Brand offers him the role of pilot for the mission through the wormhole, Cooper’s biggest concern isn’t whether or not to go, but when he might return, a testament to his excitement at the possibility of doing something more with his life. Though he’s concerned about how long he’d be away from his kids, his need to revive his lost purpose makes his decision to go an inevitable one.
Section 2 is also where we’re first introduced to TARS, a robot whose extremely human-like personality is contrasted by his boxy, inhuman appearance, making him a balanced amalgamation of man and machine (though, of course, he is technically all machine). TARS is an exceedingly useful character in a story as intricate and massive as Interstellar’s, as he can provide comic relief and moments of genuine emotion when necessary, while also helping with tasks beyond human capabilities, such as communicating directly with the various spaceships’ onboard systems and relaying data in real time. It will later be discussed how he is also a character unhindered by a fear of death who can be sacrificed if the missions so require, something that human astronauts are not expected to do.
The second part of the film has the arduous task of bringing the audience up to speed on a lot of information and introducing us to many characters very quickly: the corn is dying like the other crops, the blight will thrive on our atmosphere as it depletes our oxygen, and there’s a wormhole to take us to other worlds so we can escape. We meet Dr. Brand, Doyle, and Romilly, Cooper’s future co-pilots, in a matter of minutes. This is among the places in the film where it's crucial not to miss a moment of dialogue.
Executive producer and theoretical physicist Kip Thorne has acknowledged that while wormholes are a theoretical possibility, they’re not capable of existing naturally, so it was important to the scientific accuracy of the story that the wormhole be placed near Saturn by some unidentified “they.” We learn later, of course, that “they” turns out to be future versions of humanity, evolved past the 4 dimensions into a state where they can experience time as a place, and allow others to do so, if they so desire. For the moment, however, we’re left to wonder who “they” might be. (We’ll cover "them" in more detail in Section 6.)
Cooper’s goodbye to Murph before leaving on his mission is among the most tear-jerking moments in the film, and for good reason: this is (from Murph’s perspective) the treacherous departure that will cause her to resent her father and refuse to communicate with him for almost the rest of her life. It therefore needs to carry the gravitas to make it a turning point for her, and so it does: Murph’s heartbreak becomes a defining element of her character, one that motivates her to pursue the problem of gravity. Her pain will be worsened later when Professor Brand leaves her wondering if her father left her on Earth to die.
Cooper’s statement to her, “Once you’re a parent, you’re the ghosts of your children’s future,” is both ironic and an example of foreshadowing, as it hints that in the future he will become a ghost to her—in this case, the “ghost” in her bookshelf, communicating from the tesseract beyond her 3-dimensional world. When we reach the film’s climax and Cooper winds up doing this, and then when he appears like a ghost in her hospital room aboard Cooper Station, this statement comes full circle.
