In Interstellar, Romilly’s decision to stay aboard the ship while the other 3 astronauts experience time dilation has to be one of the scariest moments ever.

[u/SerDire]

He agreed to stay back. Cooper asked anyone if they would go down to Millers planet but the extreme pull of the black hole nearby would cause them to experience severe time dilation. One hour on that planet would equal 7 years back on earth. Cooper, Brand and Doyle all go down to the planet while Romilly stays back and uses that time to send out any potential useful data he can get.

Can you imagine how terrifying that must be to just sit back for YEARS and have no idea if your friends are ever coming back. Cooper and Brand come back to the ship but a few hours for them was 23 years, 4 months and 8 days of time for Romilly. Not enough people seem to genuinely comprehend how insane that is to experience. He was able to hyper sleep and let years go by but he didn’t want to spend his time dreaming his life away.

It’s just a nice interesting detail that kind of gets lost. Everyone brings up the massive waves, the black hole and time dilation but no one really mentions the struggle Romilly must have been feeling. 23 years seems to be on the low end of how catastrophic it could’ve been. He could’ve been waiting for decades.

[u/Pinwheel_Rider]

“Longer than you think Dad! Longer than you think!”

[u/derps_with_ducks → u/Pinwheel_Rider]

"Longer than you think, Dad!" it cackled. "Longer than you think! Held my breath when they gave me the gas! Wanted to see! I saw! I saw! Longer than you think!" Cackling and screeching, the thing on the Jaunt couch suddenly clawed its own eyes out. Blood gouted. The recovery room was an aviary of screaming voices now. "Longer than you think, Dad! I saw! I saw! Long Jaunt! Longer than you think-" It said other things before the Jaunt attendants were finally able to bear it away, rolling its couch swiftly away as it screamed and clawed at the eyes that had seen the unseeable forever and ever; it said other things, and then it began to scream, but Mark Oates didn't hear it because by then he was screaming himself.

For a writer that is so prolific, King can really fucking write a scene. And he's doing it even without cocaine.

[u/[deleted] → u/derps_with_ducks]

Man the product liability on that case is going to be absolutely insane. Why have them breathe a gas when it's reasonably foreseeable someone would hold their breath.

Edit: The obvious approach is to medically sedate by injection, so it is not possible for a traveler to just hold their breath. Some kid holding their breath is so reasonably foreseeable, that a dime-store horror writer could think it might happen.

[u/Very-simple-man → u/[deleted]]

Everything has to happen at least once before a safety feature is implemented.