Trailer For Netflix's MERCURY 13 Which Tells The Story of The First Women Who Trained to Go To Space
A couple of years ago I found and read a book called The Mercury 13: The True Story of Thirteen Women and the Dream of Space Flight. As soon as I read it, I thought that it needed to be adapted into a movie or TV series. It tells the fascinating true story of the first women ever to go through the training to become astronauts. They were doing everything that the men were and they were fully qualified to go to space, but in the end, it didn't happen.
Netflix has released the first trailer for a new documentary that will tell the inspiring story of these 13 women who trained so hard only to have their dreams of going to space shut down by NASA:
On April 9, 1959, NASA introduced their first astronaut class of all men, Mercury 7, to the world. This is the story of the 13 women who were just as deserving of their place in space.
Mercury 13 is a remarkable story of the women who were tested for spaceflight in 1961 before their dreams were dashed in being the first to make the trip beyond Earth. NASA’s ‘man in space’ program, dubbed ‘Project Mercury’ began in 1958. The men chosen – all military test pilots – became known as The Mercury 7. But away from the glare of the media, behind firmly closed doors, female pilots were also screened.
Thirteen of them passed and, in some cases, performed better than the men. They were called the Mercury 13 and had the ‘right stuff’ but were, unfortunately, the wrong gender. Underneath the obsession of the space race that gripped America, the women were aviation pioneers who emerged thirsty for a new frontier, but whose time would have to wait. The film tells the definitive story of thirteen truly remarkable women who reached for the stars but were ahead of their time.
Amazon Studios is currently developing a series that will tell this story, but this documentary will be a great way to introduce you to it and the people innvoled.
A Netflix original documentary was directed by David Sington (The Fear of 13) and Heather Walsh. It's set to premiere on April 20, 2018.