CASE digging out Dr Edmunds' landing pod, crushed in a rockslide
Edmunds is a habitable planet in a star system that is orbiting Gargantua. It is in a different system than Miller and Mann. While Miller and Mann orbit close to Gargantua, Edmunds lies farther away, likely orbiting Pantagruel, a main-sequence star a bit further away from Gargantua- a factor that Dr. Amelia Brand presents as an argument for why Edmunds might be more favourable than Mann for humanity to inhabit. The planet is named after Dr. Wolf Edmunds, who was the first astronaut to land there.
History[]
Amelia and CASE's compound.
Twelve years before the crew of the Endurance ventured through the wormhole, NASA launched the Lazarus missions, sending twelve astronauts to explore twelve prospect planets thought to be suitable for human colonization. After landing on his planet, Dr. Wolf Edmunds sent a "thumbs up" signal, indicating that the planet was promising. However, Edmunds stopped transmitting three years before the crew of the Endurance arrived in the Pantagruel-Gargantua system. This troubling outcome becomes a deciding factor when the crew needed to choose to either land on Mann's planet or Edmunds' planet.
After a failed mission to rescue Dr. Laura Miller from her planet, Cooper discovered the Endurance did not have enough fuel to visit both Mann and Edmunds, due to 23 years of orbital station keeping. Forced to choose between the two planets, Brand lobbied to visit Edmunds for its more promising data, as well as her expert opinion, stating that the planet was more favorable for human habitation, due to its greater distance from the black hole versus Mann's planet, which she correctly predicted to be as sterile as Miller's planet. Brand admits her feelings for Wolf Edmunds, explaining that her love for him draws her to his planet.
Amelia Brand burying Wolf
After a heated debate, Mann's planet is ultimately chosen over Edmunds. However, a second disastrous mission forces Cooper and Brand to continue to Edmunds with their remaining resources. After the slingshot maneuver around Gargantua, Brand became the second human astronaut to land on Edmunds, accompanied by CASE, who discovered that the eponymous astronaut perished in a rock slide many years prior. Dr. Brand tearfully buried him near her compound with his hypersleep pod tag that read: DR. EDMUNDS-12.
Geography[]
Image of the filming location in Iceland, representing Edmunds planet.
The planet appears to be an immense barren desert, however, its atmosphere is breathable and the soil may be fertile for farming. The only known mechanism by which a planet could maintain sufficient oxygen levels for humans to breathe over a long period of time is biological, so it is likely somewhere on the planet there is life that generates oxygen. The planet may possess some crude forms of plant and animal life, though none could be seen in her immediate area. It is possible that Edmunds has a diverse environment beyond the desert where Lazarus landed, but surveyed by Dr. Edmunds, giving him further cause to provide a "thumbs up" for the planet.
Speculation[]
Due to the appearance of clouds on Edmunds, it is possible that there is a source of water on the planet. In the speculation of some fans, Edmunds resembles a Mars with oceans, a desert world with water.