'The Tomorrow War' stars reveal challenges of scientific jargon (exclusive)

Watch: Yvonne Strahovski and Sam Richardson discuss untangling scientific jargon

The stars of The Tomorrow War have revealed how they got to grips with some of the scientific jargon in the movie's script.

Director Chris McKay's film follows present day humans who are conscripted to travel forwards in time to take part in a war against a terrifying alien race which has almost wiped out the world's population.

Sam Richardson plays Charlie, who joins Chris Pratt's soldier turned science teacher as part of the latest group of humans sent to the frontline.

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The 37-year-old star, best known for comedy roles in the likes of Veep and New Girl, said he had a trick to help him through some of the trickier bits of scientific dialogue.

"As an actor, I know a lot, but as a person I'm incredibly stupid. So it's about memorising things," Richardson tells Yahoo Entertainment UK.

He adds: "As an actor, you learn little tricks and little things. There's a part later in the movie where I have a mask over my face and I very purposely said 'it's very cold, let me wear this mask' because I knew that I would have to redub the actual technical talk and sure enough I did.

"So that way I didn't have to match my mouth with any nonsense I was saying. I could just go back later and fix it."

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Richardson adds that part of his role as one of the movie's more comedic characters was to contrast the seriousness of the situation with his very human reactions to what happens.

"I think that's part of what the comedy is in this," he says. "The action is so intense and the comedy is pretty grounded, so the juxtaposition makes it seem funnier."

Yvonne Strahovski, who plays one of the leaders of the human resistance, says she struggled with a different element of the script more than the scientific side of things.

"The science stuff didn't really bother me as much as the military jargon, which is what I was most unfamiliar with," she says.

"We had amazing consultants on set who really helped us out with all of that, and the physicality as well as the verbal stuff. So it was a wonderful experience."

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The Tomorrow War was originally produced by Paramount for a December 2020 release, but was delayed due to the pandemic and sold to Amazon for a reported figure of around $200m (£142m)

The movie will be made available to stream via Amazon Prime Video from 2 July.

Watch: Trailer for The Tomorrow War